The Beat Hotel

Paris nineteen fifty-six, number nine rue Git le Coeur

Word is out and everybody's beating on the door

Madame Rachou will let you in, just smile and ring the bell

Welcome to Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

The sweet smell of Pernod, a Gauloise cigarette

It's a cosmic congregation but you ain't seen nothing yet

It's an open invitation, an existential clientele

All looking for Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

They looked for it in New York City and San Francisco Bay

They looked for it in bebop jazz and it blew them all away

They tried out every avenue and then said "What the hell,

We'll look for it in Paris at the Beat Hotel"

Burroughs came up from Tangiers, Ginsberg from New York

Kerouac came up from Italy and slept out in the park

Gregory Corso came and went and where he's at no one can tell

He's still looking for Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

Take me to your leader, take me to the man

Someone has got the answer, someone's got the perfect plan

If you're looking in the alleys, if you're looking in the bars

You'll find us in the gutter, looking at the stars

This ragged band of poets, Christians, Buddhists, Jews

A new Beat generation searching for the Muse

Some found it in the arms of a mystic mademoiselle

Looking for Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

The rooms count up to forty-one, but you can sleep out in the hall

For a few centimes you can get a drink and write your poems on the wall

And the ********* mixes with the Tukish toilet smell

It's all part of Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

Alex Campbell strums an old guitar someone picked up in Spain

Ginsberg's howling poetry and Kerouac's drunk again

The rent is overdue there must be something they can sell

Maybe they can sell Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

Someone's taking photographs, Janine takes off her clothes

Marlene's meditating and concentrating on her toes

Jasmine hides in room sixteen and curls up in her shell

She's communing with Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

Take me to your leader, take me to the man

Someone has got the answer, someone's got the perfect plan

If you're looking in the alleys, if you're looking in the bars

You'll find us in the gutter, looking at the stars

They did it for the journey and not for getting there

Fame is in a whisper when you pay the taxi fare

It's just this side of heaven and a long, long way from hell

It's somewhere in Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

Nothing lasts forever, and forever's in a rhyme

It's a Buddha-like connection and everybody has their time

If you want to drink the water you've got to dig into the well

And maybe then you'll find Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

It was over by nineteen sixty-three and everyone had gone

But they'd opened up the road and the revolution was getting won

And when the poems were painted over and they rang the final bell

It was goodbye to Nirvana at the Beat Hotel

The myth is stronger than the truth, and the truth can sometimes lie

To see it all for what it was you need an uncorrupted eye

Was the journey worth it, only time will tell

Still looking for Nirvana, at the Beat Hotel

Take me to your leader, take me to the man

Someone has got the answer, someone's got the perfect plan

If you're looking in the alleys, if you're looking in the bars

You'll find us in the gutter, looking at the stars

Looking at the stars

We're looking at the stars