We'll break all the rules: April Fool, by Patti Smith

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April Fool is the first single, and my favourite track, from Patti Smith's latest album Banga. It is one of her most mesmerising songs, and it features the smouldering guitar sound of Tom Verlaine, who also appears on the track Nine. April Fool was inspired by the life and work of the pivotal Russian writer Nikolai Gogol; Patti Smith's website includes the following excerpt from his landmark short story The Overcoat:

And St. Petersburg was left without Akakiy Akakievitch, as though he had never lived there. A being disappeared who was protected by none, dear to none, interesting to none, and who never even attracted to himself the attention of those students of human nature who omit no opportunity of thrusting a pin through a common fly, and examining it under the microscope. A being who bore meekly the jibes of the department, and went to his grave without having done one unusual deed, but to whom, nevertheless, at the close of his life appeared a bright visitant in the form of an overcoat, which momentarily cheered his poor life, and upon whom, thereafter, an intolerable misfortune descended, just as it descends upon the mighty of this world!

                                                        Come     be my April Fool
                                                        Come     you're the only one
                                                        Come     on your rusted bike
                                                        Come     we'll break all the rules

                                                        We'll ride like writers ride
                                                        Neither rich nor broke
                                                        We'll race through alleyways
                                                        In our tattered cloaks so

                                                         Come     be my April Fool
                                                         Come     we'll break all the rules

                                                         We'll burn all of our poems
                                                         Add to God's debris
                                                         We'll pray to all of our saints
                                                         Icons of mystery
                                                         We'll tramp through the mire
                                                         When our souls feel dead
                                                         With laughter we'll inspire
                                                         Then back to life again

                                                         Come     you're the only one
                                                         Come     be my April Fool
                                                         Come     come
                                                         Be my April Fool
                                                         We'll break all the rules