The Dreadnaught

(Verse 1)

The boilers are screaming on a diet of slag and coal

Fifteen hundred deck-hands just a-waiting for the roll.

Steaming through the black-top on a zig-zag zig-zag line

Looking for a periscope or the tether on a mine.

The sonar’s got a "ping" and the "ping" is getting tight

Target on the starboard side, creeping through the night.

Somewhere in the basement where the pressure starts to cook

Them U-boat bastards are a-looking for a hook.

(Chorus)

It’s a steel-on-steel scrap in the middle of the swell

Forty thousand tons of iron making ready for a hell.

Depth-charges off the rack, let the ash-cans fly

Better them boys sinking than my brothers start to die.

Got the Wolfpack circling, looking for a bite

Dragging every one of us to the bottom of the night.

Yeah, the dreadnought’s brawling and she’s swinging for the chin

Waiting for the ocean-floor to take the losers in.

(Verse 2)

Then a bubble-track came whistling, hot and straight and fast

The Captain called for "Emergency" and "Hard-to-Port" at last.

The bulkheads started groaning, metal-fatigue and brine

Trying not to let that tin-fish snap the ship’s own spine.

We let the K-guns bark and we let the hedgehogs loose

Trying to put a noose around a sub-sea phantom's goose.

A grease-slick hit the surface with a mess of debris and oil

Another bunch of sailors done with all their earthly toil.

(Chorus)

It’s a steel-on-steel scrap in the middle of the swell

Forty thousand tons of iron making ready for a hell.

Depth-charges off the rack, let the ash-cans fly

Better them boys sinking than my brothers start to die.

Got the Wolfpack circling, looking for a bite

Dragging every one of us to the bottom of the night.

Yeah, the dreadnought’s brawling and she’s swinging for the chin

Waiting for the ocean-floor to take the losers in.

(Bridge)

It ain't a fair fight when you're punching at a ghost

Just a game of who’s the lucky and who’s the one who’s toast.

Keep the hatches battened and the steam-pressure high

Keep a weather-eye open for a wake under the sky.

(Chorus)

It’s a steel-on-steel scrap in the middle of the swell

Forty thousand tons of iron making ready for a hell.

Depth-charges off the rack, let the ash-cans fly

Better them boys sinking than my brothers start to die.

Got the Wolfpack circling, looking for a bite

Dragging every one of us to the bottom of the night.

Yeah, the dreadnought’s brawling and she’s swinging for the chin

Waiting for the ocean-floor to take the losers in.

(Outro)

Watch the "ping."

Watch the line.

Forty thousand tons.

Running out of time