Song Lyrics: The Smell of Rebellion
Music and Lyrics by Tim Minchin
With orchestrations by Chris Nightingale
Dialogue by Dennis Kelly
This school, of late, has started reeking…
Quiet, maggot, when I’m speaking!
…reeking with a most disturbing scent.
Only the finest nostrils smell it,
But I know it oh too well,
It is the odour of rebellion,
It’s the bouquet of dissent.
And you may bet your britches
This headmistress
Finds this foul odifer-ous-ness
Wholly olfactorily insulting
And so to stop the stench’s spread
I find a session of Phys-Ed
Sorts the merely rank from the revolting.
The smell of rebellion
Comes out in the sweat
And phys-ed’ll get you sweating
And it won’t be long
Before I smell the pong
Of aiding and abetting
A bit of Phys-Ed
Will tell us
Who has a headful
Of rebellious
Thoughts.
Hold! Hold!
Just like a rot-
ton egg
Floats to the top
Of a bucket of water
The smell of rebellion
The stench of revolt
The reek of insubordination
A whiff of resistance
The pong of dissent
The funk of mutiny in action
But that’s not right!
It hurts!
I can’t!
But Miss!
Before a weed No more!
Becomes too big and greedy
You really need
To nip it in the bud
Position two!
Before the worm starts to turn
You must scrape off the dirt
And rip it from the mud
A whiff of insurgence
The stench of intent
The reek of prepubescent protest
The funk of defiance
The odour of coup
The waft of anarchy in progress
Once we’ve exercised these demons
They shall be too pooped for scheming
Some double-time discipline
Should stop the rot from setting in.
Alright, let’s step it up, double time!
Discipline, discipline
For children who aren’t listening
For midgets who are fidgeting
And whispering in history
Their chattering and chittering
Their nattering and twittering
Is tempered with a smattering of discipline.
We must begin insisting
On rigidity and discipline
Persistently resisting
This anarchistic mischiefin’
These minutes you are fritterin’
On pandering and pitying
While little-uns like this they just need
Discipline.
The simpering and whimpering
The dribbling and the spittling
The “Miss, I need a tissue”
It’s an issue we can fix
There is no mystery to mastering
The art of classroom mistressing
It’s discipline! Discipline!
Discipline!
The smell of rebellion
The stench of revolt
The reek of prepubescent plotting
A whiff of resistance
The pong of dissent
The funk of moral fibre rotting…
Imagine a world with no children
Close your eyes and just dream
Imagine (come on, try it!)
The peace and the quiet,
A burbling stream
Now imagine a woods with a cottage
And inside that cottage we find
A dwarf called Zeek,
A carnival freak
Who can fold paper hats with his mind.
And he says,
Don’t let them steal your horses
Don’t let them take them away
If you find your way through
They’ll be waiting for you
Singing Neigh. Neigh. Neigh.
Ah-ha! And there. just like I said
The stinky maggot rears his head
Even the squittiest piteous mess
Can harbour seeds of stinkiness
Have you ever seen anything more repellent
Have you ever smelt anything worse than that
Smell of rebellion
The stench of revolt
The reek of insubordination
A whiff of resistance
The pong of dissent…
And I will not stop til you are squashed
Til this rebellion is quashed
Til glorious sweaty discipline has washed
This sickening stench away.