Текст песни: Westin Bonaventure Hotel (404 S. Figueroa St.) + перевод

I came here as a child

Strapped in the back of

The station wagon.

Inside the great concrete lobby,

Mother and father

Were fighting about

Something inconsequential,

Her earrings, His sunburn;

I padded off

To the elevator,

I pushed the button for the top floor.

And we begin to climb…

And we begin to climb…

On the third floor, an old man steps inside for a ride

and offers up his opinions on aqueducts and irrigation

On the fourth floor a night jar flutters in with a grin

he chants a mechanical song

Much to the old man’s irritation

At seven we exit the shaft for the sky buildings and great birds of prey

The old man is slapping his thigh while the nightjar praises LA

Now on nine some primordial palm tree’s colonnade offers shade

To real estate men who would swindle an elder for a single dollar

Then on twelve I see Hollwood’s Golden Stars in their cars

They drive down the yellow brick road

While Joseph Cotten pops his collar

On eighteen an elegant porter in linen

Ambles aboard, looking toward the upheaval

Says Kennedy’s been shot at the hotel he’d been in

And the old man explains a poetics of evil

Twenty-six I see the city

As a series of fires

Terror at farmstands and liquor stores

And pyramids of tires

A fragile peace is reached

When we get to twenty-nine

While Hollywood destroys Los Angeles

For the two-hundredth time.

While we watch the survivors sift through the scenes

The old man explains what «pathology» means

And we begin to climb…

Thirty-five, the menagerie takes their leave, I would grieve, but

Just as the loneliness sets in

The loveliest green-eyed girl steps in

We smile at each other and and she takes my hand

As the city is trembling and prone.

All the buildings are turning to sand

We hold onto each other and ride up on our own

And we begin to climb

And we begin to climb

And we begin to climb

Перевод песни Westin Bonaventure Hotel (404 S. Figueroa St.)