All the best people stay at the Wormwood Hotel,
It’s the biggest in Britain, and Europe, by Hell!
Built in the last century, standing forlorn
Down the road from White City, ten minutes from town.
The staff are so friendly, and dressed in dark blue,
They lock all the doors and take good care of you.
At eight every morning they open your room
While the loudspeaker plays so delightful a tune,
You go to the recess and fill up your bowl
With piping hot water, then back to your hole.
You wash and you shave, then you’re locked up again
Till breakfast, then slop out, and walkies at ten.
On the exercise yard you go round, round and round
While the men with the dogs are patrolling the ground.
Your wife comes to see you, and if you’re in luck,
She’ll bring in some dope cos you can’t have whisky.
And if they don’t find it when they shake you down,
You’ll smoke it tonight and get thoroughly stoned.
All the best people stay at the Wormwood Hotel,
They come here for weeks, months or years at a spell,
The staff are so friendly, and dressed in dark blue,
They lock all the doors and take good care of you.
The dinner they serve here is ever so nice,
With hot roast potatoes, or, if you like, rice,
Porridge in the morning may not be your taste,
So if you don’t eat it, it makes a good paste,
Just wet it and don’t bother over the smell,
And use it to stick photos up in your cell.
You can’t take in spirits, but they allow beer,
They’re quite easy-going and fun-loving here.
You’ll meet some nice people from all walks of life:
They use cro-bars, pick axes and shotguns and knives;
There’s robbers and muggers and killers as well,
But very few nonces, and we give them Hell.
All the best people stay at the Wormwood Hotel,
They come here for weeks, months or years at a spell,
The staff are so friendly, and dressed in dark blue,
They lock all the doors and take good care of you.
There’s Malcolm, a black man from Brixton in here,
He held up a bank and he might get ten years,
Another black, though he is not from down south,
Plays chess every day, he’s called Johnson (the Mouth),
He keeps saying how he expects to walk free:
He’ll go down for five or six years just like me.
There’s Stewart the arsonist, bit of a clown,
Said he fancied a laugh, so he burnt his house down,
And there’s big John from Bristol, a bright one is he,
A hardened recidivist with a degree.
A few right hard cases, but most are no harm,
Pimps, burglars and junkies: they’re all on remand.
All the best people stay at the Wormwood Hotel,
They come here for weeks, months or years at a spell,
The staff are so friendly, and dressed in dark blue,
They lock all the doors and take good care of you.
There’s a man from North London, no word of a lie,
Strangled sixteen young drifters, each one with a tie,
There’s Joseph from Ireland, a loser in life,
Helped murder some geezer’s landlord with a knife;
He says he was drunk at the time and should get
Community service, but he’s talking wet,
The best he can hope for, I’m sure you’ll agree
Is ten years for murder in second degree.
There’s two men here with unpronounceable names
From Poland, been playing some dangerous games,
Bought four kilos of cocaine and then tried to sell
Half of it to the drug squad, now there’s a sad tale.
All the best people stay at the Wormwood Hotel,
They come here for weeks, months or years at a spell,
The staff are so friendly, and dressed in dark blue,
They lock all the doors and take good care of you.
There’s one guy who isn’t around any more
Had more than a rub or a brush with the law,
Some two dozen of them went round to his pad,
He smashed up their cars with a ruddy great plank.
There’s all kinds of intr’sting people inside,
And very few of them have nothing to hide.
On Mondays they take you along for a bath,
On Saturdays, you can watch Game For A Laugh,
A film every Thursday or Friday for free,
It really is not such a bad place to be.
Don’t give them no hassle and so is the word
You’ll find it much easier doing your bird.
All the best people stay at the Wormwood Hotel,
They come here for weeks, months or years at a spell,
The staff are so friendly, and dressed in dark blue,
They lock all the doors and take good care of you.
Yes, I must admit it’s a wonderful place,
Though maybe it isn’t to everyone’s taste,
While the screws are so pleasant and it’s so secure
It wasn’t a holiday I came here for.
So if you have better ways to spend your time
Don’t make a career or a hobby of crime,
Or the man in the red gown and wig you will see,
And he’ll order you to be locked up here with me,
And the rest of the cons in the Wormwood Hotel,
Where you’ll spend all your evenings banged up in a cell,
And the staff who are friendly and dressed in dark blue
Will fasten your door and take good care of you.
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