San Francisco Patrol Releases Gigs Lyrics Comments

Details

Author
Robyn Hitchcock
According to our records, Robyn has played this song 71 times, most recently at Robyn & Emma's house on February 19, 2025. He first performed it at Panciuto on February 04, 2014, 11 years earlier.

Comments

Notes from Robyn on Patreon in 2021

SAN FRANCISCO PATROL started life in the Phoenix Hotel, a groover’s bubble in the mediæval wastes of San Francisco’s Tenderloin district. I was watching a lady in a bright red dress gliding out of the lobby, which triggered a host of romantic memories. It’s not hard to weave San Francisco into your personal mythology if you spend time there - though the myth and the reality split further apart every year. Maybe that’s what myths are for: to coat the spikes of life with a honeydew patina.

Lyrics

Can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
Nothing lasts forever, no love can be true
I can't take my eyes off you

I'm talking to myself
As if I were someone else
I'm not listening, you know I never do
I can't take my eyes off you

Fillmore and Haight and Fell
I know the streets so well
Geary, Hayes, O'Farrell, Polk and Larkin too
I can't take my eyes off you

(I can't take my eyes off you)
(I can't take my eyes off you)

Who are we staking out?
What is this life about?
Watching out for someone but you don't know who
I can't take my eyes off you
Can't take my eyes off you