To see the lyrics, click on the name of the version you are interested in (on the left).

This is one of the most popular Divine Comedy songs, since it reached #8 in the UK charts in 1999. It is a regular song at gigs.
It is indeed very efficient: the lyrics are simple, the chorus even more so. So everybody can sing it along. It is just a perfect song to ‘make you smile’.

It describes the people we see on a bus, as National Express is a British bus company. It is inspired by direct experience of Neil who used to travel by bus to visit his brother in the early/mid 90’s [1]. However, it was mis-interpreted by the NME who reviewed it as a condescendent song to the working classes, and sadly this sometime still sticks to the general opinion.

"Tomorrow Belongs To Me" is a song from Cabaret and the tune on that line is that of the song.

A video was directed by Matthew Kirkby and takes place in a mental hospital.

In 2002, the song was covered by Lenny Beige during a Divine Comedy concert at Edinburgh.