"Both Sides of the Coin" is a song from a
musical by
Rupert Holmes entitled
The Mystery of Edwin Drood, based on the
unfinished book of the
same name by
Charles Dickens, Rupert Holmes is the composer responsible for many of
Barbara Streisand's songs as well as the popular 1970's tune "The
Pina Colada Song",
The song has a lot of clever lyrics and was placed at a point in the show where the audience began to get confused with many of the characters as the show was staged as a play within a play. The central conceit of the show was that an English music hall was presenting a production of The Mystery of Edwin Drood, so that each actor had two personas, one of the member of the Theatre Royale and one as a character in Dicken's story.
I am not myself these days
For all I know I might be you
There's more than room enough for two inside my mind
I am likewise in the haze of who I am from scene to scene
What's more we two, we four, I mean are in a bind
For is it I, or is it me
And if I'm him
And if I'm me
Each one of us might not agree
On what to do
And if I take opposing sides
Within myself then who divides
up what is right or wrong
I'll go along with you.
Ha'penny, onepenny, tuppeny, thrupenny
Twelve to a shilling
Twice that to a florin
And would you not fancy the currency foreign
To find the same face on both sides of the coin
Bob is your uncle from pennies to guineas
The two-sided mint is the rule of exception
And would you not feel by the fool of deception
To find the same face on both sides of the coin.