The Auteurs was a British alternative rock band of the 1990s.

Unfair… Read Full Bio ↴The Auteurs was a British alternative rock band of the 1990s.

Unfairly dismissed as the egotrip of acclaimed songwriter Luke Haines, The Auteurs were one of the unsung bands of the mid-nineties Britpop movement. Releasing their first record, New Wave, in 1993, the Auteurs were compared to Suede, and the resurgent glam-rock movement, and began to amass a reasonable cult following. 1994's second album, and commercial highlight, Now I'm A Cowboy, saw the band embracing at times a more contemporary sound, notably on the single Lenny Valentino, which probably remains Haines' best-known song. Now I'm A Cowboy was marked out by sprawling guitar lines as much as by Haines' inimitable lyrics, a kind of visceral social commentary. While touring this album in 1995, Haines jumped off a fifteen-foot wall, breaking both ankles, resulting in his being in a wheelchair for the rest of that year, recording the starker, angrier third album After Murder Park, most notable for the ballad-like lead single Unsolved Child Murder, released for Christmas at Haines own bidding. Following this, Haines took time out to work on other projects such as Black Box Recorder and Baader Meinhof, reforming the Auteurs in 1999 for the release of the mostly overlooked final album, How I Learned To Love The Bootboys.

While Haines remains widely respected for his lyrical eloquence and eye for the minutae of life, his eccentric, confrontational personality, and habit of styling himself as a louche ne'er-do-well, perhaps impeded the formation of a more affectionate bond with his fans. The Auteurs, similarly, tended to be respected rather more than they were loved.

Housebreaker
The Auteurs Lyrics

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When I first met you
You were not house trained
A backwoods trier
The world's your oyster
Your time is mine
What's yours is mine all mine

There's no honour

Amongst thieves
So we worked together
A varied rich
and famous crime
You had your motives
I had mine
For a soul to find
Little piece rub off on mine

Trinkets, memorabilia
Diamonds for the taking
One mans treasure
never meant a thing
When I was housebreaking

Took a buckshot landing
From my most famous client
Must have lost it in the fall
Came away empty handed

When I first met you
I was not housetrained

Overall Meaning

The opening lines of the song 'Housebreaker' by The Auteurs paints a vivid picture of two individuals brought together by their affinity for a life of crime. The singer, in his reflection on the past, recalls meeting his accomplice, who was initially unrefined and inexperienced, gradually taking him under his wing and teaching him the tricks of their illicit trade. He depicts his partner as being endowed with a sort of untamed, unspoilt aura, capable of achieving anything he sets his mind to ('The world's your oyster'). This however leads him into wanting what his accomplice has, resulting in a shared existence. The two individuals become inseparable and the singer takes on an increasingly possessive tone ('What's yours is mine all mine').

The lyrics following this verse reveal that the pair's modus operandi was largely doomed to fail from the outset. Any sense of 'honour among thieves' was disregarded and what followed was an erratic, opportunistic approach to stealing whatever they could lay their hands on. They were not fussy about who they robbed or what they stole ('A varied rich and famous crime, You had your motives, I had mine'). Our protagonist craves something he has never had before, a sense of purpose or direction in his life. He believes that the untainted innocence of his partner can rub off on him and give him a sense of redemption he has never known ('For a soul to find, Little piece rub off on mine').

HousebreakerThe Auteurs Lyrics

Housebreaker
The Auteurs Lyrics