Wasteland of the Free

Off-topic
1

I just heard this Iris DeMent song which came out in 1996. Yikes.

Wasteland of The Free

Living in the wasteland of the free…

We got preachers dealing in politics and diamond mines
and their speech is growing increasingly unkind
They say they are Christ’s disciples
but they don’t look like Jesus to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We got politicians running races on corporate cash
Now don’t tell me they don’t turn around and kiss them peoples’ ass
You may call me old-fashioned
but that don’t fit my picture of a true democracy
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We got CEO’s making two hundred times the workers’ pay
but they’ll fight like hell against raising the minimum wage
and If you don’t like it, mister, they’ll ship your job
to some third-world country 'cross the sea
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

Living in the wasteland of the free
where the poor have now become the enemy
Let’s blame our troubles on the weak ones
Sounds like some kind of Hitler remedy
Living in the wasteland of the free

We got little kids with guns fighting inner city wars
So what do we do, we put these little kids behind prison doors
and we call ourselves the advanced civilization
that sounds like crap to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We got high-school kids running 'round in Calvin Klein and Guess
who cannot pass a sixth-grade reading test
but if you ask them, they can tell you
the name of every crotch on MTV
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We kill for oil, then we throw a party when we win
Some guy refuses to fight, and we call that the sin
but he’s standing up for what he believes in
and that seems pretty damned American to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

Living in the wasteland of the free
where the poor have now become the enemy
Let’s blame our troubles on the weak ones
Sounds like some kind of Hitler remedy
Living in the wasteland of the free

While we sit gloating in our greatness
justice is sinking to the bottom of the sea
Living in the wasteland of the free
Living in the wasteland of the free
Living in the wasteland of the free

2

Wow…that is scarily accurate…

3

IMHO. Hitting the nail directly on the head.

4

Which is why it’s scary

5

Quite prescient.

6

Hardcore lyrics. I’d love to hear them sung by someone else…

7

April is the cruelest month
Mixing memory with desire
breeding lilacs out of the dead land…

Oh, sorry. wrong Wasteland.

8

Hardcore indeed. And, yes, you’re right, she doesn’t quite have the voice to really belt them out. But she does feel them.

9

wow.
So true, i agree that’s scary.

10

i just listened to that… and i think the lyrics would go really really well in a dark metal/punk song. They’d be really effective that way.

11

While we’re on the wrong wasteland…

Is this Dement woman a folk(y) singer?

12

I think you are wrong. The issues discussed in the lyrics are old, what is worrying is that 10 years on, the same issues remain, some in rather more concentrated form, and many of the population are only just waking up to taste the coffee. Trouble is: most politicians sleep late.

13

I don’t know that much about her except what a colleague has told me. But yes she is folk/country and my understanding is that she is “authentic”.

14

With lyrics like those, I’d say.
There’s something about the phrasing that reminded me of Michelle Shocked’s ‘Grafiti Limbo’.
I’d like to hear that track. I’m going to try n hunt it down.

15

I see this as the typical whining, defeatist crap of those who would rather than complain than affect change.

16

I was going to start new thread for this, but then I figured it might squeeze in here without too much of a thread-jack.

And as I promised Billy I would do, here’s the opening paragraph.

17

Very helpful, Dave. I’m sure may agree.

Good post too.

18

Those lyrics are so true. My Wal-Mart CEO makes in a week what I’ll make in a lifetime. I think that’s more than 200 times my pay. Can anyone figure it out?

Billy

19

Or maybe by inspiring people through song, she is affecting change.

I’m serious. There are quite a few musicions that have inspired me, and many other people I know, to look at things in a diffrent light, or to take things further, or to get invoved in something I hadn’t thought about before.

Anyone ever heard of riotfolk?

deffiance ohio?

Ghost mice?

20

Well I don’t know your pay is, but according to Executive Paywatch, H. Lee Scott your CEO earned $17,542,908 in 2005 or $337,363/week. That does not include unexercised stock options.

I’m going to guess that Scott, save for the occasion photo op, does not shop at Wal-Mart’s but that you do and that you receive an untaxed employee discount. This will complicate the comparison, but in the end if left unaccounted for will clearly understate your pay relative to his.