Brian DeBoer of The Savvy Fools will be featuring his song "Fear In Our Eyes" at The Forge tonight. Thanks Brian for including the chords so we can all strum along! Just kidding we won't butcher your song while you're playing.
Fear In Our Eyes
© Brian DeBoer
Crushed velvet power suit
Trustworthy parachute
She’s dressed to kill
Top marks and highest honors
Were all bestowed upon her
While at McGill
C-7 A D- D-/C
No one will give her lip
E-7 A D
As she drops on the Lippe
C-7 A D- D-/C
She knows this is her time
E-7 A D D/C D/B D/Bb D/A
Ready to storm the Rhine
G D
Through the two gaping holes
B- F- C
In her unshakable disguise
G A B-7 A D G
I see fear in her eyes Eyes
D A G- D
I see fear in her eyes
Young kid within adult pants,
Part of the new resistance,
The ghetto scene
He is down to his last straw
Time to rise up in Warsaw
Against this regime
Marching he’s listening to Snoop
To take on Jurgen Stroop
He’s going to loose his chains
Not going to board those trains
Through the two gaping holes
In his unshakeable disguise
I see fear in his eyes Eyes
I see fear in his eyes
The cause worth dying for
Leads through the unexplored
Heroics hesitate
Before they crash the gate
And the huge gaping hole
When social justice does arise
Shows the fear in our eyes
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1 comment:
Hi Brian,
Sorry I couldn't make the workshop, but I would like add my thoughts to this blog. I haven't heard the music to this song, but lyrics seem to stand on their own, so hopefully my comments are valid.
We've talked before about walking the line of obscurity and clarity and I think you've done a fine job here. There is enough coherence to hook me and enough mystery to draw me into re-readings (and checking up the WWII references on ole' mr. leaky-reliable Wikipedia).
The poem seems to be about people acting for justice but with questionable means. The first character is a slick shooting lawyer -- anyways, that's what I think of when I read McGill (I have a friend who's doing international law there). The just cause is expressed by the emblematic "just war" against Hitler's Nazi Germany. I love the rhyme of lip with Lippe -- having a rhyme scheme is great for stimulating lyric writing, and allows for awesome half-rhymes or, in this case, a same rhyme.
The next character is I guess a black activist. Excellent pun on "ghetto" tying to the historical origin of the word -- the jewish ghettos in east-europe -- to the word's contemporary meaning. "Young kid in adult pants" also a dual significance because it refers both to have young activist often act beyond their years, but also they ghetto-style of wearing oversized pants.
I love the portraits of activists -- portraits of their "unshakable disguises" which cleverly undermine the activists' pose (their act, theatrically speaking) without necessarily undermining the validity of their cause. The Nazi Germany analogy is interesting because while most would assume that this is "just war", it does open space for unconditional pacificists who are against all war. I was raised a pacificist -- so this viewpoint is easy for me. My mother was fairly involved in activism in the 80's , and I ended participating in some activism myself, going to the FTAA protest in Quebec City in 2001. Activist are great target for a little satire because they can so darn solemn and self-righteous, which in the ends up looking quite ridiculous. Through my experiences in protest, I have come to the conclusion that the best (and most effective) activist are those who less concerned with noisy dramatic subversive acts, and more interested in doing less glamorous work behind the scenes.
Because I have first-hand experience with activism, my qualm is chorus -- "fear in our eyes" -- in my experience activist are not very fearful. They may sometimes be paranoid, but when they are in action it usually stems for an indignation or righteous anger, not fear. My other critique is the switch from second person "his/her fear" to "our" -- I assuming you're doing to avoid being hypocritical, a self-reflective twist that slips you from being as self-righteous as the activist you satirize. (I think i've used a similar technique when I've tried writing protest songs myself.) However, this self-reflective turn must hinge on more than the single word -- there must be something in the content of the song verifies the sincerity of this turn to be more than a technique to avoid hypocrisy. Though the last stanza is a turn to more indentifiable present, there is not much that implicates the singer as being one of the "we" of "our", so the turn could seem shallow.
Ok -- my final qualm is with the adjective "social" for "justice". This is perhaps another philosophical qualm, but how is "social justice" different justice per se? Is then such things as non-social justice, (an anti-social justice??) ? I think people have just added the word "social", because justice on its own seems to harsh and hard in our world where truth is assumed to be relative. And so we add the word "social" to make values that we think are universal more soft and palatable by not seeming absolutely universal, but only "socially" universal -- so, the same thing, but veiled.
A rant-- I guess you touched a nerve Brian! Others (and Brian especially!) please agree or disagree with anything I've said here. I'll post a blog so that we can start discussion on the nature and viability of the protest song in today's world. Post your comments here in the meantime.
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