The Wikiness

As the Chicago DNC wound down last week, I recorded this song, which I wrote when a callow 24 year old. It was my take on how the 1968 yippie riot generation had aged, fifteen years on. At that time in my life I was starting to work closely with wealthy liberals and so got close to their rampant materialism (see my ecocleaning memoir chapter).

If asked to reflect on where the yippie generation is now, almost forty years later, I’d have more compassion for them. I’m astonished at the cynicism that dripping from these words:

Americanos, in Chicago, back in 1968, came to see ’bout their democracy, and if the people were too late.

What they found there laid them on the ground, you know police had become the state.

And so they got themselves bashed by generation gap, you know, the nightstick and the mace.

Suddenly they found themselves all alone…

They saw the cards all stacked

Their dream turned bak,

Their nightmare black

They’d grown old.

Some went crazy, some got lazy, some say they found God

Some went to jail, some jumped bail, and most of them found a job.

‘What’s the use of dreamin’? When dreams only turn to rust?

Give me my greed, it meets my needs, it’s one thing I can trust.

Everybody learn which way the wind blows….

So cover up your wealth

Hang on to your health

But where’s your best self?

You grown old.

Deep into work now, a total jerk now, don’t question what’s your role.

Well, why don’t you die, and let us survive? You’re blocking up the road.

Your vehicle rapes our planet, your eyes are blue and cold.

Your body is dying, and all of your striving fan’t save your immortal soul.

Your VISA card is calling. You’re bought and sold…

You’re at the game but you’re bored,

You don’t care anymore,

Your love’s dead in the store.

You grown old.

Musically, it reflects my slapdash garage band ethic, and is the first one to use my newest acquisition, a djembe drum!

I offer it up in all its unpolished amateurism–as I do my entire SoundCloud oeuvre–as a record of my evolving musical skills.

Thanks for listening, and letting me know what you think!