Today is Alice Day. Also, about Bandcamp?

[catsittingstill]

I sang this one at the last Atlanta Housefilk but only now got around to typing the lyrics into the computer.

This is for a friend who is stuck working a horrible schedule for a horrible employer who is trying to break the union by, for example, insisting that everyone work twelve hours a day every day (like, seven days a week) and that they not remove their safety gear (gloves, welding mask) to eat lunch.  I think the plan is that if they can make everybody quit they can hire people who have no rights (illegal immigrants, probably) and treat them even worse.  The mind boggles at what "even worse" would be--though one imagines it involves no safety regulations, and no pay to speak of.

How they can even get away with treating people this way I have no idea.   And it pisses me off.

I should warn people that this song makes use of the F-word in one place (where I think it is entirely consistent with the point of view character and the situation) and for that reason might not be appropriate for some listeners or listening places.  For this reason I will hide it behind a cut.

Hold The Line 
lyrics and melody by Catherine Faber 
mp3 (a cappella) here  

The employer wants to break us, but the boss is on our side, 
And the money this will make us, is worth a little pride. 
We will meet their fucking deadline; we will build their damn design; 
Hold the line, mates; hold the line!  

It's a rotten situation; Let him strut, and bitch, and frown-- 
It takes more than just frustration to break the union down. 
So we'll smile and take his money, turn it into yours and mine; 
Hold the line, mates; hold the line!  

If we break, it won't be funny.  He will treat us just the same; 
We'll just make a lot less money, and eat a lot more shame. 
So we'll build to spec exactly, though it's pearls in front of swine-- 
Hold the line, mates; hold the line!  

Seven twelves at this location.  When we're done, for my reward, 
I will take that damn vacation I'll be able to afford. 
I'll go biking in the mountains, up above the timberline. 
Hold the line, mates; hold the line! 
Hold the line, mates; hold the line!

Also my bandcamp page has album-quality (I think) versions of this song, as well as Art Feeds Life.  They can be downloaded or streamed for free (big files for good sound quality but you have the choice of various mp3 incarnations as well if bandwidth is a problem.)  If you would like to give them a listen and let me know what you think of the reverb and eq and so on, I would be interested to hear from you.

Comments

[laughingrat]

Hey, what's Alice Day? I Google'd but got something that's clearly not right...

[catsittingstill]

Every couple of weeks I try to put up a new song--or an older song that I haven't put on the 'net yet--with an mp3 so people can hear it.

Since my friend Alice prompted me to start by asking for new songs to practice on, I refer to this as "Alice Day"

[randwolf]

"A pamphlet, no matter how good, is never read more than once, but a song is learned by heart and repeated over and over; and I maintain that if a person can put a few cold, common sense facts into a song, and dress them... up in a cloak of humor to take the dryness off them, he will succeed in reaching a great number of workers who are too unintelligent or too indifferent to read a pamphlet or an editorial in economic science."--Joe Hill

Review of new bio at http://jacksonstreetbooks.blogspot.com/2011/09/department-of-book-reports-man-who.html

[catsittingstill]

Mr. Hill put it very well.