by Joni Mitchell
Front rooms Back rooms Slide into tables Crowd into bathrooms Joke around Cheap talk Deep talk Talk talk talk around the clock Crawl home Lie down Teeth chatter Heart pounds I don't feel so good I don't feel so good Push a button to escape Preacher on the tube crying "Lord!" There's evil in this land
(Evangelist:) "Rock and roll music!" "Cast down these dope fiends and there noisy bands!" "Damn their souls!"
Preacher preaching love like vengeance Preaching love like hate Calling for large donations Promising estates Rolling lawns and angel bands Behind the pearly gates You know he will have his in this life But yours will have to wait He's immaculately tax free
"Multiple hundreds of thousands of..." Tax free "Hundreds and millions of dollars" Tax free "A hundred billion dollars! And who is paying the price? Who who "Your children are"
Pissed off Jacked up Scream into the mike Spit into the loving cup Strut like a rooster March like a man God's hired hands and the devil bands Packing the same grandstands Different clothes "Pot in their pockets!" Different hair "Sexually active" Raise a screaming guitar or a bible in the air Theatre of anguish Theatre of glory God's hired hands and the devil bands Oh come let us adore - ME! Lord, there's danger in this land You get witch-hunts and wars When church and state hold hands
Fuck it! Tonight I'm going dancing With the drag queens and the punks Big beat deliver me From this sanctimonious skunk We're no flaming angels And he's not heaven sent How can he speak for the Prince of Peace When he's hawk right militant And he's immaculately tax free
"Our nation has lost its guts!" Save me "Our nation has lost its strength" Tax free "Our nation has whimpered and cried" Save me "And petted the Castros" Tax free "The Khomeinis' and the Kaddafis'" Save me "For so long" Tax free "That we don't know how to act like a man" Save me "I think that we should turn the United States Marines loose on that little island south of Florida and stop that problem!" "I am preachin' love, I am!"
© 1985; Crazy Crow Music
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