GrimmReality

Christian

the young evangelist knocked on the woman's door
stirring her up from her household labors
politely he inquired if she were a Christian
politely she replied, "You'd have to ask my neighbors."

Kill the Poor

so you wear the vestments of ill-gotten legacy
bankrolled by CEOs, endowed by Christian destiny
give us empty words and flags to rally round
but the rest of it don’t seem to trickle down to

streets of hopeless faces, mortgaged and foreclosed
downsized to part-time jobs, foresaken by the HMOs
sucking up the welfare when there’s war to subsidize
and they won’t just go away if you ask nice

chorus
kill the poor, kill the poor, put a cap right in their brain
ain’t no room in Utopia for evidence it ain’t
arm the VPs, arm the soccer moms, declare your holy war
before the meek claim our inheritance you better kill the poor

ship our jobs to lands of despots and despair
repurpose livelihoods for merest pennies on the share
they ask for more, refer em to the green berets
there’s always more room in the mass graves

repave our cities as consumerist plantations
turn the cops into a martial force of occupation
mall of america, pristine and sterilized
And woe to those who can’t afford the price

chorus

Slut

They say you went with him out to the dirt road past the tracks
They say you gave to him something you could not get back
They say your reputation won’t soon regenerate
The cool kids are all talking shit, but who gives Shit One what they say

They say it ain’t the first time you broke that sacred rule
And word on the street is, that’s where you're headed after school
And, girl, how dare you live your life while they cluck and stare
Lord knows it’s everybody’s business what you feel down there

Ch
You’re a slut, so what of it
School days end and none of them mean shit
Take what joy there is while you still can
If god is love, love has no end
So how could heaven e’er forfend
A gift of water to a thirsty man
A gift of water to a thirsty man

The world don’t end at the county line and somewhere out there they ain’t so unkind
To begrudge both you and me and little heaven where we find it

Chorus

Nothing to Say 

You know all those pretty words you waited for some boy to tell you
You damn sure won’t hear them from me
I’m insensitive and surly, full of liquor, wings and rage
Farthest thing from some prince charming down on bended knee

I don’t believe in marriage—and I hate kids, Sex in the City
and every movie that meg ryan ever did
What I lack in graces I make up in porn and lechery
And all the stuff a "decent human being" won’t admit

And If I was a better man I’d take the time to try to see
What it is that makes me worthy of what you see in me

Ch
Stephanie, I’m outta poetry and love songs
pissed away on futile wars and endless beers
I can’t promise you the moon or stars or hollywood endings
But I can give you now and here

I’m still tilting windmills and presidents and corporate goons
As if I had a chance but I don’t
Wish I could find the words put it all in context of world in which
Our love could conquer all, but it won’t

And if I was a saner man I’d drop my hand and fold
Sober up and act my age, problem there’s I’m getting old

Ch
Ch (sub-chorus)
I’ve got nothing to say
If I did I’d screw up at any rate
Words don’t mean anything anyway

One to Grow On

You are special, TV shows say
You are the dawn of brighter new day
But you’ll discover far too late
That everything you know is wrong

Brand names do not make you cool
Cool kids are twits and tools
Fitting in’s the worst thing you can do
Cause everything they know is wrong

Hard work does not bring success
In spite of what rich folks profess
Truth is they were born thus blessed
And everything they know is wrong

br
They lie — a web of fairy tales to kid themselves they understand
this plane of senseless horror past all rationale of god or man

The president lies through his ass
History is delusion en masse
We’re living through the Looking Glass
Cause everything we know is wrong

Your folks might try but are mostly wrong
Make stuff up as they go along
You shouldn’t even trust this song
Cause everything I know is wrong

Everything you know is wrong

Honea Path

we were the first to secede and the first to fight, shelled Sumter until it ran red
this foremost among the tales our grandaddies told
no rifles in hand, the war we fight now’s just to keep our kids clothed and fed
and them we fight grandsons of generals still live up the hill in the house with the white portico

there’s a mill by the tracks we walked into each day and worked our hands bloody and raw
now there’s barbed wire around it and men with shotguns inside
they’re brothers and cousins and uncles and neighbors and claim that they’re rebels all
and that the old men just holding their own ‘gainst the union, the one Mr. Roosevelt says is our right

ch
way down here in the land of cotton
we once dared to dream of fair work for fair pay
but the company men shot us and folks here forgot us
look away, Dixieland, Dixieland, look away

all this talk about new deals up north i can’t claim to understand
all i know is the second-hand scent of magnolia don’t feed a hungry man

they call us the pawns of the reds and the yankees, but weren’t them raised the quotas four score
now the tempers flash white and the bullets rain down from the mill
in the din and dust swirling we pull out our dying, the blood of our own civil war
rebel on rebel, one dead and one holding the dark smoking gun of the man on the hill

chorus
ch2
Way down here in the land of cotton
we once dared to dream of fair work for fair pay
But our brothers they shot us, and history forgot us Look away, Dixieland, Dixieland, look away

Saint Booze 

They say these streets were paved with gold in mythic days of yore
Now the only thing that glitters here is shards
The only doors still open pawn shops and dollar stores
And random neon flicker of these churches we call bars

Times are getting better, the talking heads advise
I guess it just ain’t trickled down this far
The preachers say our true rewards await in paradise
So we find sanctuary elsewhere where communion goes down hard

Ch
Saint Booze, we come unto thy altar humble
Bearing sorrow, sin and nothing left to lose
Bless this water into beer, wash away our pain and fear
Deliver us from here, Saint Booze

Suits come out here every two years, pledge a living wage for all
But right-to-work just never made it so
We organized the factory two year ago last fall
So they packed it up and chained the doors and moved to Mexico

Ch

Armies of the Lost

Hey, Mr. Cop in your black armor
Am I such an awful guy?
Eye me up and down, finger your nightstick
Like it’s Christmas in July

Hell, I don’t know when our paths so diverged
When all the words stopped making sense
But there’s something here dividing us that’s bigger than your riot fence

Ch1
Don’t you think I got dreams like you?
Bills and a job and an asshole for a boss
Don’t you think that I want everything to work out for you and me and maybe
That’s why I’m here among these armies of the lost

Hey, Ms. Network News with the air of self-reverence, Boiling us all down to a blur
Would it be so unpatriotic just to listen to the voices yet unheard
How many died today, what wealthy men got wealthier?
Who got the latest buck passed?
How many orders go unquestioned for each question you don’t ask?

Ch2
Don’t you think that it’s my country too, and that of all these wretched refuse and tempest-tossed?
Don’t you think if you just sought the truth I wouldn’t have to come out here demanding it
With the voices of these armies of the lost

Hey, Mom and Dad America, look for us on the news tonight
The darkest of your family’s sheep
Are we any less your sons and daughters
For the lies you still believe

Ch3
Don’t you think we’re scared like you
Don’t you think at last we know what freedom costs
Out here armed with just our voices facing down the guns and pepper spray
Don’t you think we’d rather be anything but armies of the lost

Hey, Hitler! 

Hey, Hitler I see your face in the eyes of every starving child
Hey, Hitler I hear your voice in every Yalie blue-blood anglophile
You may have lost the Big One, but your thinly veiled disciples run
The world in such a way I think you’d smile

Hey, Hitler you’re there in every death-squad my taxes underwrite
Hey, Hitler in every demonstration cops and armies pacify
You’re history’s greatest jerk, but the talking heads still do your work
Making Gods of blond-haired, blue-eyed girls and guys

And if there’s a Hell you’re burning, in anguish for eternity
But your spirit lives in every chanting, trust-fund baby, Brown-Shirt-esque fraternity
Hey, Hitler
Hey Hitler

And if there’s a Hell you’re burning like a million white-hot suns
But take some balm in PR people, country clubs and patriots with guns
Guns
Guns

Hey, Hitler you dreamed a global order ruled by clean-cut white men
Hey, Hitler your dream came true in Wall Street spires, if not Berlin
Making economic war on Earth’s unruly, beaten poor
A legacy of you we’re living in

Fuck Fuck Fuck

I don’t wanna know your name, your dreams or aspirations
Don’t wanna take you out on the town
This planet’s circling the cosmic toilet
So let’s fuck like screaming banshees in a plane going down

Ch1
Romance is for movies, let’s throw out all the scripts
And we'll fuck fuck fuck till the dawn’s early apocalypse

Great Western Armies occupy the cradle of civilization
Righteous Christian warriors wage a new Crusade
War and subjugation in the name of peace and freedom
Guess it makes sense when you’re old and dumb, so fuck it, let’s get laid

Ch2
We’ll rent some porn, I’ll bring the beer and you can bring the chips
And we’ll fuck fuck fuck till the dawn’s early apocalypse

I’m not as cute as the other guys
But I know my way around your thighs
And given our imminent demise
What the fuck we got to lose?

Hairspray and SUVs and lassaiz faire-loosed industries
Have toxified the planet past the point of no return
So let’s buy a gross of condoms and we'll fuck into the sunset
Ain’t no use spitting mutants out just to watch Rome burn

Ch3
I’ll get some lube and tear one off or two or three or six
And we’ll fuck fuck fuck till the dawn’s early apocalypse

Ch4
Let’s get drunk, I’ll whisper sweet nothings in your lips
And we’ll fuck fuck fuck till the dawn’s early apocalypse

Thanks

Don’t get me wrong, I know you done your time
From Inchon to Khe Sanh to the Quaker Oats line
And yes, sir, you got me by more’n a few years, might learn
Something if I shut up and open my ears

And I know that my less-than-great generation ain’t savvy and worldly like you
So with this beer hoisted, allow me to offer some gratitude long overdue

Ch1
Thanks for the culture of thought sanitized
By Christians and bigots and Reaganites
Thanks for your silence as witch hunts and red squads
Dragged down your neighbors like dogs
Thanks for the Cold War and COINTELPRO
For Vietnam, nukes and for talk radio,
And your wide-eyed credulity stretched beyond reason
Towards con men and quislings and cheap demagogues

Ch2
Thanks for your idle consensus as pitchmen
Sold assholes as presidents, lapdogs to rich men
For letting the joyless and spiteful decide right and wrong
For everyone else
Thanks for abandoning all that you taught
About fair play and freedom of speech and of thought
For this world of shit we inherit from stewards
Who couldn’t be bothered to think for themselves

All songs by Matthew Grimm, Copyright 2005, Grimm Reality Music (ASCAP), except "Kill the Poor," by Kevin Baier & Matthew Grimm, How Do You Play Music (ASCAP)