As I was walking down the street while on my twentieth birthday-oh!
A government man, he said to me now you’d look fine in Kaki-oh!
The government is in need of men, come read our proclamation-oh!
Two years conscription life for you will be a fine vacation-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
Well it may be so I said to him, but tell me if you can-oh!
If I’m old enough to carry your guns, am I old enough to hold too?
If I’m sent to fight in a foreign land not waring with Australia-oh!
What will you give as a guarantee that I’ll not come back in a coffin-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
Well the government man he looked at me and his smile was very mockin’-oh!
He looked at me from head to toe and said you must be jokin’-oh!
There’s adult pay and adventure too, and you’re marching in the army-oh!
I winked at a lady passing by and thought of raising a family-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
So to fight in other people’s wars, don’t get yourself conscripted-oh!
If Australian soil we must defend, then let’s all volunteer-oh!
But I have no desire to see the world with a bayonet in my hand-oh!
So I tipped me hat to the government man and walked on down the street-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
A government man, he said to me now you’d look fine in Kaki-oh!
The government is in need of men, come read our proclamation-oh!
Two years conscription life for you will be a fine vacation-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
Well it may be so I said to him, but tell me if you can-oh!
If I’m old enough to carry your guns, am I old enough to hold too?
If I’m sent to fight in a foreign land not waring with Australia-oh!
What will you give as a guarantee that I’ll not come back in a coffin-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
Well the government man he looked at me and his smile was very mockin’-oh!
He looked at me from head to toe and said you must be jokin’-oh!
There’s adult pay and adventure too, and you’re marching in the army-oh!
I winked at a lady passing by and thought of raising a family-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
So to fight in other people’s wars, don’t get yourself conscripted-oh!
If Australian soil we must defend, then let’s all volunteer-oh!
But I have no desire to see the world with a bayonet in my hand-oh!
So I tipped me hat to the government man and walked on down the street-oh!
And it true me lad’s, it’s true me lads. To tell the truth I’m bound-oh!
There’s always trouble in the air with elections coming ‘round-oh!
Contributed by Bernart Bartleby - 2016/2/16 - 14:10
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Parole di Gary Shearston
La melodia è un adattamento della popolare inglese “The Derby Ram”
Nell’album intitolato “Gary Shearston Sings His Songs”
Testo trovato su YouTube come trascritto dal contributore, Artemis Fowl.
Canzone contro la coscrizione miliare voluta dal governo Australiano per sostenere la guerra americana in Vietnam.
Spesso infatti ci si dimentica che alcuni paesi mandarono in Indocina contingenti di soldati a sostegno degli USA. L’Australia, con 7.000 uomini, fu seconda soltanto alla Corea del Sud (48.000)…
“Perhaps this song, written a week after the announcement of conscription, anticipated the political and moral debates that were to come throughout Australia in following months. The tune is adapted from one of the fairly numerous Australian versions of an English folk song, The Derby Ram.”
(dalle note di copertina riportate sul sito dell’autore)