Identified as a trouble maker by the authorities since childhood, and resolved to live up to the description, Charles Carreon soon discovered that mischief is most effectively fomented through speech. Having mastered the art of flinging verbal pipe-bombs and molotov cocktails at an early age, he refined his skills by writing legal briefs and journalistic exposes, while developing a poetic style that meandered from the lyrical to the political. Journey with him into the dark caves of the human experience, illuminated by the torch of an outraged sense of injustice.
In an hour of darkness
In an hour of grief
When we look to the news
And find no relief
A clown in the White House
Rules a vampire ball
Where the blood flows freely
Right through the halls
A front man is needed
For the main freak show
So out to the barracks
They presently go
They find a pliable man
With shoulders like stone
Who says what he means
And does what he’s told
And he’s got FOUR STARS
That General Petraeus
He’s got FOUR STARS
That’s four more than you
He’s got FOUR STARS
That’s enough to betray us
He’s got FOUR STARS
So what you gonna do?
When the refugees are in millions
And the prison’s filled with innocents
When car bombs detonate routinely
Still criticism’s unseemly
When a man with a multi-colored map
Sits down and tells you where it’s at
And answers every question
In just the perfect way
You gotta say
That’s why he’s got
FOUR STARS
Good ole General Petraeus
He’s got FOUR STARS
What’s that mean to you?
He’s got FOUR STARS
That’s enough to betray us
He’s got FOUR STARS
Just enough to pull us through
When history judges men
It does so with a mighty pen
A name may be forgotten
Or forever engraved in stone
For villainy, for virtue
For loyalty or treason,
For General Petraeus
They won’t have to find a reason
They’ll say he had
FOUR STARS
That he used to betray us
FOUR STARS
And a shell game on the news
FOUR STARS
Yeah that General Petraeus
He has FOUR STARS
That’s four more than you
From the Lair of the
Defense Command
Comes the order
Destroy all men
Destroy all creatures
That walk on two
Legs are verboten
And tits are, too.
How it began
we can't recall
First we drove them
Now they drive us all
We're like cattle
And they're the prod
Lay down and worship
The mechanical god
Do you remember
when we used to play
In the land called the USA?
Little children
and mothers too
On the swings in the skies of blue
Then there came that
Terrible day
When they burned
the skies away
Now it's black
from border to border
You know the law
It says we torture
Stay inside
Till the curfew's over
We're rounding up
some terrorists
So where's your son?
He's on the list
Wake up Wake up
The bad dream's over
Wake up, wake up,
We crossed the border
Wake up, wake up,
We killed the monster
Wake up little child
And hug your father
Oh no you don't
You little shit
You thought you'd get
Away with it
We caught you now
The fun is over
Your little friends
Your little games
Your big ideas
They're to blame.
In the movie
The hero finds
the great device
Plants it behind
the monster's eyes
Pulls the pin
And pays the price
Then it's off
to paradise
So this is it
The brand new order
No one is Free
Where are your papers?
This isn't you
In this picture
These prints are fake
she's not your sister
You're just another
war resister
You should have stood
When you had the chance
Now you're a victim
of circumstance
They give the orders
And you kneel down
Last thing you feel
Is the stony ground
Just wish you could have
said
Fuck you
And your fucking order
Your fucking guns
And fucking borders
Fuck you and your dollar bill
Fuck you and your torture skills
You'll have to kill me
to shut me up
Does anybody
Wanna back me up?
When you look on this world
Filled with sadness and grief
You might think that death
Is your only relief
But if you could just learn
To lie through your teeth
You wouldn't have to eat hamburger,
You'd dine on prime beef
Instead of smokin' shake,
You'd be tokin' fine spleef
Cause God loves a hypocrite
Sure as you're born
And a lie's the best shelter
From blame and scorn
The truth's just plain trouble,
But don't look so forlorn,
Just start spewin' bullshit
You'll find shelter from the storm
Some people are blessed
With a flexible tongue
That they occupy
With spreading cowdung
Whether lobbyists, lawyers,
Judges or thieves,
They make a fine dollar
From social disease
They all stand around
And share pats on the back
So glad to be one
Of such a fine bunch of chaps
Cause God loves a hypocrite
Sure as you're born
And a lie's the best shelter
From blame and scorn
The truth's just plain trouble,
But don't look so forlorn,
Just start spewin' bullshit
You'll find shelter from the storm
Some think that lying
Won't take you that far,
But to get someplace these days
You don't drive a car
You fire up a printing press
And co-opt TV,
Rig polls and elections
Pay folks to deceive --
When the votes are all counted
What a surprise!
The one who wins
Is the one who lies.
Cause God loves a hypocrite
Sure as you're born
And a lie's the best shelter
From blame and scorn
The truth's just plain trouble,
But don't look so forlorn,
Just start spewin' bullshit
You'll find shelter from the storm
Heaven’s perfect, so why should eye care?
They say that we’re all gonna end up there.
White light and blue sky, up on Cloud 9,
But down here there’s no time to be divine.
The earth is turning in the Milky Way,
I reckon that it’s gonna stay that way,
My momma bore me, my daddy taught me,
The earth will rest me in its heart someday.
Yeah heaven’s perfect, so why should eye care?
Don’t figure I could pay the rent up there.
White light and blue sky, up on Cloud 9
My neighbor says that it’s a real good time.
The highway’s filled with rollin’ automobiles
That whisk us through domesticated fields,
We rarely stop to see what’s on the way,
It always looks the same, anyway.
Yeah heaven’s perfect, and I might care,
If it was somethin’ like the County Fair
When some old blues band plays a funky tune
The beer is cold and it’s the middle of June.
They put another WalMart out this way,
They said it couldn’t wait another day,
They gave ‘em tax breaks, they gave us jobs,
Thank god that Michael Moore is such a slob.
Heaven’s perfect, as everyone knows,
The place where all good people go,
In glorious garments, that they’ve put on,
Arrive like soldiers on the shores of dawn.
Yeah heaven’s perfect, but I’m just not there,
A thousand promises won’t drag me there,
Yeah I’ll just stay here see what I can do
On my perfect Friday afternoon.
Heaven’s perfect, so why should eye care?
They say that we’re all gonna end up there.
White light and blue sky, up on Cloud 9,
But down here there’s no time to be divine.
The earth is turning in the Milky Way,
I reckon that it’s gonna stay that way,
My momma bore me, my daddy taught me,
The earth will rest me in its heart someday.
I was born down in Texas
Silver spoon in my nose
I tasted sweet senoritas
Hey you know how it goes
Then I went into politics
Man, I sure got it right
Made lots of money
Made even more friends
It was a fool's delight
At last I came to the castle
With the doors open wide
And I concluded without much ado,
Heaven's safe, but the profit's in Hell
Then I opened my Bible
And it showed me the way
There was voting on the Senate Floor
I thought I heard them say
Welcome to the Hotel Babylonia
Such an ancient place (such an ancient place)
There'll be no disgrace
Plenty of guns in the Hotel Babylonia
You can find terrorists here
Any time of year
Alberto is so helpful
He has explained so clear
How it is that I'm invincible
How the story ends
How they give me the power
How we do what we will
One voted to stay my knife
The others voted to kill
So I dialed up the Congress
"We need money and time"
They said take everything you need
We're drinking Jack Abramoff's wine
And I hear Achmed Chalabi calling
From far away
There's so much money here
that we can make
Come and we can play
We're living it up at the Hotel Babylonia
Such an ancient place (such an ancient place)
There'll be no disgrace
Plenty of guns in the Hotel Babylonia
You can find terrorists here
Any time of year
Baghdad's one big blister
Filled with murder and crime
And I've spent everything the world will earn
Until the end of time
And in the prison courtyard
We strung up old Saddam
But he died like an iron man
and on YOU TUBE he lives on
Now I try to remember
How I got to this place
I'm naked as a jaybird
Facing some disgrace
"Relax," says Maliki
We are glad to deceive
You'll be here another twenty years
Don't even try to leave
We're living it up at the Hotel Babylonia
Such an ancient place (such an ancient place)
There'll be no disgrace
Plenty of guns in the Hotel Babylonia
You can find terrorists here
Any time of year
Well it’s two-thousand seven
Feelin’ pretty far from heaven
Unable to rise
Above the debate
Degenerating into
Senseless Hate
Lily-livered preachers
And Southern Belles
Shack up together in Baghdad hotels
They schlep salvation in their private hells
Built by Halliburton
Cause the sacred sells
Now listen God Almighty
Got some questions for you
Why do the KKK love ya
And the Jews do to?
Is banking always sacred?
Isn’t oil, too?
Are you in it for the money?
Are you cut in, too?
I read an expose on you
It told me what you’re trying to do
It told me who you’ve bought
And who you’ve sold
The deals you cut in the Age of Gold
And I ain’t hatin’ Satan,
He didn’t do anything wrong
He was put up to it
Set up
Taken down
Like Saddam.
Why do you bless the virtuous hypocrite
Give ‘em wealth and all the rest of it
Leave little children dying
Mothers crying
Planet burning
Species dying
And I ain’t hatin’ Satan,
He didn’t do anything wrong
He was put up to it
Set up
Taken down
Like Saddam.
If you can’t control your creations,
If justice doesn’t exist,
Then wherefore are you God Almighty
What type of game is this?
And I ain’t hatin’ Satan,
He didn’t do anything wrong
He was put up to it
Set up
Taken down
Like Saddam.
Machines are the slaves
Of the modern day,
No need for men to labor
At a poor man’s pay
Microchips used to make me
Feel all right
They powered my iPod
And the tunes were tight
Then one day there came a money crunch
And a Chinese robot ate my lunch
And I became a Luddite
Overnight!
I used to carry my guitar
In a gunny sack
Go to Circle K
For a midnight snack
Hot dogs, pudding pops
Were really cool
I ate that shit
Like a fuckin’ fool
Then the doc said I had colon cancer
In a New York minute I had the answer
And I became a Luddite
Overnight!
I used to have a girlfriend
Her name was Rita
Then I got a computer
And I ceased to meet her
All night deep in Internet
Seein’ silicone chicks
Havin’ cybersex
Then one day I got my credit card bill
And I was a Jack without a Jill
Well who is Ricky Ricardo?
The plastic Latino
Married Lucille Ball
And played Cubano
In a Music Hall.
Lucy! Lucy!
I don’t love you
Not because of all the things you do
They say you’re funny
But I know you’re not
Lucy Lucy
I think you’re hot.
Your buddy Ethel is a laugh and a half
But I think you’ve
Got an incredible ass
Let’s get Ricky outta the way
I’m four years old
And it’s time to play
Lucy! Lucy!
I don’t love you
Not because of all the things you do
They say you’re funny
But I know you’re not
Lucy Lucy
I think you’re hot.
Hollywood is an incredible place
You’re like a clown with
Makeup on your face
You’re like a bird
Lookin’ weird and proud
You make my uncles laugh out loud.
Lucy! Lucy!
I don’t love you
Not because of all the things you do
They say you’re funny
But I know you’re not
Lucy Lucy
I think you’re hot.
I don’t love Lucy
No, no, no
She isn’t funny
Let me go
Stuck in the living room
She makes me twitch
Now where the hell do I feel that itch?
Lucy! Lucy!
I don’t love you
Not because of all the things you do
They say you’re funny
But I know you’re not
Lucy Lucy
I think you’re hot.
Lucy Lucy
I think you’re hot.
IT'S GONNA GET WORSE (BEFORE IT GETS BETTER), by Charles Carreon
Well the flood came down
Took the house away
Wouldn’t you know
That the porch would stay
On that beat up couch
With the cigarette burns
I can just sit here
While the world turns
And it’s gonna get worse
Before it gets better
I heard the guv’mnt lady say
Before she drove away
In her guv’mnt car
She was a real go-getter
But she never came back this way
I hope the neighbors didn’t catch her
Well eventually they brought some trailers in
Of formaldehyde, plastic and tin
I moved indoors one summer day
Now they wanna take it all away
I signed all the forms
And said what can I do?
They said maybe you can stay
A month or two
But it’s gonna get worse
Before it gets better
Money doesn’t grow on trees
And people aren’t honeybees
Yeah it always gets worse
Before it gets better
That’s what they always say
Forever and a day
Like Napoleon said at Waterloo
When the story’s wrote
Then you’re through
You can bitch and moan
You can cry and weep
Sign a gov’mnt loan
Get a repayment sheet
But it always gets worse
And it rarely gets better
There’s a bigger force in play
I heard that preacher say
Before they burned his church
And the weather got wetter
There’s always hell to pay
At least ‘till judgment day
‘Cause it’s gonna get worse
Before it gets better
So I take five shots a day
And now you’ll hear me say
It was worse
But now it's gotten better
If your life is plagued with discord,
and you can't get out of bed,
If you're hungover with sadness
and wish that you were dead,
If you've got a forty-five
pointed up against your head,
Then you might as well
become a Buddhist
And save a little lead.
Well if you dig the Mahayana
You don't have to cut your hair
And if you chant a little now
You'll have nothing to fear
When death comes strolling down the aisle
And extends his hand to you,
You'll say "my ticket's paid today,
So what more can I do?"
The Dharma's just for losers
At least that's what the Siddha said
When he rolled the final snake eyes
With the eyeballs from his head
And dakinis started cackling
Like buzzards in the sky
Then he clicked his heels
And grabbed his chick
And flew away on high.
It's Tantra, baby, on the hoof
Too hot to try to sell,
And if you don't believe me
We'll discuss it all in hell.
The family is twisted,
That's known around these parts,
The men will steal your car
While the women break your heart.
The crossing signs are switched up
All around this place,
When you play it, it's a Joker,
Though you swore you drew an Ace,
And the hit men play with apple pies
The girls are made of stone
And every word that flies about
Is sure to break a bone.
The guides have all gone crazy
In this place where travel's free,
There's nothing more amazing
Than to see one in a tree,
Laughing like a psycho
With his head inside a box
You'd swear he'd never heard
That little kids get chicken pox.
It's Tantra, baby, grab a bite
And hang on to your hat,
We'll feed you magic potions
And lay you on a mat,
We'll dance around you wildly
With flowers in our hair
And when you wake in our place
You are a billionaire.
When I was a little boy
On my daddy's knee
He told me we were livin'
In a democracy
Then I went off to high school
And took a civics class
They said the three-party system
Kicked socialism's ass
Now I'm paying taxes
And voting like I should
Won't somebody tell me
Why it don't do no good
We got a nut in the White House
Who thinks he's Jesus Christ
He thinks he died already
And this is paradise
Well you can call up the Congress
But it don't do no good
They're totally useless
Like a gun made of wood
So I went to the courthouse
And the Chief Justice said
That the Bill of Rights
Was officially dead.
Well I went to the preacher
I said this cannot be
He said son do not say that
It's perilous, you see
He said you see that statue
It's got a hidden bug
It's not the good Lord watchin'
The hawk has killed the dove
I said is nothing sacred?
He said not that I know
So I took my donation
And said I had to go
Next I went to the doctor
I said what's going on?
Has everyone gone crazy?
Don't tell me nothing's wrong
He said I ran all the tests
The results are sure
Everyone's stone deaf
And there is just no cure
So I went to the banker
Said what's the price of gold?
He said we don't stock that
It's under central control
But if you want some credit
I'll give it to you cheap
And then he smiled like the devil
Gave me the terminal creeps
So I went to the girl
Who walks the neighborhood streets
She said don't bother asking
I'm all out of treats
I said you must be kidding
At least you could be real
She said I'm giving up now
There's nothing left to steal
So I went to the airport
To get a ticket to fly
They said hey no way man
He's on the list, all right
They called security quickly
They put me in this can
And now I'm so glad to see you
We need to make a plan
Yeah but don't let 'em hear you
Here, just give me your hand
When night-time comes we'll make some plans
When the guard's asleep we'll make some plans.
LET'S GO BACK TO THE DAYS OF DIALUP, by Charles Carreon
I grew up without the Internet
And I ain’t never found a use for it yet
Yep, a horse and buggy is good enough
For a person who needs to move their stuff
Yeah, let’s go back to the days of dialup
We’ll get all the citizens riled up
Remembering about the good old days,
Good enough for me is the way it should stay.
When I get a look at that Internet porn
It makes me wanna blow my horn
It’s mighty hard to look the other way
When every pretty face just wants to play
So let’s go back to the days of dialup
The folks around here are all riled up
It wasn’t this way in the good old days
So let’s turn back the clock and quit the rat race
Yeah they’re all wrapped up in this fiber net
Never seen no good from it yet
Too many bills already to pay
What’s a poor local fellow to say?
But let’s go back to the days of dialup
Me and my friends are all riled up
You don’t need nothing we don’t understand
And we all agree it was a terrible plan
They say there ain’t no solution, we can’t fix nothin’
Can’t fire nobody or get an answer to a question
They must think we’re stupid or just don’t care
How much we pay for light and air
So let’s go back to the days of dialup
All say “aye” and stand up
Don’t have to understand when you know what you’re doin’
And I’m pretty darned sure it’s not myself I’m screwin’
We’re headed back to the days of dialup
Better get used to sayin’ “giddy-up,”
’Cause the past was fast, but the future will be slower.
You can honk your horn, but we won’t pull over.
