And We Have All These Questions to Make Us Go Roam..

And we’ve got all this distance to make us come home.
As the sun burns, a child learns, the tide churns, the world turns.


When I was in Chicago the week before last I was taught a new singer and a great new song by my two and half year old niece, Shunie: Antje Duvekot, Merry-Go-Round.

When we would be riding about the city in the Honda mini-van Shatay and Matt would always have groovy folk inflected kids music playing. No Wiggles like crap amongst us, thank God. That stuff is simply obnoxious. I firmly believe that music should be shared across generations. All this "generation gap" crap is mostly nonsense now anyhow, especially now that the great technological revolutions (in film, video and recorded sound) are essentially complete. We all own Elvis these days, and the interim is all in color. The past 40 years is more intimate to us now than the 50's where to me when I was ten (that's in 1981, 20 something years before). When you've lived through everything from Black Sabbath, the Clash to Nirvana, the power of music to shock and divide is pretty much null, anyway.

That's just to say that I have the same stance toward the Wiggles as I do Lady Gaga: they both suck because their aural and visual (and hence spiritual) aesthetics are ugly.

Anyhow, I was really pleased to hear the music that Matt and Shatay have been playing for the girls. A lot of old folk songs and children's classics, but done in a groovy modern folk style that really impressed me.


Shunie's a precocious 2 year old in that she's talking in full, complex sentences. One of the most loquacious two-year olds of my limited acquaintance. She also really likes music. She's like a little general, too, in that she's not afraid to tell you when she likes, dislikes, or wants something. When a song she likes ends, you'll immediately hear her pipe up from the back seat "Again!" And Shatay, Matt or I (if I was the only one there) would be expected to hit the repeat button, and play that particular song again.


This song is one of her particular favorites. I'd never heard it before, and when I heard it immediately fell in love with it. It has apparently been used as the soundtrack to a Bank of America commercial. The singer and composer, Antje Duvekot, needs cash on the barrel head just like the rest of us, and isn't above selling her poetry to scummy usurers, or performing on cruise ships to the delectation of the besotted petit bourgeois, as the video clip I'm posting here proves.

It's a great song, in any case, even if one or two of the lines are false. The truth is never worthless. No one should ever lie. Notice how she loses her breath at that very line in the performance here? Just so. That line's crap.

Those few quibbles aside, I have say that this song is great, and that like my very discerning niece Shunie, I can't get enough of it. I keep hitting play, over and over again.

Hope you like it, too:

Lyrics:

Someone is tossing petals in a stream,
Somewhere someone is standing at the foothills of their dreams.
Someone got a paintbrush, is painting over doubts,
Someone opened up his eyes and saw the sun coming out.
Someone was captive and found the courage to get off,
Throw a boulder in the well, somewhere the rain has stopped.
Someone is finding the place where they belong..

Well, everyday is summer somewhere in the world,
And the summer boys are headed for the falls to kiss the girls.
With their impatient hands groping honey breasts and curls,
They are filled with desire.
And high in the hills there's a baby being born,
As forgiveness and peace wash over bruises and sores,
People bridging the distance over nettles and thorns.

Everyone aboard on the merry-go-round,
Some things will rise up so that others come down.
If the devil don't dance, heaven won't shine.
It's a mighty thick haze and it's a pretty thin line.
If the facuet is tightened up the love won't flow,
If the love isn't bright enough the corn won't grow.
If the night isn't dark enough the moon won't glow..

A rich man counting money, a tired man counting sheep,
While the safe man counts his blessings, the hungry man has beans.
There's a million people praying, raising up their eyes,
To what turns out to be the same god, the same sky.
We are slightly scared of death, a little bit afraid,
So we celebrate everything we can think to celebrate.
We shall sing out loud to keep the hounds away..

Everyone aboard on the merry-go-round,
Some things will rise up so that others come down.
If the devil don't dance, heaven won't shine.
It's a mighty thick haze and it's a pretty thin line.
If the facuet is tightened up the love won't flow,
If the love isn't bright enough the corn won't grow.
If the night isn't dark enough the moon won't glow..

Prisons will crumble and governments will fall,
It's the order of freedom to be preceded by walls.
'Cause the truth would be worthless if no one ever lied,
So we carry our shame in the interest of pride.
And we have all these questions to make us go roam,
And we’ve got all this distance to make us come home.
As the sun burns, a child learns, the tide churns, the world turns..

Everyone aboard on the merry-go-round,
Some things will rise up so that others come down.
If the devil don't dance, heaven won't shine.
It's a mighty thick haze and it's a pretty thin line.
If the facuet is tightened up the love won't flow,
If the love isn't bright enough the corn won't grow.
If the night isn't dark enough the moon won't glow..


[As a note and aside,  Antje kinda looks like Shatay.  Similar personal vibe, too, like in this clip especially: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eji97jgOgFw  ]



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