Saturday, July 08, 2006

Words of a Prophet.

I grew up listening to these songs of freedom.

Get up, stand up: stand up for your rights!
Get up, stand up: don't give up the fight!

Preacherman, don't tell me,
Heaven is under the earth.
I know you don't know
What life is really worth.
It's not all that glitters is gold;
'Alf the story has never been told:
So now you see the light, eh!
Stand up for your rights. Come on!

Get up, stand up: stand up for your rights!
Get up, stand up: don't give up the fight!

Most people think,
Great God will come from the skies,
Take away everything
And make everybody feel high.
But if you know what life is worth,
You will look for yours on earth:
And now you see the light,
You stand up for your rights. Jah!

Get up, stand up! (Jah, Jah!)
Stand up for your rights! (Oh-hoo!)
Get up, stand up! (Get up, stand up!)
Don't give up the fight! (Life is your right!)
Get up, stand up! (So we can't give up the fight!)
Stand up for your rights! (Lord, Lord!)
Get up, stand up! (Keep on struggling on!)
Don't give up the fight! (Yeah!)

We sick an' tired of-a your ism-skism game -
Dyin' 'n' goin' to heaven in-a Jesus' name, Lord.
We know when we understand:
Almighty God is a living man.
You can fool some people sometimes,
But you can't fool all the people all the time.
So now we see the light (What you gonna do?),
We gonna stand up for our rights! (Yeah, yeah, yeah!)

So you better:
Get up, stand up! (In the morning! Git it up!)
Stand up for your rights! (Stand up for our rights!)
Get up, stand up..
.


Hear the children cryin',
but I know they cry not in vain.
Now the times are changin';
love has come to bloom again.

Smelling the air when spring comes by raindrops
reminds us of youthful days.
But now it's not rain that water the cane crops,
but the sweat from man's brow;
the substance from our spine.
We gotta keep on living, living on borrowed time:
Hallelujah time!

Yes, you can hear the children singing: Hallelujah time!
As they go singing by and by: Hallelujah time!
Oh, "hallelujah" singing in the morning.
Hallelujah time! Let them sing; don't let them cry.

Over rocks and mountains
the sheep are scattered all around.
Over hills and valleys,
they are everywhere to be found.
But though we bear our burdens now,
All afflictions got to end somehow:
From swinging the hammer, pulling the plough.

Why won't you let us be, to live in harmony?
We like to be free like birds in a tree.

Hallelujah time! Yes, you can hear the children singing.
Hallelujah time! Yes, as they go singing by and by.
Hallelujah time! Oh "hallelujah" singing in the morning.
Let them sing; never let them cry.
Hallelujah time! "Hallelujah" singin' in the morning.

This last one is my favourite. The album it was on came out after they killed him; a final irony.


Old pirates, yes, they rob I;
Sold I to the merchant ships,
Minutes after they took I
From the bottomless pit.
But my hand was made strong
By the 'and of the Almighty.
We forward in this generation
Triumphantly.
Won't you help to sing
These songs of freedom? -
'Cause all I ever have:
Redemption songs;
Redemption songs.

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our minds.
Have no fear for atomic energy,
'Cause none of them can stop the time.
How long shall they kill our prophets,
While we stand aside and look? Ooh!
Some say it's just a part of it:
We've got to fulfil de book.

Won't you help to sing
These songs of freedom? -
'Cause all I ever have:
Redemption songs;
Redemption songs;
Redemption songs.

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our mind.

Wo! Have no fear for atomic energy,
'Cause none of them-a can-a stop-a the time.

How long shall they kill our prophets,
While we stand aside and look?

Yes, some say it's just a part of it:
We've got to fulfil de book.

Won't you help to sing
Dese songs of freedom? -
'Cause all I ever had:
Redemption songs -
All I ever had:
Redemption songs:
These songs of freedom,
Songs of freedom.


The more Man smoke Herb, the more Babylon fall.

Lah.

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