Get all 50 Joe Solo releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Songs For Our Times EP, No Pasaran- 10th Anniversary Edition, 'WELCOME TO JOETOWN'- The Joe Solo Podcast, Keeping On, Farewell Hatfield Main, Sledgehammer Songs, Twenty From Twenty, Answer Machine/See You When I Get There, and 42 more.
1. |
Song For Our Times
03:55
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I'm singing a song for our times
No riddles just rhythms and rhymes
And I'm stood on these old battle lines, my friends
Singing a song for our times
I've penned you a paean for these days
For the millions lost out in the maze
Of today's brand new culture war craze, my friends
I've penned you a paean for these days
Where the overwhelmed masses have all given up
Cos their half-empty glass is a privatised cup
And they know someone's dying but don't want to look
I'm singing a song for our times
I'm singing a song for our times
Where our taxes help pay for war crimes
And we're willingly deaf, dumb, and blind, my friends
Singing a song for our times
Did the tour guide inform you that all here are friends?
There's an armed guard outside for your Mercedes Benz?
Every last grain of sand here's been ethnically cleansed
I'm singing a song for our times
I'm singing a song for our times
Where they jail you for holding a sign
Does the punishment still fit the crime here, friends?
I'm singing a song for our times
Where the Reformers dream of some racist utopia
Built on white privilege and Islamophobia
Try to speak up and they'll just troll all over you
Singing a song for our times
I'm singing a song for our times
Where hidden behind the headlines
Are a million or more class war crimes, my friends
I'm singing a song for our times
See, the reason this country is down on its knees
Is we all fight the symptoms but not the disease
All you singers, you poets, I'm begging you please
Won't you sing us a song for our times
Where the libraries burn and the straight arms are rising
Their palms to the floor against this bloodshot horizon
If you're running scared then that's hardly surprising
But I'm singing a song for our times
I've been stabbed in the back, I've felt their double-dealing
I'll die on my feet, thanks, I'm not one for kneeling
I'll stand up here tall and sing once more with feeling
This is a song for our times
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2. |
Calling It Out
02:51
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They're rewriting history in front of our eyes
They've hidden the truth with a blanket of lies
Through the deafening silence I'm still in no doubt
That one day we'll all have been calling it out
You scroll past the post cos you're not in the mood
For news that they shoot at kids queueing for food
Now it's dodging the snipers or going without
But one day we'll all have been calling it out
One day we'll all have been
All have been calling it out
One day we'll all have been calling it out
So where do you run with no safe place to hide?
When the only ones saying it's not genocide
Are the ones with the guns and the bombs and the clout?
One day we'll all of been calling it out
One day we'll all have been
All have been calling it out
One day we'll all have been calling it out
Now I've never been one you'd accuse of being vague
And I hope those bastards end up in The Hague
And let history record what this all was about
One day we'll all of been calling it out
One day we'll all have been
All have been calling it out
One day we'll all have been calling it out
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3. |
Rich History
02:34
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n every town in the country
Their shadows hang over the square
Eclipsing good folks in their passing
The once high and mighty stand there
Their arrogance cast now in iron
And targets for pigeons in flight
Bathed by the mumbling leanings
Of a century of drunks on a Saturday night
Chorus:
So rise up all ye children
Who died in his mines
Rise up all ye workers
Who paid for his crimes
Rise up from your graves
And let everyone see
The truth that they hide
In their Rich History
I think of the women who fought for their families
Through that long winter of 84
While them like him sent in the coppers
With their curfews and martial law
If it was up to me who got the statue
It wouldn't be one of the boss
But the women who rose from the coalfields
Not that bastard up there on his hoss
Chorus:
So rise up all ye children
Who died in his mines
Rise up all ye workers
Who paid for his crimes
Rise up from your graves
And let everyone see
The truth that they hide
In their Rich History
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4. |
N.W.B.C.W
02:54
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Give me news now that's not propaganda
Or an image that isn't AI
You can keep your rage bait
I won't amplify hate
Cos it's all just a cut-and-paste lie
Ch:
Give me no war but class war
Give me no war but class war
Cos there's no war but class war
Can ever bring peace to the world
Is that honestly your voice we're hearing?
The one that speaks when you tap on a screen?
Cos if not, you're being used
You've been groomed and abused
Bet you won't spread that round on a meme
Ch:
Give me no war but class war
Give me no war but class war
Cos there's no war but class war
Can ever bring peace to the world
You say it's a fight for your country
But you're getting the enemy wrong
The rich make a mint here
And you'd still be skint here
With every last immigrant gone
Ch:
Give me no war but class war
Give me no war but class war
Cos there's no war but class war
Can ever bring peace to the world
Can you hear now the deafening silence?
Cos it's white faces murdering brown?
Now imagine the noise
For deploying 'Our Boys'
If that was the other way round
Ch:
Give me no war but class war
Give me no war but class war
Cos there's no war but class war
Can ever bring peace to the world
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5. |
England Has Gone To Hell
02:25
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t's the swastika daubed
On a neighbour's front door
It's the march
With the Nazi salutes
On dog-whistle TV
The answers are easy
And a flagrant abuse
Of the truth
If you love your country so much
That you're throwing
A brick at an empty hotel
Don't look for England
In all the old places
England has gone to hell
Grifters and chancers
Sell their easy answers
While fanning the flames
Of your hate
All their intrusions
And soundbite solutions
Are there to shut down
All debate
So don't look for truth
Up there on the ledge
It's in the blood splatter
Here where it fell
And don't look for England
In all the old places
England has gone to hell
Professional bigots
Are all cashing in
On the rage that their words
Can inspire
There for distraction
And fuelled by reaction
They pour petrol
On your bonfire
And although you're being tricked
Into making them rich
You still slaver when they ring the bell
But don't look for England
In all the old places
England has gone to hell
Puffed up with pride
You took your enemy's side
And stabbed your class in the back as you fell
Don't look for England in all the old places
That England has gone to hell
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6. |
A New Way To Resist
01:46
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They'll say we were warned of what would come
They'll say that our last song has been sung
They'll say that our friends have all been turned
They'll say that our books were banned then burned
They'll say that my old ideas are dead
Our words are removed before they're read
Then one day we'll just cease to exist
We need a new way to resist
I bet those London streets will see
A hundred marches A to B
While the real battle's going down
In long forgotten northern towns
You can get five years for singing songs
Or through infiltrating Zoom anons
What kind of free country is this?
We need a new way to resist
Do you see now the feedback loop they make
With division for division's sake?
How algorithms canvas votes
Through complex themes in bitesize quotes?
Do you see now how all these empires rise
Cos no-one can tell the truth from lies?
How all of that has led to this?
We need a new way to resist
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Joe Solo Scarborough, UK
Joe Solo is an award-winning musician, writer, poet, activist, broadcaster and washing machine engineer from
Scarborough.
Live he has an ever growing reputation as both a performer and raconteur, being thought-provoking, comical and punch-the-air political often in the same breath.
He is not an artist you forget in a hurry.
... more
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