I'm thinking of the glories of Western Civilization. Yeah, the wonderment of sewers and poverty, of rich Libertarians and government lies, of chemical sterilization and religious fanatics. All things bright and beautiful and so on.

I'm relatively incoherent tonight, striving to put these skeins of thought into relative order, into a passing semblance of logic yet failing. Some days it is difficult for me to put a sentence together properly. Some days I'm caught thinking only in phrases, rude and stubborn clumps of words, rebellious in their wired desire to stand out. This is one of those days. So here are some lyrics from an old Tonio K. song from 1978, The Funky Western Civilization. The curmudgeon in me likes them. They are not deep and they are not brilliant but I find them funny.

come on everybody
get on your feet
get with the beat
there's a brand new dance craze
sweeping the nation
and its called the funky western civilization

well there's a riot at the courthouse
there's a fire in the street
there's a sinner bein' trampled
by a thousand pious feet
there's a baby
every minute
bein' born without a chance
now don't that make you want to jump
right up
and start to dance?

let's do the funky
the funky western civilization
it's really spunky
it's just like a summertime vacation
... [lyric omitted due to ironic but sexist content.]

they put jesus on a cross
they put a hole in j.f.k.
they put hitler in the driver's seat
and looked the other way
now they've got poison in the water
and the whole world in a trance
but just because we're hypnotized
that don't mean we can't dance

Labels: songs