Shaking hands and fingers that do tremble
Soldier's Joy has been a bitter pill
Though in battle, a brave man I resemble
Alone I am a coward without will
Pierce McGee from the great State of Missouri
To the Show-Me-State militia I belong
And to judge from the pride on the Confederate side
I'd say five hundred thousand rebels can't be wrong
A rebel stand is no place for a traitor
A loveless Union cannot bend us to her will
Cannot command the soldiers who now hate her
Nor demand the fealty of her generals
I took a rifle ball in my shoulder
But my entire body filled with pain
I pleaded with them all at the field hospital
"Oh, God, another shot of morphine!"
Soldier's Joy oh what's the point in pleasure
When it's only meant to kill the pain
Lay down my arms and take the coffin's measure
Or take up arms and send me out to fight again
Shaking hands...was I a coward, was I brave?
With shaking hands, I took the bitter pill
Now tell the story on my grave, my soul they could not save
What the bullet would not kill, the needle will.
Soldier's Joy has been a bitter pill
Though in battle, a brave man I resemble
Alone I am a coward without will
Pierce McGee from the great State of Missouri
To the Show-Me-State militia I belong
And to judge from the pride on the Confederate side
I'd say five hundred thousand rebels can't be wrong
A rebel stand is no place for a traitor
A loveless Union cannot bend us to her will
Cannot command the soldiers who now hate her
Nor demand the fealty of her generals
I took a rifle ball in my shoulder
But my entire body filled with pain
I pleaded with them all at the field hospital
"Oh, God, another shot of morphine!"
Soldier's Joy oh what's the point in pleasure
When it's only meant to kill the pain
Lay down my arms and take the coffin's measure
Or take up arms and send me out to fight again
Shaking hands...was I a coward, was I brave?
With shaking hands, I took the bitter pill
Now tell the story on my grave, my soul they could not save
What the bullet would not kill, the needle will.
Contributed by Alessandro - 2009/6/10 - 11:10
Sotto il nome di Guy Clark avete messo che questa canzone è cantata anche da lui: non è così! La canzone di Guy Clark è un'altra cosa. Ora ve la mando.
Renato Stecca - 2013/8/23 - 23:43
Caro Renato, la canzone di Guy Clark c'è già sul sito ed è questa: Soldier's Joy, 1864. Come giustamente ci segnali, il titolo giusto è "Soldier's Joy, 1864" quindi abbiamo corretto aggiungendo la data.
CCG Staff - 2013/8/23 - 23:50
Scusate, mi sono confuso, perchè non avevo visto che c'era anche la canzone "vera" di Guy Clark. Che comunque s'intitola "Soldier's Joy, 1864". Ciao.
Renato Stecca - 2013/8/23 - 23:58
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Note for non-Italian users: Sorry, though the interface of this website is translated into English, most commentaries and biographies are in Italian and/or in other languages like French, German, Spanish, Russian etc.
Album “Arkansas Traveler”
Nell’album “Arkansas Traveler” la Shocked, avvalendosi di prestigiose collaborazioni come Taj Mahal, The Band e Uncle Tupelo, è andata alla riscoperta, e addirittura a riscrivere, alcune delle canzoni più celebri dell’american roots music.
Stando a quanto scrive Arnold Rypens nel suo “The Originals” (1996), “Soldier’s Joy”, di autore sconosciuto, è una canzone che risale al XVIII secolo. Il motivo, di origine irlandese, diffusosi durante la Guerra Civile americana, era anche noto come “The King's Head” (da cui il titolo alternativo della Shocked, “Shaking Hands”). La prima registrazione conosciuta di “Soldier’s Joy” è quella della Victor Military Band del 1915. Molti artisti l’hanno interpretata: Skillet Lickers (1931), Jimmy Driftwood (1957), Jerry Reed (1958), Hawkshaw Hawkins (1959), Nitty Gritty Dirty Band (1973) per finire con la versione originale di Guy Clark, “Soldier’s Joy, 1864” del 2002, presente sulle CCG/AWS.
Quando postai quest’ultima versione non avevo capito il senso del testo. Oggi, grazie al sito Graffiti Limbo, dove i testi della Shocked sono spiegati, scopro che “la gioia del soldato” altro non è che la morfina che, evidentemente fin dal ‘700. veniva generosamente profusa ai maciullati che sui campi di battaglia non avevano la fortuna di morire sul colpo… Come non ricordare la celebre ed agghiacciante scena del soldato americano, sbudellato dai giapponesi a Guadalcanal, che invoca la morfina e se ne inietta tre siringhe nella coscia, nel film “The Thin Red Line” di Terrence Malick?
Da un’intervista alla Shoked del 1992: “Here's another fiddle tune that my father taught me called Soldier's Joy. I asked him what does that mean -- soldier's joy -- and my father told me that it's an old word for morphine. He told me that back during the Civil War they didn't have such good conditions in the field hospitals and that if you got shot they would send you to the field hospital and give you a bunch of morphine. If you was lucky they sent you back out to fight again and you died, and if you weren't lucky they sent you back out to fight again only you didn't die. Instead, you went home from the war and you'd probably lost your arm or your leg to gangrene and then you had a life-long addiction to morphine.”