Beautifully irreverent and respectful! Long live Weill and Brecht!

*promote

-reminiscent of Ute Lemper or Lotte Lenya doing Weill and Brecht.

I'm guessing the poster of this video is calling this song a Doors classic because the second verse was changed from "Show us the way to the next pretty boy" to "Show me the way to the next little girl".

The original song is an all time classic by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill, and the writing credit should be theirs.

Brecht

Nice poem:) I think we need more Bertolt Brecht:

FROM A GERMAN WAR PRIMER

AMONGST THE HIGHLY PLACED
It is considered low to talk about food.
The fact is: they have
Already eaten.

The lowly must leave this earth
Without having tasted
Any good meat.

For wondering where they come from and
Where they are going
The fine evenings find them
Too exhausted.

They have not yet seen
The mountains and the great sea
When their time is already up.

If the lowly do not
Think about what’s low
They will never rise.

THE BREAD OF THE HUNGRY HAS
ALL BEEN EATEN
Meat has become unknown. Useless
The pouring out of the people’s sweat.
The laurel groves have been
Lopped down.
From the chimneys of the arms factories
Rises smoke.

THE HOUSE-PAINTER SPEAKS OF
GREAT TIMES TO COME
The forests still grow.
The fields still bear
The cities still stand.
The people still breathe.

ON THE CALENDAR THE DAY IS NOT
YET SHOWN
Every month, every day
Lies open still. One of those days
Is going to be marked with a cross.

THE WORKERS CRY OUT FOR BREAD
The merchants cry out for markets.
The unemployed were hungry. The employed
Are hungry now.
The hands that lay folded are busy again.
They are making shells.

THOSE WHO TAKE THE MEAT FROM THE TABLE
Teach contentment.
Those for whom the contribution is destined
Demand sacrifice.
Those who eat their fill speak to the hungry
Of wonderful times to come.
Those who lead the country into the abyss
Call ruling too difficult
For ordinary men.

WHEN THE LEADERS SPEAK OF PEACE
The common folk know
That war is coming.
When the leaders curse war
The mobilization order is already written out.

THOSE AT THE TOP SAY: PEACE
AND WAR
Are of different substance.
But their peace and their war
Are like wind and storm.

War grows from their peace
Like son from his mother
He bears
Her frightful features.

Their war kills
Whatever their peace
Has left over.

ON THE WALL WAS CHALKED:
They want war.
The man who wrote it
Has already fallen.

THOSE AT THE TOP SAY:
This way to glory.
Those down below say:
This way to the grave.

THE WAR WHICH IS COMING
Is not the first one. There were
Other wars before it.
When the last one came to an end
There were conquerors and conquered.
Among the conquered the common people
Starved. Among the conquerors
The common people starved too.

THOSE AT THE TOP SAY COMRADESHIP
Reigns in the army.
The truth of this is seen
In the cookhouse.
In their hearts should be
The selfsame courage. But
On their plates
Are two kinds of rations.

WHEN IT COMES TO MARCHING MANY DO NOT
KNOW
That their enemy is marching at their head.
The voice which gives them their orders
Is their enemy’s voice and
The man who speaks of the enemy
Is the enemy himself.

IT IS NIGHT
The married couples
Lie in their beds. The young women
Will bear orphans.

GENERAL, YOUR TANK IS A POWERFUL VEHICLE
It smashes down forests and crushes a hundred men.
But it has one defect:
It needs a driver.

General, your bomber is powerful.
It flies faster than a storm and carries more than an elephant.
But it has one defect:
It needs a mechanic.

General, man is very useful.
He can fly and he can kill.
But he has one defect:
He can think.

- Bertolt Brecht, from the Svendborg Poems (1938)

I agree-ethanol is a goddamn travesty-thank the money-printers(empire), working both sides against the middle-thank the hard-core head-in-ass environmentalists, their rabid lobbying, the media, all complicit-
thank the farmers who are paid to do what they are told.....follow the money, follow the money, follow the money-
Ethanol is a sick, twisted crime against humanity-
Drill for fucking oil, you fucking morons, OR-demand the alternatives from the people that keep them under lock and key to enslave us, and empower themselves-

the reality is this-ethanol makes NO DENT in the world food market-The reason food prices go up and down, and fuel prices go up and down, is because inflation, depression, etc...IS MANIPULATED means of control

How about some Brecht and Weill


What Keeps Mankind Alive?-(1928)

You gentlemen who think you have a mission
To purge us of the seven deadly sins
Should first sort out the basic food position
Then start your preaching, that’s where it begins

You lot who preach restraint and watch your waist as well
Should learn, for once, the way the world is run
However much you twist or whatever lies that you tell
Food is the first thing, morals follow on

So first make sure that those who are now starving
Get proper helpings when we all start carving
What keeps mankind alive?

What keeps mankind alive?
The fact that millions are daily tortured
Stifled, punished, silenced and oppressed
Mankind can keep alive thanks to its brilliance
In keeping its humanity repressed
And for once you must try not to shriek the facts
Mankind is kept alive by bestial acts

"Mack the Knife" or "The Ballad of Mack the Knife", originally "Die Moritat von Mackie Messer", is a song composed by Kurt Weill with lyrics by Bertolt Brecht for their music drama Die Dreigroschenoper, or, as it is known in English, The Threepenny Opera. It premiered in Berlin in 1928. The song has become a popular standard.

--http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mack_the_Knife

love her, got 2 Bert Brecht cd's a her..!

"Lotte Lenya certainly wasn't dressed like this!"....ah but she has, she has.....Weill and Brecht ran from the Nazis, they were there for the Bauhaus days and that bit of escape from structure....seen pics of Lenya in some pretty risque costumes

Bertold Brecht-10 February, 1898
Kurt Weill-2 March, 1900
Lotte Lenya October 18, 1899

.....got a musical flash, related to message..."Ballad of the Soldier's Wife"
Kurt Weill, and Bertold Brecht