Labor-lore and Working Class Culture

Add a Comment

Comment by Julie Horne on December 22, 2012 at 18:57

recording of 'old oaken bucket' on you tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI4ej8b1VeE

this is the tune used for 'dollar alarm clock'

Comment by Julie Horne on December 22, 2012 at 18:56

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpfhDZfa478

"Dollar Alarm Clock"

(tune of "Old Oaken Bucket")

Comment by Nathan Moore on December 20, 2012 at 3:36

Viola: Does the IWW songbook say it that song was written to a specific melody?  Just curious.  

Comment by Viola Wilkins on December 20, 2012 at 3:28

DOLLAR ALARM CLOCK

(John Healy)

How dear to my heart are those chimes in the morning

That yank me from bed with melodious thrill;

How sweet is the sound of the regular warning

That yells that it's time that I hike to the mill.

Without it I'd sleep till the sun had arisen,

Be late to the job that my boss lets me use;

Get canned, perhaps steal, maybe land in a prison,

If the chimes didn't hustle me out of my snooze.

Chorus: The faithful alarm clock;

The rattling alarm clock;

The dollar alarm clock

That rests on my shelf.

What a blessing it was when the thing was invented:

It beats the slave -driver who came with his stick;

It rests on the shelf in the shack that I rented;

It never gets hungry, it never gets sick.

If overly weary I take a tin bucket

And place the alarm clock down into the thing;

When it chimes in the morning it doubles the racket;

It would wake up the dead when the two of them ring.

Sometimes the good woman gets worn and weary

And says we are hauling too much of a load;

I tell her the journey would look still more dreary

If the dollar alarm clock should fail to explode.

Then here's to my booster that only needs winding;

And here's to the victim that just keeps alive,

The boss gets the money and I do the grinding

The clock starts the circus at quarter past five.

 

tune: Old Oaken Bucket

From IWW Songbook, 1918

Comment by Nathan Moore on December 18, 2012 at 1:51

Comment by Nathan Moore on December 18, 2012 at 1:49

Awesome!  Thanks, Viola!  Nice find.

Comment by Viola Wilkins on December 18, 2012 at 0:44

Ye olde socialist songbook
http://www.mediafire.com/view/?o6tbi8b3qf6dgbw

Comment by Sarah Laird on October 17, 2012 at 20:44

Wondering if anyone knows and could supply the chords to the song 'the Socialist ABC' which appears in the play 'Close the Coalhouse Door' written by Alan Plater, music by Alex Glasgow.

Comment by Viola Wilkins on October 12, 2012 at 1:40

Joe Hill's ashes song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkCwYUl_Gh8

Comment by Nathan Moore on June 23, 2012 at 7:06

Check out my new film "We Just Come To Work Here" The Music of Harry Stamper.  It examines the life and music of the late folksinger who wrote many songs about the labor movement, including the classic "We Just Come To Work Here (We Don't Come To Die)."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45gjdMY4bgo

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• …
• 19
• Next ›
• Page