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DONKEY DAYS
By Shadow Album: Shadow Enchanted, T&T, 1995
Back in the days of the pitch oil lamp
When girl was darling, boy was scamp
Stealing mangoes in the dark
The black cock crow and the bulldog bark
Those were the days of the donkey cart
The donkey story breaks my heart
Donkey working all day long
A donkey's work was never done
You think it easy for a poor donkey
To be transport for a family?
He got to tote up the mango
He got to tote up the cocoa
He got to tote up the dry wood
He got to tote up the green wood.
And then big belly man want to jump on his back
Fat belly man want to jump on his back
Thin belly man want to jump on his back
All dem wind belly man want to jump on his back.
Donkey had no rest time, no no, still after sunset time
As soon as he wake up, he had no time for makeup
Because fat bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Black bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Thin bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Wind bumsee boy want to go for a ride
On the poor little donkey [they want a ride]
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah
I sorry for the donkey [they want a ride]
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Those were the days of the La Diablesse
The pretty, pretty girl with the long, long dress
She would watch you in your eyes
She would have you hypnotise
Take you down to a lonely place
Show you she cow foot, skin up she face
The only escape for you got to be a miracle.
Donkey never send you to look for girl
Donkey got to come to your funeral
He got to tote up your coffin
All your big belly soften
All your muddy-up sliders
Plus a lot of joy riders
Big belly man want to jump on his back
All dem fat belly man want to jump on his back
Thin belly man want to jump on his back
A lot of wind belly man want to jump on his back.
Donkey had no rest time, no no, still after sunset time
As soon as he wake up, he had no time for makeup
Because fat bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Black bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Thin bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Wind bumsee boy want to go for a ride.
Poor little donkey [they want a ride]
Pretty little donkey [they want a ride]
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
All dem fat bumsee boy
All dem black bumsee boy
All dem thin bumsee boy
All dem wind bumsee boy [they want a ride]
Those were the days of the Jumbie man
They used to come back from down Jumbie land
Face to face with your cousin, Joe
You went to his funeral a long time ago
He stretch out his hand to give you a shake
Is another corner you looking to take
You run so fast, you fall in the grass
More work for the poor jackass.
He got to tote up your body
And fus your big belly heavy
Plus your muddy-up sliders
Plus a lot of joy riders
Big belly man want to jump on his back
Fat belly man want to jump on his back
Thin belly man want to jump on his back
Wind belly man want to jump on his back
Donkey had no rest time, no no, still after sunset time
As soon as he wake up, he had no time for makeup
Because fat bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Black bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Thin bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Wind bumsee boy want to go for a ride
Poor little donkey [they want a ride]
Yeah, yeah, yeah [they want a ride]
All dem fat bumsee boy
All dem black bumsee boy
All dem thin bumsee boy
All dem wind bumsee boy [they want a ride]
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey, yeah, yeah
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey, yeah, yeah
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey
All dem fat bumsee boy [they want a ride]
All dem black bumsee boy [they want a ride]
All dem thin bumsee boy [they want a ride]
All dem wind bumsee boy [they want a ride]
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey, yeah yeah
Gimme me a ride on yuh donkey
Poor little donkey, yeah [they want a ride]
Poor little donkey [they want a ride]
All dem fat bumsee boy
All dem black bumsee boy...
Source: The lyrics posted on this blog are often transcribed directly from performances. Although it is my intention to faithfully transcribe I do not get all the words and I have a knack for hearing the wrong thing. Please feel free to correct me or to fill in the words that I miss by dropping me a message via e-mail. I'd be forever grateful. Thanks in advance!
.............................................................................................................................. 
A Note From The Gull [First posted 5/1/2010
Thank you, Shadow!
These days I cannot seem to get enough of Shadow's "Donkey Days". This world seems to be roiling with a deep unease manifesting in catastrophes, wars and rumours of wars, the "godly" caught left, right and centre with their pants around their ungodly ankles, politicians possessed by a determination to prove to all (who are paying attention) that they are in fact even more ignorant and destructive than we imagined them to be. So maybe "Donkey Days" sums it all up for me. The poor little donkey represents Gaia - groaning creation patiently suffering the unreasonable demands and unthinking assaults we've been increasingly piling on its back. The donkey can also represent all the long suffering citizens of this country and of this world who take and take and take. I've heard about the camel's back and the straw that broke it, but what will it take for the donkey to say, "No more!" So the headphones hug my ears and the volume is at maximum as I listen to "Donkey Days" over and over and over... It is not escapism, I don't think. It is my way of channeling my reflections while reducing the cacophony around me to one unifying, hypnotic rhythm. Everything is connected. I will say again and again that The Shadow's work is pure genius.
"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.
Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.
Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare
6 comments:
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to listen to Shadow's masterful blend of lyrics and musical arrangement, but what I appreciated even more was your distillation of the absurd, irrational elements of the current human condition.
Your summation "everything is connected" evolves so naturally from your examples of the 'unreasonable demands and unthinking assaults" that have resulted from failure to see that connection.
A thinking person here cringes everyday at every new vocal and bizarre manifestation of that failure to see such connections by that many legged mob that calls itself the "Tea Party".
Louis, thanks for visiting and your thoughtful comment. So good to hear from you and to share my love of Shadow's music with you.
About the Tea Party, if the winds and Gulf Stream push the spill around Florida and up the east coast, they might just have a Boston Oil Party instead. By the way, have you heard one "Drill, baby, drill!" recently? Hope a miracle happens though, for the sake of the innocent environment and the wildlife that will suffer the immediate and worst blows.
Blessings to you and yours.
If the damage (environmental, emotional, personal and intellectual) and the influence and the hypocrisy weren't so deplorable it would be amusing watching those Republican senators now squirming to distance themselves from the very slogan that they promoted with perverse glee during the Presidential Election while still pushing for such drilling.One new version, which they insist does not mean the same as the original is "Drill here, drill now".
I am not sure I know the meaning of the expression "Oil Down" and i am sure it wouldn't fit, but it did come to this expat's mind when you mentioned that Boston Oil Party.
Thanks for that, Louis. I had not heard about that new version of the slogan but I thought that the original had been buried by the more apt, "Spill, baby, spill" that has been making the rounds. It will take some genius, or more likely, mass amnesia/delusion to put a positive spin on this industry.
About the Oil Down, here is one recipe for "Vegetarian Cassava Oil Down" and and you will see that this deliciousity is far removed from the toxic brew that is belching up from below the ocean floor.
Don't think that our Trinbago hasn't been quietly paying a price too and according to the Intergovernmental Marine Consultative Organization, Trinidad is classified as a high risk area for oil spills in the Caribbean region. "Kill, baby, kill."
Blessings
GG, Thanks for turning the spotlight on these songs that we've either taken for granted or simply ignored.
Anon,
Thanks for visiting and for the comment. You are thanking me for doing the easiest thing of all - loving the lovable.
I often find myself thinking about Shadow's work and especially what I call the elemental stuff. Words like "hypnotic" and "entrancing" come to mind. I wonder where he stands in the pantheon of great Trinbagonian musicians, about what influenced him and also which performers have been influenced by his work.
Sometimes I think I hear echoes of his style in one other band but I have to to think about that some more and find the evidence to support that claim before I say which band. Anyway, I like to believe that his uniqueness is a result of his having special permission to travel freely between the surface world and the increasingly subducted but more real world of the folk consciousness.
I see him as a channeler, who also helps to keep the lines of communication open by simply using them. More recently, "psychedelia" has been coming to mind but I'm wary of using it because there is a suggestion of mind alteration with that word which is not what Shadow is about. He is more about the connection to a primordial, natural, pre-altered state. The bassman is definitely in his head but it is also in our heads and when we are receptive to Shadow as medium, all our bassmen begin to resonate in sync.
Turn up the volume and close your eyes and listen, really listen, to Donkey Days.
I keep on loving the offerings from the hearts of our best musicians.
Blessings
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