Thanks for the historical reference. What did that commie nut mean when he put it on his guitar?
Mussolini
Anyway,
We are the folk song army,
Every one of us cares.
We all hate poverty, war, and injustice
Unlike the rest of you squares.
There are innocuous folk songs, yeah,
But we regard 'em with scorn.
The folks who sing 'em have no social conscience,
Why, they don't even care if Jimmy Crack Corn.
If you feel dissatisfaction,
Strum your frustrations away.
Some people may prefer action,
But give me a folk song any old day.
The tune don't have to be clever,
And it don't matter if you put a couple extra syllables into a line.
It sounds more ethnic if it ain't good English
And it don't even gotta rhyme... (excuse me: rhyne!)
Remember the war against Franco?
That's the kind where each of us belongs.
Though he may have won all the battles,
We had all the good songs!
So join in the folk song army!
Guitars are the weapons we bring
To the fight against poverty, war, and injustice.
Ready, aim, sing!
--Tom Lehrer
"Thanks for the historical reference. What did that commie nut mean when he put it on his guitar?"
Just for the sake of history:
When Woody Guthrie talked about killing fascists, he meant capital-F Fascists in the 1940's sense of the word, which was coined by Mussolini. Guthrie volunteered for WWII even though he was in his thirties and raising children.
That "commie nut" meant that music, as a form of expression, stands against negative ideals like fascism.
The labor, communist, communalist and "left-wing" groups went from a stance of neutrality in World War II to an anti-facist stance as the United States entered the war. Howard Zinn goes into great depth of being swept up in the feeling that the violence was justified in "You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train," ultimately coming to the conclusion that the bombing missions he flew in WWII, even though they were aimed at stopping the fascist tide, were still against his own personal belief of non-violence.
Guthrie was one of several prominent folk singers who, with the US entering the war, changed positions from singing songs protesting war to embracing it. "This machine kills fascists" is constantly being referenced by other musicians, from English folk singer Donovan's variation, "This machine kills," to Harvard grad and rock and roller Tom Morello's "Arm the Homeless" guitar.