IWW singer and storyteller Utah Phillips dead at 73.

[Ken Burch]

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5g4nN0dSXk7jr5M8y0GA4L0Q9kjUA

(I'm posting this here because it was in Saturday's paper and the LBN time fascists might delete it over that technicality).

Utah was a great singer and a fighter for the working class.

You can hear some of his songs on YouTube.

As Joe Hill said "Don't mourn. Organize."

[Finn Polke]

1. Utah, a hero I unreservedly memorialize

Utah Phillips, great friend of the working class, great performer, a real hero I have always looked up to. Sad that he is gone but his spirit will live on.

Thanks for posting this, Ken.

[Ken Burch]

2. Here's a recording of Utah singing one of his great songs.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3428972345229046017&q=Utah+Phillips&ei=W3s7SKWzKY-WrgPJ7vX1Aw&hl=en

[Ken Burch]

3. And the lyrics of another couple of them

All Used Up
( U. Utah Phillips) Larimer Street


I spent my whole life making somebody rich
I busted my ass for that son of a bitch
And he left me to die like a dog in a ditch
And told me I'm all used up.

He used up my labor, he used up my time
He plundered my body and squandered my mind
Then he gave me a pension, some handouts and wine
And told me I'm all used up

My kids are in hock to a god you call Work
Slaving their lives out for some other jerk
And my youngest in 'Frisco just made shipping-clerk
He don't know I'm all used up

Some young people reach out for power and gold
And they don't have respect for anything old
For pennies they're bought, for promises sold
Someday they'll be used up

They use up the oil, they use up the trees
They use up the air and they use up the seas
But how about you, friend, and how about me
What's left, when we're all used up

I'll finish my life in this crummy hotel
It's lousy with bugs and my God, what a smell
But my plumbing still works and I'm clear as a bell
Don't tell me I'm all used up

Outside my window the world passes by
It gives me a handout, then spits in my eye
And no one can tell me, 'cause no one knows why
I'm still living, but I'm all used up

Sometimes in a dream I sit by a tree
My life is a book of how things used to be
And the kids gather 'round and they listen to me
They don't think I'm all used up

And there's songs and there's laughter and things I can do
And all that I've learned I can give back to you
And I'd give my last breath just to make it come true
And to know I'm not all used up

They use up the oil, they use up the trees
They use up the air and they use up the seas
But as long as I'm breathing they won't use up me
Don't tell me I'm all used up.


Larimer Street
(U. Utah Phillips)

Your bulldozers rolling through my part of town
The iron ball swings and knocks it all down,
You knocked down my flophouse and you knocked down my bars
And black-topped it over to park all your cars.

Chorus: And where will I go and where can I stay?
You knocked down the skid row and hauled it away,
I'll flag a fast rattler and ride it on down, boys,
They're running the bums out of town.

Old Maxie the tailor is closing his doors,
There ain't nothing left in the secondhand stores,
You knocked down my hock shop and the big Harbor Lights
And the old Chinese cafe that was open all night.

You ran out the hookers who worked on the street
And built a big club where the playboys can meet.
My bookie joint closed when your cops made a raid,
But you built a new hall for the stock market trade.

These little storekeepers they don't have a chance
With the big uptown bankers a-calling the dance,
With their suit-and-tie restaurants that's all owned by Greeks
And the counterfeit hippies and their plastic boutiques.

Now I'm finding out there's just one kind of war,
It's the one going on 'tween the rich and the poor.
Don't know a lot about what you'd call class
But the upper and middle can all kiss my ass.