{"id":115,"date":"2006-01-07T07:56:00","date_gmt":"2006-01-07T07:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/?p=115"},"modified":"2015-11-01T23:05:40","modified_gmt":"2015-11-02T07:05:40","slug":"government-witness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/2006\/01\/07\/government-witness\/","title":{"rendered":"Government Witness"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Government<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

L<\/span>ike a lot of people in the 70’s, I was fascinated by the so-called radical underground, whether I wanted to be or not. No one could escape the media fixation with celebrity fugitives like Patty Hearst.<\/p>\n

I conceived this song as a basic song of romantic betrayal — with the twist that betrayal takes the form of turning government witness.<\/span><\/p>\n

I made sure that, in classic gangster movie tradition, the antihero is promised the ultimate punishment for his crimes — a bitter fate compounded by what he sees as his lover’s treachery. So don’t start up with me for glamorizing criminals and terrorists.<\/p>\n

The song was originally performed with my band, Machine Dog. There’s a link below to a download of the Machine Dog version of “Government Witness.”<\/p>\n\n

Machine Dog version<\/a><\/p>\n

GOVERNMENT WITNESS<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Someone’s been bleeding us
\na young man wake up each day old and tired
\nI got my gun and my silver bullets
\ngonna get me a government vampire<\/p>\n

Hanging on the chain link fence
\ngot my silver cross my Smith & Wesson .38
\nBut when they turn on the juice
\nI’m crucified on the electric gate<\/p>\n

If this is real life<\/span>
\nI guess I’ll get used to it<\/span>
\nI’ll be all right as<\/span>
\nsoon as I get over these electro-convulsive fits<\/span><\/p>\n

Shackled in my place
\ninside rthe federal courtroom dock
\nStaring at your face
\nfloating in the witness box<\/p>\n

You’re looking right through me
\njust like you never heard my name
\nbut you used to lay right next to me
\nin our little hideout by the lake<\/p>\n

If this is real life<\/span>
\nI suggest you get used to it<\/span>
\nYou’ll be all right<\/span>
\nas soon as you find a heart to fit that hole in your chest<\/span><\/p>\n

Governmewnt witness
\nwho would have dreamed you’d be a government witness
\nGovernment witness
\ngo ahead — deny you are a government witness<\/p>\n

You must have lied to me then
\nWhy can’t you lie to them now
\nWill you be lying to yourself
\nwhile I sweat it out in the death house — death house<\/p>\n

This is real life . . .<\/span><\/p>\n

Copyright 1980
\nTK Major<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 Like a lot of people in the 70’s, I was fascinated by the so-called radical underground, whether I wanted to be or not. No one could escape the media fixation with celebrity fugitives like Patty Hearst. I conceived this song as a basic song of romantic betrayal — with the twist that betrayal takes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_meta":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,340],"tags":[221,824,969],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2207,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115\/revisions\/2207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}