SONGS:
-- Civilization And Its Discontents --
2 July 1981. Toronto.

Found on:

The Trouble With Normal (1983) & (2002)
Lyrics:

I need a helmet to protect my head
I need earphones to hear what gets said
I need a miracle to keep this little thread from snapping

I know a lot about alienated man
But we've all heard as much about that as we can stand
It's just what happens when you let the time span catch you napping

Two forward and one back
Blind fingers groping for the right track
What's to do when a stab and a pat on the back look like the same thing?

Civilization and its discontents
When all's been said and all the money spent
Trying to beat the system of the world's events
Gets you nowhere.

Tired faces with the bus stop blues
Man on a bench with a blanket of news
The young Jamaican joking with the old Jew about women

So many people so lost you feel sorry
But too much pathos just makes you angry
And even though I know who loves me I'm not that much less lost

Black outline, sliding gray scale
Subtle variations of dark to pale
Pearl sky raining light like hail, come on and pierce me
Raining light like a vision of the holy grail, come on and pierce me

Civilization and its discontents
When all's been said and all the money spent
Trying to beat the system of the world's events
Gets you nowhere.



Known comments by Bruce Cockburn about this song, by date:

  • 9 September 1990

    BC: "...an old song, "Civilization and its Discontents", the title and central image was lifted from the title of a book by Sigmund Freud that I never read, in fact, but..."

    Laurie Brown: "Oh you're trying to get us to believe that you've read Freud?"

    BC: "Well I did read some Freud actually but I found him rather hard going and rather boring and not entirely believable (laughs)...but I did read some Freud when I was in high school actually. That's when I guess I was most concerned with the theory of sex (laughs)."

    - from "Rock N' Roll N' Reading" (hosted by Denise Donlon). Interviewer: Laurie Brown. Location: The New Music (TV programme). Airdate: 9 September 1990. Submitted by Dave Macklin.



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