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We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

In The Ruins They've Left Us, We'll Plant Gardens Still

by Wooden Shoe Ramblers

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1.
Plains Song 03:34
That old black snake has been crawling across the plains And these two winding rivers stand in its way Already frack-laced and holding fields washed away With soil, and with hog shit, ammonia and blame And what will they say when they speak our names In these years still unfolding, our children now babes? When the well pads still slave, in the Bakken, from the grave While the oil keeps on flowing to the jangling of chains Come mother, come father, and stand with me now As we bury our grievances in this dark ground Come brother, come sister, let's dig in our heels And from Alberta down to Texas we'll bankrupt their oil fields Come friends and come comrades, we've got cultures to kill And in the ruins that they've left us, we'll plant gardens still.
2.
Wade in the water, wade in the water Wade in the water, protectors gonna defend the waters See those pipelines comin' 'round, protectors gonna defend the waters We're turning their plans upside down protectors gonna defend the waters The water's sacred like me and you protectors gonna defend the waters and those who pollute the waters are damn fools, protectors gonna defend the waters Wade in the water, wade in the water Wade in the water, protectors gonna defend the waters See those pipelines comin' 'round, protectors gonna defend the waters We're turning their plans upside down protectors gonna defend the waters The water's sacred like me and you protectors gonna defend the waters and those who pollute the waters are damn fools, protectors gonna defend the waters Wade in the water, wade in the water Wade in the water, protectors gonna defend the waters
3.
Chorus: Break the line, break the line, ‘cause we’re running out of time make them fight for every mile, make them fight for every dime they’re building pipes over the water, every summer’s getting hotter there’s no compromise, we gotta break the line From the arctic to the Amazon’s a global climate war First Nations on the front line won’t take it anymore Standing Rock was the beginning- if they want to build Line 3 Before they put it in the ground they’ll have to get through you and me Chorus My daddy was a Bolt Weevil, he fought the big CU And made the towers crumble when the power line came through He raised me right and proper, so I learned my lesson well If you want to stop a line you’ve got to blow it straight to hell chorus From Duluth to the Red River, the crackdown’s being laid Northern Lights will be the iron fist for Enbridge’s crusade But North woods is our battle ground, the path ahead is clear Let our bodies on the line become the spanner in the gears chorus repeated: Break the line, break the line, break the line
4.
I didn't want to move to California where it's always dry On the other side of a mountain range with the fires raging high Where the rivers are choked with concrete to shunt the rain out to the sea If I'm gonna die that's not the place I'd choose for me And in their millions, teeming masses, struggling to catch their breath Would push you down beneath the water if it meant a chance to rest Where the fault lines won't stop groaning in the bedrock that was broke In the path of a tsunami is a relentless, tortured hope Like the "ghost wolves" with no families, or the cougars moving east Or the migratory songbirds who tomorrow cease to be Or the bison in the paddock with a butcher at its throat We did it to the world around us as we did it to our own And in their millions, teeming masses who don't have words but still know fear Know longing and the pain of losing when their kinships disappear And if the machines won't stop spinning, then these bodies are the brakes It's extinction or restoration, and that's the choice we get to make I don't know why I don't leave the city and these people who I fear I don't know why this river called me and the wind carried me here There must be something that I'm doing, though its shape I don't quite see For now the lilacs on the night breeze comfort me And their millions, teeming masses, who don't know the power they hold When the screens are always telling them "You're better off alone. Every commons gets evicted, every culture gentrifies And every year another loved one tires and chooses suicide." But this angry, bitter hope inside which never quite congeals Whispers "the ways we hurt each other show the ways we've got to heal," And I'll hear my spirit ringing where the chisel left this cleft Between the hammer and the anvil, there is only singing left And in our millions, teaming masses, building toward we don't know what But it might be a better future than the present that we've got Where we listen to each other and let the rhythms guide our breath And then we'll face this fear together, a broken but a singing Left And then we'll face this fear together, hand in hand, the Singing Left
5.
Hush-a-bye, don't you cry Go to sleep you little baby When you wake, you shall have all the pretty little horses Blacks and bays, dapple and grays All the pretty little horses Way down yonder, down in the meadow Lies my poor little child bees and butterflies flies are pickin' out its eyes The poor little child crying mama Blacks and bays, dapple and grays All the pretty little horses Blacks and bays, dapple and grays All the pretty little horses Hush-a-bye, don't you cry Go to sleep you little baby When you wake, you shall have all the pretty little horses Blacks and bays, dapple and grays All the pretty little horses
6.
Running through the forest, running through the hills Hear those dogs a-barking at Harriet Tubman’s heels With a Bible in one hand, a pistol in the next She led the fight for freedom with that fire in her chest Hey Sister Harriet, Tell me where you gone? I’ve gone up to the north country, I left before the dawn The fight for our freedom was the price to go my bail A thousand dollars on my head and hound dogs on my trail Harriet saying brother come along with me We’ll chase behind the drinking gourd and find the Jubilee Harriet saying sister come on, don’t be slow Ain’t gonna wait for Pharoah just to let our people go Hear the voices telling me by morning we’ll be free General Tubman’s coming up the banks of Combahee People gotta rise up when we hear the trumpets blow And the master’s house is falling like the walls of Jericho
7.
Goin' across the mountain, oh fare thee well Goin' 'cross the mountain, you can hear my banjo tell Got my rations on my back, my powder it is dry Goin' across the mountains, Chrissy don't you cry Well I'm goin' across the mountain, oh fare thee well Goin' 'cross the mountains, you can hear my banjo tell Leave before it's good daylight, if nothin' happens to me By this time tomorrow I'll be in in Tennessee Guess you'll miss me when I'm gone but I'm goin' through When the war is over, I'll come back to you Well I'm goin' across the mountain, oh fare thee well Goin' 'cross the mountains, you can hear my banjo tell Goin' across the mountain even if I have to crawl Gonna give Jeff Davis a piece of my rifle ball No slave or no freedman ever done me any harm, ain't gonna lay my life down for no rich man's cotton farm Well I'm goin' across the mountain, oh fare thee well Goin' 'cross the mountains, you can hear my banjo tell
8.
Bella Ciao 04:47
Una mattina mi sono alzato O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao Una mattina mi sono alzato E ho trovato l'invasor O partigiano, portami via O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao O partigiano, portami via Ché mi sento di morir E se io muoio da partigiano O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao E se io muoio da partigiano Tu mi devi seppellir E seppellire lassù in montagna O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao E seppellire lassù in montagna Sotto l'ombra di un bel fior Tutte le genti che passeranno O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao Tutte le genti che passeranno Mi diranno: "Che bel fior" Questo è il fiore del partigiano O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao Questo è il fiore del partigiano Morto per la libertà The world is waking outside my window O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao The world is waking outside my window for the enemy have come Oh partisan, please take me with you O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao Oh partisan, please take me with you for I know my death is near and if I die in the fight for freedom O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao and if I die in the fight for freedom you will have to bury me Oh bury me up upon the mountain O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao Oh bury me up upon the mountain under the shade of a blooming rose and all those passing along my graveside O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao and all those passing along my graveside stop and shed a tear for me This is the grave of a fallen comrade O bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao This is the grave of a fallen comrade who died for liberty
9.
Lac Megantic 04:36
That oil train is three miles long, coming down the track Its wheels are pitted iron and its barrels loomng and black Those barrel cars are long as night and blacker than the crow Riding from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico Looks we’ll be here for a while, but then that’s nothing new The North Star line is always stalled when the oil train comes through It’s been that way these past few years ever since the boom began Riding from the Bakken Shale or the Athabasca Sands I heard there was an accident on a line out in Quebec In the town of Lac Megantic was an oil hauler wreck Said she came in without warning in the small hours of the night There was screaming on the rails and then the air was full of light Old cars on old tracks, just one conductor on the shift The MMA had cut its costs, it was in the name of thrift Switched off the job in Nantes, with an engine fire to kill But those brakes gave out past midnight, she came rolling down the hill And down in Lac Megantic at the new Music Cafe The people crowded in to hear Bolduc and Ricard play They were singing to the old Chansons, la vie et l’amore Without thinking on the railroad tracks that ran outside the door And she was moving fast and faster down the main line in the night Her bells were deadly quiet and her wheels were smoking white And the ground shook like an avalanche when she hit the bend downtown The sky was raining fire when that oil train came down The sun was rising red over the black and bloody smoke The ground was still burning where the oil train had broke For 47 dead and gone they’d ring the chapel bell When she rode like the Pale Horseman and what followed her was hell That oil train is three miles long, coming down the track Its wheels are pitted iron and its barrels long and black Those barrel cars are long as night and blacker than the crow Riding from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico Right through here is where they go; right through here is where they go.
10.
That night in Milan, was the setting How hot, that the sergeant was sweating Brigadier, crack open the window A push, and Pinelli goes down Oh sergeant, Pinelli repeated- I am innocent- but how I’m treated! Anarchy does not call us to bombing To be free, we must just disobey No more lying, Pinelli, confess it Without even your word we can guess it The bomb was laid out by Valpreda Your friend, and the blood’s on your hands Said Pinelli, the bomber’s some other- Not my comrade or one of my brothers The hands stained with blood are your own, sir, and the ones that are holding your leash The sergeant leaned in, and was smoking Blowing out and Pinelli was choking Brigadiere, crack open the window Pinelli, it’s four stories down Our flags were black in our mourning Three thousand comrades gave this warning, We swore by the blood of Pinelli We will neither forget or forgive You Guida, and you, Calebresi Was it you who sent out the order, To cover up the fascist murder? Was Pinelli the price in your game? That night in Milan, was the setting How hot, that the sergeant was sweating Brigadier, crack open the window A push, and Pinelli goes down
11.
Sand Hills 05:29

I am nothing but a man, made my life upon the land
 west Wisconsin is my home
 In a town of farms and mills, high up in the Driftless Hills
 
Where as I boy I’d roam
 
Those sand bluffs would remain, until the company came
 To strip the hillside bare
 
Digging up the sand to frac someone else’s land
 
In some other town somewhere

 Chorus: 
and I know it's for the best, I should count myself blessed
 that's what the companies say
 but I'll turn my eyes, hang my head and cry
 
'cause they’re haulin’ the sand hills away

 Well, I know that times are tough, this economy is rough
 and we’ve all seen better days 
and when they’re mining out the hills, there’ll be jobs to be filled
 at twenty dollar an hour’s pay
 but the mine don’t seem to care if our kids can breathe the air
 or the water’s there for all 
and when the boom is through, those jobs will be gone, too
 and leave the country raw

 chorus

 Is this the best way, as some people say 
to power our country
? because it seems a damned high cost, when there’s so much to be lost
 and the wind and the sunshine’s free
 the more I think, the more I find that it’s burning in my mind
 that it’s a damned and shameful sin 
to put creation up for bids, and leave nothing for our kids 
but ghosts of sand hills in the wind

 chorus
12.
Hello again, your Honor- I think you know me well My name is Richard Carlile, and the truth to you I’ll tell My charge is sedition and libel in the press- I’ve printed no lies, sir, but sedition I’ll confess for a king is still a man, no less or greater than Those who delve the loam and dig the deathly mines And the station of your birth gives you no claim over the ear No right over our labor and no right over our minds Chorus: You'll never silence me, with your troops or with your jail you'll never silence me- and let the truth stand for my bail Take my paper, take my pen, and I will come to raise again And I'll sing your name, Oh Liberty, until every man and woman's speaking free I know the charge against me, and I'll tell you what it's for- for putting books and putting power into the hands of the working poor, and for writing these words I know are true: There's the servants and there's the masters and there's a war between the two I've seen men locked into your cells, your priests damn us into hell your yeomen cut the people down- with the gun and saber too on the fields of Peterloo, and the Corn Law and wage slavery in the slums of London Town Chorus Is there any Earthly power to put King George on the run, More than the Yankee rebels, more than Boney’s guns? But the common folk of Britain, could do with their arms crossed What all the arms of Europe had ventured and had lost We are co-conspirators, engaging in the war Declared on us the day they forged a crown And put reason into chains, put people in the same But people, by refusing, could pull any tyrant down Chorus
13.
In eighteen hundred one Peg and awl In eighteen hundred one Peg and awl In eighteen hundred one Peggin' shoes was all I done I'm gonna lay me down my awl, my peg and awl In eighteen hundred two Peg and awl In eighteen hundred two Peg and awl In eighteen hundred two Peggin' shoes was all I'd do I'm gonna lay me down my awl, my peg and awl In eighteen hundred three Peg and awl In eighteen hundred three Peg and awl In eighteen hundred three Peggin' shoes was all you'd see I'm gonna lay me down my awl, my peg and awl They've invented a new machine Peg and awl They've invented a new machine Peg and awl They've invented a new machine I peg one shoe, it pegs fifteen I'm gonna lay me down my awl, my peg and awl In eighteen hundred four peg and awl In eighteen hundred four peg and awl In eighteen hundred four pegging shoes I'll do no more I'm gonna lay me down my awl, my peg and awl
14.
I love my flag, I do i do that floats upon the breeze I also love my arms and legs and neck and nose and knees One little shell might spoil them Or give them such a twist They would be of no use to me I guess I won't enlist I love my country yes i do I hope her folks do well Without our arms and legs and things I think we'd look like hell Young men with faces half shot off are unfit to be kissed I've read in books it spoils looks I guess I won't enlist But if someday the call went out to build this land some homes where families live more happily than in some dark catacombs if the army marches to raise a park for hikes and games and trysts and let alone their tanks and drones Well then I would enlist

about

In 2017, a group of friends came together to share music and perform for a benefit show for railroad workers facing repression. Driven by our struggles as workers, land and water protectors, antifascists, and anarchists, we have built a practice of music together- one that draws on the long memory to find lessons for today's struggles, that explores our distinct roots to find a dialogue among our diasporas, that finds care to sustain our fights and fights for that which we care about. Now, at the end of the long hard year of 2020, we are proud to release our debut album. As the world seems to groan and crack around us, we reject the return to normalcy, and look to the world that grows in our hearts. In the ruins they have left us, we will plant gardens still.

We offer this album on a name-your-price basis, starting at just $7. We are grateful to our friends, comrades, and community for the support that allows us to keep making music and to take an active part in making "good trouble."

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released December 23, 2020

The musicians on this album are Jessica Garraway, Sam Adams, Emmett Doyle, and R Young. Recording and mixing by Elizaveta Gorkova.

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Wooden Shoe Ramblers Minneapolis, Minnesota

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