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Black-White Calypso

Jeremy Taylor
Language: English


Jeremy Taylor


[1961]
Parole e musica di Jeremy Taylor
Canzone inclusa nello spettacolo intitolato “Wait A Minim!”

Wait A Minim!

Un classico di Jeremy Taylor offerto all’interno di uno spettacolo musicale, diretto da Leon Gluckman, che andò in scena a Londra a metà degli anni 60. In Sudafrica, ovviamente, non fu mai rappresentato durante l’epoca dell’Apartheid. E anche in Gran Bretagna l’ultima strofa, quella che parla di coppie miste come soluzione al problema di pelli troppo scure o troppo bianche, fu censurata. (fonte: 3rd Ear Music)
The other day reading Drum magazine
I'll tell you some of the things I seen
The other day reading Drum magazine
I'll tell you some of the things I seen
Advertisements for special cream in every section
Give you a soft and pale complexion
Make your black skin lighter creamier and whiter
But when I look in the Star what do I find
But advertisements of a different kind
Because it seems that the white people have a notion
To make them selves black with the Sun Tan Lotion

Tell me, tell me, tell me why I want to know the fact
Why all the black people want to go white and the white people want to go black.

Turning the pages of Zonk I see
A special tonic, which guarantee
Turning the pages of Zonk I see
A special tonic, which guarantee
To make your curly hair straight
And bring you success on every date
Misfortune in love is attributed there
To having such coal black curly hair
But when I pass by the Rosebank Beauty Parlour
I see the women sitting there hour after hour
With a great big thing on their head trying to make their straight hair curly instead
Ain't it ridiculous!

Tell me, tell me, tell me why I want to know the fact
Why all the black people want to go white and the white people want to go black.

Now the other day the native girl she say to me
Au! Master, your madam she is very skinny
She say she also is much too thin
She must have some fattening vitamin
She say that it's a fact that
All the men like her bottom to be fat
But in the northern suburbs the women are used
To living on lettuce and orange juice
To be slim is their preoccupation
My god, what a crazy nation - this is so

Tell me, tell me, tell me why I want to know the fact
Why all the black people want to go white and the white people want to go black.

I have a simple remedy
For all this frustrated energy
I have a simple remedy
For all this frustrated energy
If you blacks have too much of this pigment stuff
And the white people say you've not got enough
Don't waste your time buying creams and jellies
Trying to change the colour of your bellies
but follow the example of my brother
He married a black girl, they love each other
And she gives him a little bit of black in the night
And he gives her a little bit of white
That's the solution!

Now I, now I, I know why I can tell you the fact
Why all the black people want to go white and the white people want to go black.

Contributed by Bernart Bartleby - 2014/5/17 - 22:07




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