August, 1969. I was a young doctor and in those days it was common to lend a hand at mass demonstrations, sit-ins, "sanctuaries", free clinics. Some of it was scary as hell (the Chicago convention) but a lot of it was boring. Some of it had low priority, especially when it wasn't political and there was always more to do than time or energy to do it. So when I got a phone call from a friend asking if I would staff a clinic at a rock concert I told her, "Hell, no. It's going to rain like stink. Do you think I'm fucking crazy?" It did rain at Woodstock that weekend. And I stayed home in a nice, dry apartment. Live and learn.
I did get to see the film, though and it turns out that there are more than a dozen performances missing. One of them was the great Janis Joplin doing "Work me Lord." You decide whether this is a religious song. I don't care if it is or isn't. I'm just using the title as an excuse to put it up:
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Thanks! I love Janis!
I still have my first Big Brother & the Holding Company LP!!!
Janis RIP - think I will raise a glass of Southern Comfort this aft in loving memory!!!
RIP Janice. She's got the attitude. Thanks for the clip!
Great clip....
I was one of those muddy kids in the crowd.
I have always had a talent for being in the wrong place at the right time or vice versa....
Whether you are religious or non-religious, we humans seem to be afflicted at times by the emotional state which gives rise to the song's lyrics. Personally, I vote for existential crisis as the basic underlying theme of the song.
Although not the same as an existential crisis, I can remember two distinct times in my life when I cried out (silently in my mind) for god to deliver me. The first was when I made a parachute jump from a large overly crowded cargo jet. I was the last jumper in a long stick (line of jumpers) on a windy day. I just knew that I was going to be dropped into the trees and be ripped apart. I was frightened down to the marrow of my bones. The second was in the middle of an intense firefight in which I was wounded twice (2/327, 101st Airborne, RVN 1967-69). I just knew I was going to die!
Even as a confirmed atheist, I know (as I think we all know) the intensity of emotion that gives rise to such a heartfelt plea for supernatural intervention. At least for me, the intellectual certainty of knowledge just didn't seem to be comfort enough!
Title: Work Me, Lord
Artist: Janis Joplin
Album: I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!
Work me lord, work me lord.
Please don't you leave me,
I feel so useless down here
With no one to love
Though i've looked everywhere
And i can't find me anybody to love,
To feel my care.
So ah work me lord, whoa use me lord,
Don't you know how hard it is
Trying to live all alone.
Every day i keep trying to move forward,
But something is driving me, oh, back,
Honey, something's trying to hold on to me,
To my way of life.
So don't you forget me down here, lord,
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
Ah, ah, don't you forget me, lord.
Well i don't think i'm any very special
Kind of person down here, i know better,
But i don't think you're gonna find anybody,
Not anybody who could say that they tried like i tried,
The worst you can say all about me
Is that i'm never satisfied. whoa.
Whoa, oh, oh, work me lord, hmm, use me lord,
Please, honey, don't you leave me,
I feel so useless down here.
I can't find me anybody to love me
And i've looked around,
I've looked everywhere, everywhere
And i can't find me anyone to love,
To feel my care.
So honey don't you go and leave me, lord,
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
Honey, don't you go off and leave me, lord.
Can't i show you how hard it is
Trying to live when you're all alone.
Everyday i keep pushing,
Keep trying to move forward
But something is driving me, oh, back,
And something's trying to hold on to me,
To my way of life, why.
Oh please, please, oh don't you go and
Forget me down here, don't forget me, lord.
I think that maybe you can ease me,
Maybe i can help you, said uh whoa,
Oh please, please, don't you go and leave me lord,
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, whoa, whoa please,
Hmm please, don't you leave me, lord.
Pretty powerful stuff. I, too, remember Janis Joplin--I did not go to Woodstock (had to work), but a number of my family & friends did. They came back energized and all of them became active in some sort of social activism. Correlation?
microdot: LOL. Why am i not surprised you were there? Hi to J. and thanks for the great Iran clip.
Early GenX here, having watched the news from Woodstock on the TV as a little kid.
I will never forget seeing pictures of people sleeping in literal piles of garbage. Even at single-digit age I knew darn well where germs came from, and I remember having vaguely-formed thoughts about the complete collapse of society due to casual disregard for sanitation & hygiene (not to mention rampant drug use). "My God!, these hippies are out of their minds, they don't even wash!" Eww...
Events like that one were also what put an end to legitimate research with the psychedelic drugs for 40 years. Only in the last few years has science regained access to these promising compounds.
And no doubt the swinging sixties had something to do with the rise of antibiotic resistant bacterial strains.
Hey Revere, be glad you didn't go, you might have caught something nasty. With a few exceptions such as warriors in combat, the pride in saying you were in a place where history was made, doesn't quite measure up to the sensation of projectile vomiting or explosive diarrhea.
no thanks: A word of caution about your childhood intuitions. The idea that disease comes from garbage, another version of the miasma theory, is what held up medical science for a few thousand years. In fact decaying organic matter is not the cause of disease. So you might want to rethink this. Moreover Woodstock and the 60s didn't put an end to research in psychoactive drugs. Big Pharma and agribusiness are the ones we can thank for antibiotic resistance. Dirty hippies are a convenient but misplaced target.
Work Me Lord, I enjoyed very much. I am a firm Christian, and the words can be used for instruction and as a lesson in life. They can be applied for a short sermon or a sunday school talk. It does have a great deal of meaning. I never get into real rock and roll, but whenever I want to hear someone scream, Janis is the one. She puts ever so much power and feeling into her craft. Bruce