Songs United States: Parts I–V

S 0 N G S 61 YANKEE SEE Well I had a dream and in it I was teaching cave people how to use blenders and toasters. I drive up to the cave in my car. Hey hey hey hey hey hey hey! In my car. (Actually it was a used car.) And there they are-banging their heads against the walls of the cave, And I say: Hey folks! Listen you're doing it the hard way. Lemme show you a thing or two. I say "Yankee see, Yankee do. Home of the many and land of the few." Well I was trying to think of something to tell you about myself-and I came across this brochure they're handing out in the lobby, And it says everything I wanted to say-only better. It says: "Laurie Anderson, in her epic performance of United States Parts 1 through 4 the whole dad-burn gesamtkunstwerk-has been baffIng audiences for years with her special blend of music . . . slides . .. films . .. tapes . . . films (did Isay films?) . . . hand gestures and moreHey hey hey hey hey hey hey ... Much more." Let's take a look a look around the stage at what we like to call The System , i.e. the highly sophisticated (very expensive) state of the art gadgetry-with which I cast my spell. Now let me tell you something: this stuff does not grow on trees ... Yankee see. Yankee do. Land of the free. Home of the new. Home of the many. Land of the few. Hip hip hippety hop . .. Well hip hip hip hippety hop. Seems to be working . Well I was in LA recently on music business-and I was just sitting there in the office filling them in on some of my goals. I said: Listen, I've got a vision. I see myself as part of a long tradition of American humorYou know, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Elmer Fudd, Roadrunner, Yosemite Sam, And they said: "Well actually, we had something a little more adult in mind." And I said: "OK! OK! Listen, I can adapt!" Hey hey hey hey hey Land of the free ... Home of the brave. Land of the lost. Land of the saved. Yankee see. Yankee do. Lucy I'm home. Lucy, I'm home!! LUCY?! I'm home!! I wonder what happened to her. 62 HEY AH It was up in Canada and it was August, but very cold. I had been staying on this Cree Indian reservation for a few days, just sort of hanging around. One day, some anthropologists showed up at the reservation. They came in a little plane with maple leaves painted on the wings. They said they were there to shoot a documentary of the Cree Indians. They set up their video equipment in a tin quonset hut next to the Hudson Bay Company. Then they asked the oldest man on the reservation to come and sing some songs for their documentary. On the day of the taping, the old man arrived. He was blind and wearing a red plaid shirt. They turned on some lights and he started to sing and rock back and forth. But he kept starting over and sweating. Pretty soon it was clear that he didn't really know any of the songs. He just kept starting over and sweating and rocking back and forth. The only words he really seemed sure of were "Hey ah ... hey ah hey ... hey hey hey ah hey ... hey . . ." hey ah hey hey hey ah hey I am singing the songs hey ah hey ah hey ... the old songs . . . but I can't remember the words of the songs .. . hey hey hey ah hey .. . the old hunting songs. I am singing the songs of my fathers and of the animals they hunted down hey hey hey ah hey. ... I never knew the words of the old songs hey hey ah hey hey hey ah hey I never went hunting. Hey hey ah ah hey ah hey ... I never sang the songs. Hey ah hey of my fathers hey hey ah hey I am singing for this movie . . . hey ah I am doing this for...