Les paroles de “The Shutdown” (“L’Arrêt”) écrites par un metallurgiste anonyme de Cap-Breton (Canada), ont été publiées dans le “Herald du travail maritime”, le 30 août 1924.
La musique a été composée en 2011 par l’auteur Garry Leech et cette chanson a été enregistrée par son groupe The Misfit Boys pour un CD de compilation intitulé “Cape Breton Island Protest Songs”. Il est étonnant d’entendre de quelle manière “The Shutdown” traduit la crise actuelle du capitalisme.
Paroles de la chanson:
The mill’s shut down three months they say
It may be more but anyway
We’re out of luck they’ll be no pay
Now…how about the eats
Vacations are all very nice
They add to life a little spice
But when you haven’t got the price
It’s … quite another tale
The family needs this and that
A pair of shoes, a shirt, a hat
We’ve not enough to feed a cat
And … how about the rent
But we’ll pull through somehow no doubt
No use our misery to spout
And should the landlord throw us out
We’ll … camp upon the street
Thank God the company’s alright
The dividend is safe and tight
The stockholder can sleep at night
Tho’ … we feel rather blue
God feeds the little bumble bees
The birds that flit among the trees
The flies, mosquitoes and the fleas
And we … well we can starve
Now charity will do its part
Soup kitchens will be on the mart
And when the mills again do start
We’ll … have our load of debts
So they’ve shut down, they might as well
They’ve been curtailing quite a spell
It seems the country’s going to hell
Small loss … then we’ll go to.
MLH, 30 August 1924.
