D-Squared

This is exciting for us! Our friend and webmistress, Cheryl Colan, went on a camping trip with us to the desert and video taped our newest song, “Little Iraq”. The song was inspired by a camping experience several weeks prior to the filming, when we embarked on an impromptu Birthday Camp in the desert just north of Phoenix.

It started out innocently enough – hiking among the saguaros, throwing the frisbee for Yippy and a gourmet campfire meal. But from dusk to noon the next day we witnessed an assault on the desert unlike anything we had ever experienced. Drunken fishermen drove throughout the night around Lake Pleasant in their diesel trucks (one right through our camp); the moon kicked up a small arms barrage that lasted until 3AM; and the next morning, after the sheriff had tried to ticket us for an unrestrained dog, a horde of off-road vehicle enthusiasts descended upon the river bottom we were camped in. When we were finally driven out, we passed hundreds of people with all manner of armaments from pistols to shotguns to AK47s, standing upon mounds of spent shell casings firing into the desert – a most impressive display.

At one point we climbed a small mountain only to command a 180 degree view several miles deep of churning dust accompanied by a soundtrack that bore a striking resemblance to Apocalypse Now. It was then that we dubbed the place Little Iraq. And it pissed Don off enough to go home and write this song.

To vote for “Little Iraq” on YouTube go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWJbQ0KJTus

They’re shooting up the desert tonight down in Little Iraq
Some of the boys going out there will not be coming back
They’ll drown in a dry wash of shotgun shells and beer
With the sound of freedom still ringing in their ears
In their ears

The dudes in the diesels come spoiling for a fight
They circle ’round the campfires hunting for Friday night
Every now and then you can hear ‘em bogging down
Where the sand gets soft cussing their luck and
Pushing that truck that they do not dare turn off
Do not dare turn off

The moon rises yellow hooded like a weeping eye
Tired of dripping light down on the scenery sliding by
On the AK47s and the shot to shit tvs
If it’s shiny we shoot at it my country tis of thee
Oh my country tis of thee sweet land of liberty
Of thee I sing

Dawn brings the deputy to survey the battle scars
Beating the thickets writing tickets to unabandoned dogs and cars
It’s the only quiet of the day and he wants to be gone real soon
Nobody’s dying to be high sheriff of this country
At high noon

The quadrunners and the ghostriders start gunning their engines
The shiny plastic helmets make them look like little aliens
Popping wheelies in the river bottom ’til the dust just chokes the air
And mom follows behind with the sandwiches’cause it’s a family affair
It’s a family affair

My grandpa showed me this country when I was a kid
Saguaros soldiered everywhere
Now they only march on the mountains and the few
That are left down there in the flats are peppered
With bullets the size of golfballs buried in the rotting wood
And if you’re the one with the biggest gun
I guess you just call that good

Yeah and everyone else is evil everyone else is wrong and
If you won’t fight for what is right then you simply don’t belong
And we do not feel for pulses and we do not feel for pain
Pay very close attention listen to the rhythm of the fallen reign
Telling me what a fool I’ve been
What a fool I’ve been

They’re shooting up the desert tonight down in Little Iraq
Some of the boys going out there will not be coming back
They’ll drown in a dry wash of shotgun shells and beer
With the sound of freedom still ringing in their ears
In their ears, in their ears
The sound of freedom

(A video of this song can be seen under “music video”.)