[ ]   [ ]   [ ]                        [ ]      [ ]   [ ]
Bruce Cockburn — Justice
Album: Inner City Front
Avg rating:
5.8

Your rating:
Total ratings: 250








Released: 1981
Length: 4:46
Plays (last 30 days): 0
What's been done in the name of Jesus?
What's been done in the name of Buddha?
What's been done in the name of Islam?
What's been done in the name of man?
What's been done in the name of liberation?
And in the name of civilization?
And in the name of race?
And in the name of peace?
Everybody
Loves to see
Justice done
On somebody else

Can you tell me how much bleeding
It takes to fill a word with meaning?
And how much, how much death
It takes to give a slogan breath?
And how much, how much, how much flame
Gives light to a name
For the hollow darkness
In which nations dress?
Everybody
Loves to see
Justice done
On somebody else

Everybody's seen the things they've seen
We all have to live with what we've been
When they say charity begins at home
They're not just talking about a toilet and a telephone
Got to search the silence of the soul's wild places
For a voice that can cross the spaces
These definitions that we love create --
These names for heaven, hero, tribe and state
Everybody
Loves to see
Justice done
On somebody else
Comments (36)add comment
 bam23 wrote:
As an American listener, I can suggest that you are overly dismissive of quite a few of us. I have no real trouble seeing why this country has its negative image outside the borders. When I lived in Japan, it was quite interesting to see this country's actions from a great remove. The sense I got was of a large and dim giant blundering through the world. Many of us are very critical of the country and its continuing failure to live up to our oft-proclaimed principals. But I think Bruce Cockburn is great and have been hoping for some time that he would show up near where I live.
 
{#Cheers}
 nicknt wrote:
Great song from a good album with great lyrics (very actual by the way), I'm very surprised by the low rating.

 
Maybe because he is such a whiner.
 westslope wrote:
Love it.

But yeah, I can see how this song would make most American listeners very uncomfortable.

 
As an American listener, I can suggest that you are overly dismissive of quite a few of us. I have no real trouble seeing why this country has its negative image outside the borders. When I lived in Japan, it was quite interesting to see this country's actions from a great remove. The sense I got was of a large and dim giant blundering through the world. Many of us are very critical of the country and its continuing failure to live up to our oft-proclaimed principals. But I think Bruce Cockburn is great and have been hoping for some time that he would show up near where I live.
As per comment below - too preachy. Just a long series of rhetorical questions and statements. pxd
Love it.

But yeah, I can see how this song would make most American listeners very uncomfortable.
 nicknt wrote:
Dubito fortemente che il grande Bruce conoscesse quel brano
raga wrote:
Reggae guitar copy of italian artist Loredana Bertè ".. e la luna bussò" 1979

 

 

Tu credi? Col successo che ha fatto quel pezzo in Italia solo due anni prima?
Secondo me lo conosceva eccome, è solo un gran volpone...
 nicknt wrote:
Great song from a good album with great lyrics (very actual by the way), I'm very surprised by the low rating.

 
Dunno Nick, lyrics are kind of preachy. Becomes annoying when musicians get too carried away with their political opinion as if it is objectively determinable truth, IMHO of course.
 nicknt wrote:
Great song from a good album with great lyrics (very actual by the way), I'm very surprised by the low rating.

 
Definitely agree. I gave it an 8.
Dubito fortemente che il grande Bruce conoscesse quel brano
raga wrote:
Reggae guitar copy of italian artist Loredana Bertè ".. e la luna bussò" 1979

 


Great song from a good album with great lyrics (very actual by the way), I'm very surprised by the low rating.
Reggae guitar copy of italian artist Loredana Bertè ".. e la luna bussò" 1979
BRILLIANT ARTIST
Best album he did, singing the truth sometimes hurts...
The music is meh, but the words are very powerful and appropriate today.

I've heard it said that we judge others by their actions while ignorant of their intentions but we judge ourselves by our intentions regardless of our actions.
Velveeta.
Not one of Bruce's better ones.
When they say charity begins at home
They're not just talking about a toilet and a telephone
Got to search the silence of the soul's wild places
For a voice that can cross the spaces

amen. 

 
This little ditty is mighty preachy.
All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic.-Wilde
 Kaisersosay wrote:
Look at Bruce rocking a little rasta,,,,its a happy little ditty.....oh wait,,,maybe not....

 
You said it
I like it. Sound a bit like Colin Bass' Indonesian band.
Look at Bruce rocking a little rasta,,,,its a happy little ditty.....oh wait,,,maybe not....
Good lyrics
Probably because I've been living in New York for the last year, this anniversary of the attacks is particularly melancholy. Thanks for the set.

This particular song is...meh. But it's shaping up to be quite a set.
The lyrics are interesting, but too much \"I want to make a great philosophical song\" for me. It\'s too PC as well. One line that redeems the rest though is: everybody loves to see justice done on somebody else Still, \"If I had a Rocket Launcher\"\'s lyrics are much better IMHO... they get basicaly the same point across, but much better, and do not feel arrogant like those can.
His voice is too strained. Also, this is the \"type\" of song that\'s forgettable to me, like most Grateful Dead or something.
Socially-conscious but in a white-bread, trite sort of way.
not a bad song, has a catchy Reggae beat, but might sound better if it didn\'t sound so polished. to me, this kind of music needs to be raw, more discordant, more rebellious, not as canned as this sounds...but i still like it anyways. no wonder is Bob Marley was such a genius....his legacy can be heard a million times a day all over the world. Peace, brothers :p
Not a bad song, but not one of his strongest efforts in my opinion. Maybe it\'s the production on the studio albums, but some of his songs from this era come across much better live (including on his live recordings). The version of \"Broken Wheel\" on this album is kind of so-so, but the live version just kicks ass.
I just love the line "everybody loves to see justice done - on somebody else"...
I've always been a big fan of Bruce Cockburn... this track is great, I'd forgotten all about it and it couldn't be more relevant today... a bit of an antithesis to his angrier "If I Had A Rocket Launcher" but as most people do, he's probably had time to rethink his politics too... this should be recorded in several languages and released worldwide... Cheers Jacques Radio Paradise: What Radio Could Have Been.