Music: Somewhere In America by The Alternate Routes

On June 9, 2019, Tara Donnelly Gottlieb and her brother Eric Donnelly stood across the green from the very spot where their parents were violently and tragically killed and encouraged us to continue the work to prevent gun violence. Tara recorded her brother singing a song about their parents and so many other victims, Somewhere in America. Please take a few minutes to listen to this powerful message as a way to honor the memory of Kim and Tim Donnelly and the courage of their children.






Lyrics:

Poem: "America Is A Gun" by Brian Bilston

Posted by @brian_bilston on Twitter:

Music Video: "Bang Bang Bang" sung by Tracy Chapman

Lyrics:

What you go and do 
You go and give the boy a gun 
Now there ain't no place to run to 
Ain't no place to run

When he hold it in his hand 
He feel mighty he feel strong 
Now there ain't no place to run to 
Ain't no place to run

One day he may come back 
Repay us for what we've done 
Then where you gonna run to 
Where you gonna run

But one fine day 
All our problems will be solved 
Bang bang bang 
We'll shoot him down

Give him drugs and give him candy 
Anything, oh to make him think he's happy 
And he won't ever come for us 
He won't ever come

But if he does 
And if there's no one else around 
Bang bang bang 
We'll shoot him down

If he preys only on his neighbors 
Brothers, sisters and friends
We'll consider it a favor 
We'll consider justice done

But if he comes for you or me 
And we can place a gun in his hand 
Bang bang bang 
We'll shoot him dead

What you go and do 
You go and give the boy a gun 
Now there ain't no place to run to 
Ain't no place to run

Now we'll all be at his mercy 
If he decides to hunt us down 
'Cause there ain't no place to run to 
Ain't no place to run

If he wants the chances that you took from him
Oh, and nothing that you own
Then there'll be no place to run to 
There'll be no place to run

And if he finds himself to be 
A reflection of us all 
Bang bang bang 
He'll shoot us down

Before you can raise your eyes to read 
The writing on the wall 
Bang bang bang 
He'll shoot you down

Before you can bridge the gulf between 
And embrace him in your arms 
Bang bang bang
He'll shoot you down

Songwriters: Clive Kenneth Scott / Desmond Dyer / Donavan L. Johnson

Bang Bang Bang lyrics © EMI Music Publishing

Music Video: "Shoot You Down" by the Revivalists

HERE is a link to the video, also posted below.

In a Huffington Post article, two of the Revivalists band members discuss the song and how shootings like the ones at Sandy Hook and Parkland inspired them to try to share this beautiful message.





Lyrics:

I’ll always be the stone, not the one who throws it
I’ll always be the road, that’s the path I’ve chosen
Know you’re not alone when your heart is broken
Say, I just wanna know
Yeah, I just wanna know

Can we for once just live with no guns?
And I tell, tell no lies
We’re not born to just die

People say, people say, what goes around comes around
But I won’t, no, I won’t shoot you down

I’ll always be the bridge, not the one who burns it
I’ll always be the kid with open arms deserving
Of all the love you give in a world that’s hurting
Say, we just want to live
Yeah, we just want to live

So can we for once just live with no guns?
And I tell, tell no lie
We’re not born to just die

People say, people say what goes around comes around
But I won’t, no, I won’t shoot you down
Said I won’t, no, I won’t shoot you down

I won’t shoot you down
I won’t shoot you down
So can we for once just live with no guns?

People say, people say what goes around comes around
But I won’t, no I won’t shoot you down
People say, people say what goes around comes around
But I won’t, no I won’t shoot you down

I won’t shoot you down
I won’t shoot you down
I won’t shoot you down
No I won’t
No I won’t
Shoot you down

Songwriters: David Shaw / Dave Richard Bassett

Shoot You Down lyrics © Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.

Music Video: "Sound of Surviving" by Nichole Nordeman

HERE is a link to the YouTube video, where you can also find links to purchase the song and contact information for the singer, Nichole Nordeman.



Lyrics:

They told me I’d never get to tell my story Too many bullet holes It would take a miracle These voices Inside my head like poison Trying to steal my hope Silencing my soul But my story is only now beginning Don’t try to write my ending Nobody gets to sing my song This is the sound of surviving This is my farewell to fear This is my whole heart deciding I’m still here, I’m still here And I’m not done fighting This is the sound of surviving These pieces The ones that left me bleeding Intended for my pain Became the gift you gave me I gathered those pieces into a mountain My freedom is in view I’m stronger than I knew And this hill is not the one I die on I’m going to lift my eyes and I’m going to keep on climbing I’m still here Say it to the ache, lying there awake Say it to your tears I'm still here Say it to the pain, say it to the rain Say it to your fear This is the sound of surviving This is my farewell to fear This is my whole heart deciding I’m still here, I’m still here And I’m not done fighting No, I'm not done fighting And I am still rising Rising, I'm still rising And I'm not done fighting This is the sound of surviving Music video by Nichole Nordeman performing Sound Of Surviving. (C) 2017 Capitol Christian Music Group, Inc.

Music Video: Hallelujah Parody - Letter to Wayne LaPierre, NRA

Parody of "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen - Based on the arrangement by Pentatonix.







LYRICS TO THE HALLELUJAH PARODY Open Letter to Wayne LaPierre You see yourself the defender of the amendment passed to you from above, and any change that happens must go through ya. While other freedoms slipped away with nothing standing in their way, you waved your gun and claimed your hallelujah. Hallelujah, Hallelujah Hallelujah, Hallelujah We’ve heard you say these words before, about the guns that you adore. There really is no point in talkin’ to ya. You pride yourself the ears and eyes of five or so million other guys, and think your words will draw their hallelujah. Hallelujah, Hallelujah Hallelujah, Hallelujah Your mind is stuck in sixty-five when cold-war commies were alive. And those who wanted change were out to screw ya. And gun controls of any kind mean liberal commies in your mind who'll steal your rights then raise their hallelujah. Hallelujah, Hallelujah Hallelujah, Hallelujah Your logic is profoundly flawed, with teachers for your new vice-squad. You’d arm them to the teeth but they see through ya. Your rigid stance results in death. You claim that right with every breath, howling through your broken hallelujah. Hallelujah, Hallelujah Hallelujah, Hallelujah We think it’s time that you step down. Just walk away and pass the crown, before someone decides they need to sue ya. The arms race lost, it would appear and you’ve become the thing you fear an echo of your bloody hallelujah. Hallelujah, Hallelujah Hallelujah, Hallelujah


To support Pentatonix's work please visit https://parodyproject.com/supportus

The Stoneman Douglas High School Drama Club Performs "Shine"

On February 21, one week after the mass shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, a town hall meeting was held to discuss the issues of gun violence reduction and how they related to the shooting.

It was an emotion-charged event, where students and teachers confronted legislators and the NRA, face to face, on the issues.

At the end of the event, though, was this moving musical tribute, where members of the Stoneman Douglas High Schooll Drama Club, some of whom lost friends during the shooting, performed an original musical performance, entitled "Shine"....




"You're not gonna knock us down / We'll get back up again / You may have hurt us but I promise we are stronger and / We're not gonna let you win / We're putting up a fight / You may have brought the dark / But together we will shine a light," the chorus says.

It is chilling and amazing. If only we didn't have to have events like this, so that memorial songs like this wouldn't be needed anymore.

Music Video: "Among The Nine" by Caeli Barnhart

Caeli Barnhart, a singer/songwriter, was in a classroom at Umpqua Community College during the shooting there and experienced the terror of the lockdown and subsequent evacuation.

Caeli has now written a song and performed it on piano, entitled "Among The Nine," in memory of the victims of the UCC shooting.

HERE is an article about her song and her thoughts.  From the article:

Barnhart wrote the song in a half hour. 

“I was sitting there and just trying to think of what to do,” she recalled. “I just couldn't get their faces out of my mind.” 

Barnhart titled the song, “Among the Nine,” in memory of the nine people shot and killed at UCC. 

“The last lyrics in the chorus are, Bring me home, that I may rest among the nine,” she said. “When I'm singing it, I look to them for strength.”

Below is the YouTube video of her performing "Among the Nine" and the lyrics are printed below that.

(Caeli had also written and performed a song on guitar, in 2012, entitled "You Are Safe" in memory of the Sandy Hook shooting victims.)

"Among the Nine" by Caeli Barnhart (YouTube Link):

Lyrics:

Thursday morning, just an every day
Not yet knowing, we'd be forever changed
Sit in the classroom, full of innocent eyes
This world that's been so cruel, had evil in mind

Bring me home, take me where love wins every time
Bring me home, where all of this darkness has no place to hide
Bring me home, I'm so tired
Bring me home, that I may rest among the nine

Tears and candles, filled the park with light
While broken families, wondered how to make this right
All of the faces, forever burned in our memory
Remind of changes, and the love we need desperately

Bring me home, take me where love wins every time
Bring me home, where all of this darkness has no place to hide
Bring me home, I'm so tired
Bring me home, that I may rest among the nine

It was their first year
It was their time for change
They chased their dreams here
And they stood for faith

Bring me home, take me where love wins every time
Bring me home, where all of this darkness has no place to hide
Bring me home, I'm so tired
Bring me home, that I may rest among the nine

Tell me why, tell me
Tell me why, just tell me


Addendum:  You can follow Caeli at:
www.facebook.com/caelibarnhart
www.soundcloud.com/caelibarnhart
www.twitter.com/caelibarnhart

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Music: "Guns & The Crazy Ones" by Danny Schmidt

From the songwriter and musician, Danny Schmidt:  "Regardless of your take on how best to control gun violence (and I have friends on both sides of the table), I think we can all agree that there's way too much of it in this country. This song and video were inspired by the emotional fatigue of seeing tragic headlines and devastated faces in the news, day after day after day after day . . ."


GUNS & THE CRAZY ONES

Seems to me it's just as plain as please
It's plastered the news
Cause every day there's a new display
Of cannons come loose

Once was tough, two's a called bluff, three's enough's enough
Four was cruel, five's a dead school, six is like they're gunning for you

So tell me this, when the spirit slips
And can't hardly stand
What will it grasp if it falls too fast 
I hope just a hand

But if not, if the shell's shocked, if there's no angels near
If fury finds that in the chambered mind, there's just bullets and steel

So blame the guns or blame the crazy ones
It's almost the same
Cause in the home of the free and brave
These tools are insane

The best dirt on the free earth and we can't shake our pride
We're two sides of a mudslide, and we're both buried alive

So tell me now, tell me anyhow
When will it end?
Cause every time it's a friend of mine
The ghosts and the men

It seems to me it's just as plain as please

Music: "Shots" by Imagine Dragons

"Shots" by Imagine Dragons

I'm sorry for everything
Oh, everything I've done

Am I out of touch?
Am I out of my place?
When I keep saying that I'm looking for an empty space
Oh, I'm wishing you're here
But I'm wishing you're gone
I can't have you and I'm only gonna do you wrong

Oh, I'm going to mess this up
Oh, this is just my luck
Over and over and over again

I'm sorry for everything
Oh, everything I've done
From the second that I was born it seems I had a loaded gun
And then I shot, shot, shot a hole through everything I loved
Oh, I shot, shot, shot a hole through every single thing that I loved

Am I out of luck?
Am I waiting to break?
When I keep saying that I'm looking for a way to escape
Oh, I'm wishing I had what I'd taken for granted
I can't help you when I'm only gonna do you wrong

Oh, I'm going to mess this up
Oh, this is just my luck
Over and over and over again

I'm sorry for everything
Oh, everything I've done
From the second that I was born it seems I had a loaded gun
And then I shot, shot, shot a hole through everything I loved
Oh, I shot, shot, shot a hole through every single thing that I loved

In the meantime we let it go
At the roadside
We used to know
We can let this drift away
Oh, we let this drift away
At the bay side
You used to show
In the moonlight
We let it go
We can let this drift away
Oh, we let this drift away

And there's always time to change your mind
Oh, there's always time to change your mind
Oh, love, can you hear me?
Oh, let it drift away

I'm sorry for everything
Oh, everything I've done
From the second that I was born it seems I had a loaded gun
And then I shot, shot, shot a hole through everything I loved
Oh, I shot, shot, shot a hole through every single thing that I loved

In the meantime we let it go
At the roadside
We used to know
We can let this drift away
Oh, we let this drift away
At the bay side
You used to show
In the moonlight
We let it go
We can let this drift away
Oh, we let this drift away

And there's always time to change your mind
Oh, there's always time to change your mind
Oh, love, can you hear me?
Oh, let it drift away

Lyrics: Red Crayons, by Bill McIver

Below are the lyrics to the song "Red Crayons" by Bill McIver, guitarist and songwriter.

You can go HERE to hear the song and purchase it.  I hope you will.  As stated on his page:

All proceeds from online sales of "Red Crayons" will be donated to the non-profit group "Sandy Hook Promise," which is trying to bring about sensible gun legislation in the United States.

Thank you, Bill, for supporting common sense gun legislation.


Red Crayons 
written by Bill McIver © 2012, All rights reserved 


Armed with innocence, armed with crayons 
Blunt-tip scissors in small hands 
Cut construction paper and paste 
Will something be constructed or will it be waste? 

Little jackets on hooks, drawings on walls 
Empty metal jackets lay heavy in the halls 
Books are unread behind closed doors 
Empty magazines are spread on the floors 

Fight baby tooth and nail to hold that glock 
Shout “arm the teachers” nevermind the chalk 
Let no gun or slug be thought restricted 
If I loved a drug as much you'd call me addicted 

Fill malls and cinemas and schools with police 
Slow creep of the State’s ok so you can keep a piece 
Fill the holsters, sword the sheaths 
True freedom and safety means we’re armed to the teeth 

Can’t yell fire in a theater but I can say what’s strange 
I can drink a beer these days without a password exchange 
My wife she can vote now and there are no slaves 
Have you seen the flag? Hell, even it has changed 

“War is hell” is what was heard in my father’s day 
Don’t even have to look outside the USA 
Where a score and ten die from guns each day 
From Anchorage to Aberdeen from Maine to LA 

We'll never know what Dolly heard from James 
But don’t you find it odd and ain’t it strange? 
That bullets find the children but the 2nd finds no change 
So Johnny gets his rocks off at the range 

There are far more bullets than crayons in the stores 
Bullets and crayons strew the floor 
The only action’s with a gun, there’s inaction in the Halls 
Crayons and bullet holes mark the walls 

All these fuckers dress in black and attack kids in schools 
An unregulated militia who are we kidding with no rules 
You say every arm and sleeve despite all this wrong 
I came in here with my sleeves rolled up to sing this song 

Sales of bullets shoot through the roof 
People draw conclusions and offer proofs 
Children, well children will draw what they see 
They’ve sold out of red at the crayon factory 

Poem: Let Us Explain How This Happened In Your School

(The poem and collage, below, and preamble, are by Cynthia Jacobi, a volunteer for Ceasefire Oregon)

Preamble: 

After Newtown, people asked what could you say to those parents who lost children?  

I ask what could we say to the children who we failed to 
Protect?  What could we possibly give as explanation?  

(Collage by Cynthia Jacobi)

Let Us Explain How This Happened In Your School    

by Cynthia Jacobi 

It happened because the mother was odd

     and the boy was weird   

because neighbors did not bake cookies to greet them

     blank curtains were drawn and lawns were wide

Because the mother could no longer sing the boy to sleep

because the mother didn’t lock the safe or hide the key

because the other kids pushed him aside

It happened because the mother took the boy to practice

because the mother took the boy Christmas shopping

because America sells mega-magazines everywhere

     and Hollywood sells violence

It happened because of Gun Luv

because we are the land of the brave and the free

     and cowboys and Bonnie and Clyde

because bullets open doors to entry

Because the boy didn’t need to reload much

It happened because the NRA

     loudspeakers spread dollars and fear

because there was no good guy with a gun

    to shoot the bad guy with a gun

It happened because we fail to be horrified for long

because hunters of quail and rabbit are silent

Because reasonable people find no reason to be so

It happened because we have forgotten the poems

     we once knew by heart

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Lyrics: God We Have Heard It

This was sung at the opening of a panel discussion that I participated in today at First United Methodist Church in Eugene, in memory of the Sandy Hook victims, sung to the tune of "Ah Holy Jesus".


"God We Have Heard It"
by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette (copywrite 1999)


God, we have heard it, sounding in the silence:
News of the children, lost to this world's violence.
Children of promise!  Then without a warning,
Loved ones are mourning.

Jesus, you came to bear our human sorrow;
You came to give us hope for each tomorrow.
You are our life, Lord, God's own love revealing.
We need your healing!

Heal us from giving weapons any glory;
Help us, O Prince of Peace, to hear your story;
Help us resist the evil all around here;
May love abound here!

By your own Spirit, give your church a clear voice;
In this world's violence, help us make a new choice.
Help us to witness to the joy your peace brings,
Until your world sings!