Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye
Lyrics
While goin 'the road to sweet Athy, hurroo, hurroo
While goin' the road to sweet Athy, hurroo, hurroo
While goin 'the road to sweet Athy
A stick in me hand and a drop in me eye
A doleful damsel I heard cry ,
Johnny I hardly knew ye.
With your guns and drums and drums and guns, hurroo, hurroo
With your guns and drums and drums and guns, hurroo, hurroo
With your guns and drums and drums and guns
The enemy nearly slew ye
Oh my darling dear, Ye look so queer
Johnny I hardly knew ye.
Where are your eyes that were so mild, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your eyes that were so mild, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your eyes that were so mild
When my heart you so beguiled?
Why did ye skedaddle from me and the child?
Oh Johnny, I hardly knew ye.
Where are your legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your legs that used to run
When you went for to carry a gun
Indeed your dancing days are done
Oh Johnny, I hardly knew ye.
I'm happy for to see ye home, hurroo, hurroo
I'm happy for to see ye home, hurroo, hurroo
I'm happy for to see ye home
All from the island of Ceylon
So low in flesh, so high in bone
Oh Johnny I hardly knew ye.
Ye haven't an arm, ye haven't a leg, hurroo, hurroo
Ye haven't an arm, ye haven't a leg, hurroo, hurroo
Ye haven't an arm, ye haven't a leg,
Ye ' re an armless, boneless, chickenless egg,
Ye'll have to be put with a bowl to beg,
Oh Johnny I hardly knew ye.
They're rolling out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo
They're rolling out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo
They're rolling out the guns again,
But they never will take our sons again,
No they never will take our sons again ,
Johnny I'm swearing to ye.
Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye is an English song by Joseph B. Geoghegan, published in London in 1867. It originally had a different melody, but is now based on the American song When Johnny Comes Marching Home .
content
Though originally intended as a humorous song, it is now considered an expressive anti-war song. The text deals largely with a monologue between an Irish woman and her former lover whom she meets again on the road to Athy , County Kildare . After their illegitimate child was born, he ran away and joined the army. He was terribly disfigured during the war on Sulloon Island ( Ceylon , now Sri Lanka ). Despite all this, the woman is happy to see him again. Modern versions often end with an anti-war protest.
Text variations
"With your guns and drums and drums and guns" is sung partly as a chorus, partly as a single verse. In addition, the line is partially changed to “With your drums and guns and guns and drums”.
Recordings and use
- The Clancy Brothers
- Alexandra
- Irish rovers
- Glenn Miller Orchestra
- Dropkick Murphys released their version of it on their album The Meanest of Times .
- Mahones
- Guns N 'Roses
- De Dannan
- The Tossers play the song at some of their concerts and have it released on the live album Gloatin 'And Showboatin' .
- Karan Casey released a version of this song on her album Ships in the Forest in 2008 .
- Joan Baez often sang this song at her concerts in the 1970s as a protest against the war in Vietnam .
- Jacob Miller used the melody in his song Peace Treaty , which celebrated the short-lived peace treaty between the rival parties in Jamaica on the occasion of the One Love Peace Concert .
- Stanley Kubrick also uses this melody in his satirical nuclear war film Dr. Strange or: How I learned to love the bomb as music while the fighter planes fly to their location.
- The song was used in the short film Soldier , which was one of the finalists at the 2nd Annual NowFilmFestival. The festival is internet-based and runs on both YouTube and Myspace . Quote (from English): "'Soldier' is a short experimental film that depicts a day in the life of a soldier on the front in the Iraq war in a kind of rap song (performance poetry)."
- The melody is also used in the credits of the anime series Black Lagoon : Roberta's Blood Trail.
- Pianist Giovanni Mirabassi interpreted the song on the solo album Avanti!
- In the movie Die Hard: Now all the more , the song runs in the background as an instrumental version in the scene in which the gangsters arrive at the detonation site with all the trucks after the bomb explosion in the subway, while Simon Gruber walks comfortably into the bank building.
- Santiano in the 2013 album With the Tides
- In the series Sons of Anarchy (season 1, episode 08), the version of the Dropkick Murphys runs during an assassination attempt on the Irish arms dealers.
- De Höhner with their song Mir kumme met allemann over (Festpiraten)
- The band Fiddler's Green with their song Hip Hurray on the album King Shepherd
- Crime Scene: Attack on Guard 08 , 2019
literature
- Jonathan Lighter: The Best Antiwar Song Ever Written . Occasional Papers in Folklore No. 1. CAMSCO Music and Loomis House Press, 2012, ISBN 978-1-935243-89-2 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Lighter 2012, pp. 28–29.