FROM AVALANCHE'S JUNE-JULY 2009 RECORDING SESSIONS AND THE NEW CD. A SONG ABOUT THE CURRENT BANKING CRISIS...AND THE CROOKS THAT CAUSED IT.
melodic
hard rock
classic rock
mainstream
original rock
political rock
arena rock
the road less traveled
songs with a message
avalanche hard rock band
michael foster
will there be tomorrow
Story behind the song
TELL US WHERE THE MONEY WENT
Copyright 2009 by CRYSTAL MAGIC MUSIC PUBLISHING (ASCAP)
Music and Lyrics by: Michael Foster
Arranged, Produced, and Mixed by: Michael Foster
Engineered by: Mark Easton
Recorded in July, 2009 at ROUGH CUT STUDIO...... Eastford, Conn.
Mixed in November, 2009 at GOLDEN SUN STUDIO.....North Palm Beach, Florida.
Michael Foster: Guitar (Left), Vocals, Electric guitar (Wah) Solos.
Mark Easton: Guitar (Right), Backing Vocals, Electric guitar solos.
Barry Easton: Drums.
Michael Corsini: Bass.
Stephanie Krowka: Backing Vocals.
This is a song that I originally wrote most of the music for in 1986...but rewrote and rearranged this year (2009) along with the lyrics. It is a song about the Financial meltdown of September, 2008...and the trillion dollar plus "bailout" (TARP) authorized by the Bush Administration, only days before they were voted out of power by angry American voters. The unbelievable numbers...combined with the fact that there were no safeguards, no conditions, and no accountability attached to that bailout means that without a doubt...we all just witnessed the greatest heist ever successfully pulled off...and it was all done right in front of us...simply because those who wield the political power in this Corporate-controlled government knew there was nothing anyone could do to stop it...because the only people who really could...are the problem. For all intents and purposes the U.S. Treasury was looted...and the crooks that did it took everything they could find...and then took more....saying that the sheer size of the "bailout" required the printing of new money...even though doing that just devalues all U.S currency...which means whatever money people might have has a lower net value...and buys even less than it did before the "bailout" happenned...which just further weakens an economy that is already teetering on the brink.
The World Economy is built on an increasingly fragile "house of cards"...and the catastrophe this meltdown actually was for millions of people, as they watched their homes foreclosed on...and their retirement funds, life savings, and pensions shrink to a fraction of what they were...is nothing compared to what is coming...when that house of cards finally collapses under the weight of it's own greed.
The song's title is simply what millions of hard working people are asking themselves every day...as they continue to see Wall St. hot shots reward themselves with multi-million dollar bonuses...paid for by taxpayer dollars from that "bailout"....bonuses that should never even happen. Bonuses are supposed to reflect good work and profitability for the companies those executives work for...rather than rewards for dangerous, unwise, and unethical business practices, and ultimately dismal leadership and abject failure, that ultimately gambled and lost the investments of millions of people...so that a few wealthy people might get richer. When banks and investment firms have grown so large that they are deemed "too large to fail" (because the entire world economy would fail with them)...then it could only happen as a result of the complicity of their "paid employees" (masquerading as "public servants" in Congress, the Senate, and other positions of great power), who have eliminated the Anti-Trust laws that used to make these business practices and these monopolies illegal. The anti-trust laws that used to exist to prevent this very thing from happening have been systematically eliminated....or de-regulated.
Today...corporations ARE the government...and the laws today are designed for one reason only: to increase their profits...regardless of the human cost to the populations that government is supposed to protect. It's an angry song...and that's because this stuff really pisses me off. Sometimes...the only voice left to call this what it really is...is the sarcastic angry voice of rock and roll. Nobody who's voice actually gets heard,
Lyrics
TELL US WHERE THE MONEY WENT
Lyrics by: Michael Foster (Copyright 2009 by Crystal Magic Music Publishing).
1st VERSE
(Tell us where the money went!)
When bankers get a bailout...and leave us with our hand out...I think that something's stinking...
(Tell us where the money went)
And all the folks on Main Street scramble for a new seat...on a ship that's sinking....
(Tell us where the money went)
We got foxes in the henhouse...
'Cause we hand them the keys....
Is it smoke...is it mirrors?
NO!
The place is on fire!
UNISON CHORUS
Tell us where the money went!
Print the money... get it spent.
Forget your mortgage....PAY YOUR RENT!
Corporation Government...
VOCAL BRIDGE
They want to steal your future...
They want all your stuff...
Can't you see the big picture?
Enough's NEVER enough!
You'd better learn how to like it...
And if you don't....THAT'S TOUGH!
'Cause when Greed is your Master...
Then the game gets...rough.
REPEAT UNISON CHORUS
SECOND VOCAL BRIDGE
Crooks inside the Treasury...
Strip the cupboards bare...
Stealing all that they see....
'Cause they just don't care...
Take your house and your savings...
Can we make you a deal?
Ten cents on the dollar...
Is such a.....STEAL!
GUITAR SOLOS (Mark, Mike)
REPEAT 1st VOCAL BRIDGE
OUTRO GUITAR SOLOS (Mark, Mike, Mark, Mike)
END.