Telephone Blues (1950) chords by Sonny Terry
Verse 1
D
Now, if you want higher wages let me
A
D
tell you what to do
You got to talk to the workers
in the shop with you.
A
You got to build you a union,
D
got to make it strong,
But if you all stick together,
boys, it won't be long.
You get shorter hours,
better working conditions,
Vacations with pay. Take your kids
Verse 2
to the seashore.
D
G
It ain't quite this simple,
so I better explain
Just why you got to ride
on the union train.
D
A
'Cause if you wait for the boss
to raise your pay,
We'll all be a- waitin' 'til Judgment
Day.
G
We'll all be buried, gone to heaven,
D
St. Peter'll be the straw boss
then.
Verse 3
D
Now you know you're underpaid but
A
the boss says you ain't;
He speeds up the work 'til you're 'bout
to faint.
D
You may be down and out
, but you ain't beaten,
You can pass out a leaflet and
call a meetin'.
Talk it over, speak your mind,
G
Decide to do somethin' about it.
Verse 4
Course, the boss may persuade
some poor damn fool
To go to your meetin' and act
like a stool.
D
But you can always tell a stool,
though, that's a fact,
He's got a yaller streak a- runnin'
A
down his back.
He doesn't have to stool,
he'll always get along
On what he takes out of blind men's cups.
Verse 5
G
You got a union now,
D
and you're sittin' pretty,
Put some of the boys on the steer
A
D
G
ing committee.
D
A
G
D
The boss won't listen when one guy squawks,
A
D
But he's got to listen when
the union talks.
He'd better, be mighty lonely
Everybody decide to walk
Verse 6
out on him.
D
Suppose they're working you so
hard it's just outrageous
And they're paying you
all starvation wages.
G
You go to the boss and the boss would yell,
"Before I raise your pay I'd see you
all in hell."
Well, he's puffing a big seegar,
D
feeling mighty slick
'Cause he thinks he's
got your union licked.
A
Well, he looks out the window
and what does he see
But a thousand pickets,
G
and they all agree:
He's a bastard, unfair,
slavedriver,
Bet he beats his wife!
Verse 7
Now, boys, you've come to the hardest time.
D
The boss will try to bust your picket line.
He'll call out the police, the National Guard,
A
They'll tell you it's a crime to
D
have a union card.
They'll raid your meetin',
they'll hit you on the head,
They'll call every one of you a goddam red,
Unpatriotic, Japanese spies,
sabotaging national defense!
Verse 8
D
G
But out at Ford, here's what they found,
And out at Vultee, here's what they found,
And out at Allis- Chalmers,
D
here's what they found,
A
And down at Bethlehem, here's
what they found:
That if you don't let
red- baiting break you up,
And if you don't let stoolpigeons break you up,
G
And if you don't let vigilantes
break you up,
D
And if you don't let race hatred break you up,
You'll win. What
I mean, take it easy, but take it!
Telephone Blues (1950)
Sonny Terry
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