Tekst piosenki
In 1980
As part of a project called Word of Mouth
I was invited, along with eleven other artists
To go to Panape
A tiny island in the middle of the Pacific
The idea was that we’d sit around talking for a few days
And that the conversations would be made into a talking record
The first night we were all really jet-lagged
But as soon as we sat down the organizers set up all these mikes
And switched on thousand white light bulbs
And we tried our best to seem as intelligent as possible
Television had just come to Panape a week before we arrived
And there was a strong excitement around the island
As people crowded around the few sets
Then the day after we arrived
In a bizarre replay of the first TV show ever broadcast to Panape
Prisoners escaped from a jail
Broke into the radio station and murdered the DJ
Then they went off on a rampage through the jungle
Armed with lawnmower blades
In all, four people were murdered in cold blood
Detectives, flown in from Guam to investigate
Swarmed everywhere
At night we stayed around in our cottages
Listening out into the jungle
Finally the local chief
Decided to hold a ceremony for the murder victims
The artist Marina Brownovich and I went
As representatives of our group … to film it
The ceremony was held in a large thatched lean-to
And most of the ceremony involved cooking beans in pits
And brewing a dark drink from roots
The smell was overwhelming. Dogs careened around barking
And everybody seemed to be having a fairly good time
… as funerals go
After a few hours Marina and I were presented to the chief
Who was sitting on a raised platform above the pits
We’d been told we couldn’t turn our backs on the chief at any time
Or ever be higher than he was
So we scrambled up onto the platform with our film equipment
And sort of duck-waddled up backwards to the chief
As a present I brought one of those Fred Flintstone cameras
The kind where the film canister is also the body of the camera
And I presented it to the chief
He seemed delighted and began to click off pictures
He wasn’t advancing the film between shots
But since we were told we shouldn’t speak unless spoken to
I wasn’t able to inform him that he wasn’t going to get twelve pictures
But only one, very, very complicated one
After a couple more hours
The chief lifted his hand
And there was absolute silence
All the dogs had suddenly stopped barking
We looked around and saw the dogs
All their throats had been simultaneously cut
And their bodies, still breathing
Pierced with rods, were turning on those spits
The chief insisted we join in the meal
But Marina had turned green
And I asked if we could just have ours to go
They carefully wrapped the dogs in leaves
And we carried their bodies away
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