《The Cultural Ambassador(Live)》歌词

[00:00:00] The Cultural Ambassador (Live) - Laurie Anderson

[00:00:00] Anyway I was in israel as a kind

[00:00:03] Of cultural ambassador

[00:00:06] And there were lots of press

[00:00:07] Conferences scheduled

[00:00:09] Around the performances

[00:00:10] The journalists usually started things off

[00:00:13] By asking about the avantgarde

[00:00:16] So what's so good about new they'd ask

[00:00:20] Well new is interesting

[00:00:25] And what they would say is so

[00:00:27] Good about interesting

[00:00:29] Well interesting is you know it's interesting

[00:00:34] It's like being awake you know

[00:00:37] I'm treading water now

[00:00:38] And what is so good about

[00:00:39] Being awake they'd say

[00:00:41] Finally I got the hang of this

[00:00:43] Never answer a question

[00:00:45] In israel always answer by asking

[00:00:47] Another question

[00:00:49] But the Israelis were vey curious

[00:00:51] About the gulf war

[00:00:52] And what americans had thought

[00:00:53] About it and I tried

[00:00:55] To think of a good question to

[00:00:56] Ask and answer to

[00:00:57] This but what was really on

[00:00:58] My mind was that the

[00:01:00] Week before I had myself

[00:01:02] Been testing explosives

[00:01:04] In a parking lot in tel aviv

[00:01:08] Now this happened

[00:01:09] Because I had brought some

[00:01:10] Small stage bombs

[00:01:11] To Israel as props for this

[00:01:14] Performance and the

[00:01:15] Israeli promoter was very interested in them

[00:01:19] And it turned out that he was on weekend duty

[00:01:21] On one of the bomb squads and bombs were

[00:01:24] Also something of a hobby during the week

[00:01:27] So I said

[00:01:28] Look you know these bombs are

[00:01:30] Nothing special just just a little smoke

[00:01:32] And he said well we can get much

[00:01:35] Better things for you

[00:01:37] And I said

[00:01:37] No really these are fine and he said

[00:01:39] No but it should be big theatrical

[00:01:42] It should make an impression I mean

[00:01:44] You really just the right bomb

[00:01:46] And so one morning he arranged to have

[00:01:48] About fifty small bombs delivered to a parking lot

[00:01:52] And since he looked on it as a sort of

[00:01:54] Special surprise

[00:01:55] Favor I couldn't really refuse so

[00:01:59] We are on this parking

[00:02:00] Lot testing the bombs and after

[00:02:02] The first few explosions

[00:02:04] I found I was really getting pretty interested

[00:02:09] They all had very different characteristics

[00:02:12] Some had fiery orange tails and

[00:02:14] Made these low paah

[00:02:15] Paah paah popping sound others

[00:02:17] Exploded mid air

[00:02:19] And left long smoky slinky trails

[00:02:22] And he had several

[00:02:23] Of each kind in case I needed to

[00:02:26] Review them all at the end

[00:02:27] And I'm thinking

[00:02:29] Here I am a citizen of the world's largest arms

[00:02:34] Supplier setting off bombs with the world's second

[00:02:37] Largest arms customer and I'm having a great time

[00:02:45] So even though the diplomatic part of the trip

[00:02:47] Wasn't going so well at least

[00:02:49] I was getting some instruction in terrorism

[00:02:53] And it reminded me of something in a book by

[00:02:55] Don deLillo about how terrorists

[00:02:58] Are the only true artists

[00:02:59] Left because they're the only ones who are still

[00:03:02] Capable of really surprising people

[00:03:06] And the other thing it reminded me of were all the

[00:03:09] Attempts during the gulf war to outwit

[00:03:11] The terrorists and I especially

[00:03:13] Remember an interesting

[00:03:14] Liist of tips devised by the us embassy in madrid

[00:03:20] And these tips were designed for americans

[00:03:23] Who found themselves in wartime airports

[00:03:26] The idea was not to call ourselves to the

[00:03:28] Attention of the numerous foreign terrorists

[00:03:31] Who were presumably lurking all over the terminal

[00:03:34] So the embassy tips were a list of mostly don'ts

[00:03:40] Things like don't wear a baseball cap

[00:03:44] Don't wear a sweat shirt with the name of

[00:03:47] An american university on it don't wear

[00:03:50] Timberlands with no socks don't chew gum

[00:03:55] Don't yell ethel our plane is leaving

[00:04:00] I mean it's weird when your entire culture

[00:04:03] Can be summed up in eight giveaway characteristics

[00:04:10] And during the gulf war I was traveling around

[00:04:13] Europe with a lot of equipment and all the airports

[00:04:16] Were full of security guards who would

[00:04:19] Suddenly point to a suitcase and start yelling

[00:04:22] Whose bag is this I wanna know right now

[00:04:25] Who owns this bag

[00:04:26] And huge groups of passengers would start

[00:04:29] Out for the bag just running around in circles like a

[00:04:32] Skud missile on its way in and I was carrying

[00:04:35] A lot of electronics so I had to keep unpacking

[00:04:38] Everything and plugging it in and demonstrating

[00:04:41] How it all worked and I guessed

[00:04:44] I did seem a little fishy

[00:04:46] A lot of this stuff wakes up displaying led program

[00:04:49] Readouts that have names like adam smasher and

[00:04:52] So it took a while to convince them that they

[00:04:54] Weren't some kind of espionage system

[00:04:58] So I've done quite a few of these sort of impromptu

[00:05:02] New music concerts for small groups of detectives

[00:05:06] And customs agents and I'd have to keep setting

[00:05:11] All this stuff up and they'd listen

[00:05:12] For a while and they'd say

[00:05:14] So uh what's this

[00:05:17] And I'd pull out something like this sayfilter and

[00:05:20] Now this is what I'd like to think

[00:05:23] Of as the voice of authority

[00:05:26] And it would take me a while to tell them

[00:05:29] How I used it for songs that were you know

[00:05:32] About various forms of control and they would say

[00:05:39] Now why would you want to talk like that

[00:05:46] And I'd look around at the and the undercover

[00:05:50] Agents and the dogs and the radio in the corner

[00:05:54] Tuned to the superbowl coverage of the war

[00:05:58] And I'd say take a wild guess

[00:06:06] Finally of course I got through with this after all

[00:06:10] American made equipment and the customs agents

[00:06:13] Were all talking about the effectiveness no the

[00:06:17] Beauty the elegance of the american

[00:06:20] Strategy of pinpoint bombing

[00:06:23] The high tech surgical approach which was being

[00:06:27] Reported by cnn as something between grand opera

[00:06:32] And the superbowl like the first reports before the

[00:06:37] Blackout when tv was live and

[00:06:41] Everything was heightened

[00:06:43] And it was so euphoric

[00:06:45] The Cultural Ambassador(live版) - Laurie Anderson