The Band Played The National Anthem
Words by Roger Burton-West © 1 March 1994
TTTO And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda by Eric Bogle


  G           C            G              Em
When I was a young boy I dreamed of the stars,
         G        D              G
And the velvet of endless black night.
                 C             G           Em
And America was racing to the Moon and to Mars,
        G             D             G
And a bloodless war they seemed to fight.
       D                    C         G
Then Apollo Six burned in electrical fire,
         D                     C       G
White, Grissom and Chaffee in funeral pyre,
                        C               G               Em
And they'd said it was safe, but then they were proved liars,
           G       D             G
But they started again just the same.

	                        C       G
	And the band played the national anthem,
	                               D
	As they lowered them into the grave.
	    C
	The heroes had died,
	    G            C
	We stood by and cried,
	        G            D              G
	But the next ones we hoped we could save.

The Russians were racing and they had done well,
With their probes and their sputniki beeping.
They had landed their robots on Venus' hot hell,
And the Moon while the Rangers were creeping
Then four Salyut crewman were scattered and burned,
Not even enough for a funeral urn,
And they said they were sorry, and next time they'd learn,
Not that /that/ helped the heroes at all.

	And the band played the national anthem
	As they put up the monument stone
	But since that dark day
	KOCMOC had to pay
	And we raced for the moon all alone.

And we got to the moon, but we threw it away,
For a few precious rocks, nothing more.
Then they planned a new ship, that could just about pay,
And the world watched and waited in awe.
But they cut that proud ship till she hardly could fly,
And when she was built they told outrageous lies,
And it was not surprising that men had to die,
Ere they found out that she was no good.

	And the band played the national anthem,
	As the ship came apart in the air.
	And Feynman said "Take
	Heed of your mistakes!"
	But he's gone now and nobody cares.

And whatever is next there are bound to be dead,
It was never a safe way to travel.
But if we give up now we're easily led,
By the prophets of meaningless babble.
And though it's not safe we must try it once more,
For now we need space more than ever before,
And once we're in orbit the moon's at our door,
And we have to go back there some day.

	And the band will play national anthems
	And they'll honour the valiant slain
	For though we are down
	And stuck to the ground
	We must get into orbit again.

		[Optional ending: sing quietly]
		Oh say can you see by the dawn's early light
		What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming...?