This Ain’t No Picnic

d. boon worked at an autoparts store. he wanted to play jazz on the radio but the bigotted boss dismissed it as "nigger shit" and told him to turn it off. he wanted to quit but desperately needed the money, and vented out through this song.

Should be 'foreman presides over me,' not 'for a man'. "Losing my self respect for a man who presides over me" doesn't make any sense. A foreman is the working man's equivalent of an office supervisor or something.

This song is a blue collar anthem about struggling to make ends meet in a hostile and shitty work environment, not racism. It was allegedly inspired by D. Boon's racist boss calling music on a jazz radio station "nigger shit." But that's just what some college kid hipster wrote in a book longer after Boon got killed in a car accident. Hell of a story, but who knows if that actually happened?

Stay skeptic, fuck the man.

This song is about racism. Apparently, It's about a bigotted boss D. Boon once had.

i love the urgency of this song, and pretty much all of double nickels. d. boon just spits out the lyrics as fast as he can, it's tremendous.

I wouldn't go so far as to say "this song is about racism". Of course, it comments on it twice - "I should go pitch a tent but our land isn't free" and "I refuse to be a slave" both show up in the last verse. More so this song is about the American "machine", as he puts it, and how it isn't much of a picnic anymore - for anyone.

that's rad.

sorry i didn't add anything intelligent.

After 20 + years loving this jam ( at Loud volume levels) I have to admit that I've always screamed along with D. Boon thusly : ...' In the Place under My sheets..I refuse to be a slave'... I took that, with the rest of the song, to mean Hate the job you Must endure as a Slave...but never give up Inside your Dreams (that you have when sleeping under your sheets). I will probably continue, My way, but am gladl to have seen these lyrics...