We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Monsters

from Fuck Sandwich by Unusual Squirrel

/

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $1 USD  or more

     

  • Buy the Full Digital Album

about

Susan Hwang's Bushwick Book Club is an incredible thing. A bunch of us are assigned a book to write a song about, and then we get together and perform it. Usually there's an audience too. In October of 2016, the assignment was to write about any monster from any book. So I chose the monsters that created the financial crisis of 2007-2008, from the books "Too Big to Fail" and "The Big Short."

lyrics

There are monsters far more frightening
Than the evil scary clown
That waits behind the bushes
Till he sees you come around
There are monsters you don't know about
And they will take you down
They're manufactured in offices downtown

Monsters of Accounting
Monsters of the Law
Monsters of Investment
For the petit bourgeois

Monsters

Monsters

Monsters of the Government
That looks the other way
What can keep
These monsters at bay

Monsters

Monsters

I said there are monsters far more frightening
Than the evil scary clown
That waits behind the bushes
Till he sees you come around
There are monsters you don't know about
And they will take you down
And they are made in offices downtown

Monsters that have
Brought down entire nations
I'm talking about
Collateralized debt obligations
And there's nothing you can do my friend
'Cause there aint no way to stop
A well positioned
Credit default swap

Monsters

Monsters


The earliest CDOs were constructed by Drexel Burnham Lambert – the home of “junk bond king” Michael Milken.
But it takes a village:
Securities firms;CDO managers, Financial guarantors; Investors, of course, and maybe most important, the Rating agencies, who helped cause the crash of 07 and 08 by giving really shitty junk CDOs the highest ratings.


Credit Default Swaps were invented by Blythe Masters from JP Morgan in 1994. They are basically bets that a loan or investment will fail.
There is no required reporting of swaps to a government agency. So investors had no way of knowing that the same motherfuckers who were selling them the investments were also betting against those same investments.

Monsters

Monsters

There are monsters far more frightening
Than the evil scary clown
That waits behind the bushes
Till he sees you come around
There are monsters you don't know about
And they will take you down
And they are made in offices downtown

Monsters of Accounting
Monsters of the Law
Monsters of Investment
For the petit bourgeois
Monsters of the Government
That looks the other way
Nothing can keep
These monsters at bay

c. 2016 John S. Hall

credits

from Fuck Sandwich, released January 19, 2017
John S. Hall - vocals, finger snaps
Violet S. Hall - violin

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Unusual Squirrel image

Unusual Squirrel New York, New York

Unusual Squirrel is:

John S. Hall - vocals
Susan Hwang - janggu, accordion, backing vocals
Ray Brown - guitar, piano, percussion
Preston Spurlock - keyboards, percussion

with special guest Violet S. Hall - violin on "The Quartet," "Monsters," and "Everlasting."

Produced by Charlie Nieland ... more

contact / help

Contact Unusual Squirrel

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this track or account

If you like Unusual Squirrel, you may also like:

Bandcamp Daily  your guide to the world of Bandcamp

On Bandcamp Radio

Fabiana Palladino stops by to talk about her mesmeric debut LP.
listen now