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Before P!nk, Paul McCartney and Moby helped take PETA’s message to the masses, trendy ’80s songbirds Nina Hagen and Lene Lovich put PETA US on the radio and the pop culture radar with their edgy dance hit ‘Don’t Kill the Animals’.
Now, to celebrate the animal anthem’s 30th anniversary, PETA US is offering a free download of the out-of-print Wax Trax Records collectible.
The quirky song – which begins with a laboratory raid heard over walkie-talkies – opens PETA US’s Animal Liberation album, which also features The Smiths, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Howard Jones. It was named Rock Album of the Week by The New York Times upon its release in April 1987.
Hagen and Lovich were the first artists to donate a song to PETA US – since then, Prince, The Black Keys, Morrissey, Chrissie Hynde and Dolly Parton have followed in their footsteps.
By Nina Hagen and Lene Lovich
We all want to see thru life’s mystery
The quest for knowledge is a natural activity
But science be careful – science be kind
We can’t go on pretending to be blind
Those animal experiments don’t make sense
You’re getting nowhere with cruelty and death
I say ignorance was some excuse
But uh-uh not now – you see we got the proof
A-a-aanimal testing is a dangerous game
All systems are different – we’re not the same
It’s a terrible risk – so no surprise
We get wrong results – hey, what about thalidomide?
Abuse yourself of your own free will
Get hurt – get high – get in distress
But don’t drag the animals into this mess
No more torture! The animals are free
The same with messing around with atomic energy
Hey, hey, doctor – reincarnation
Would you like to come back as a laboratory rat?
Here we are coiled like a sleeping snake
We got to expand our potential
For God’s sake
If we want to avoid this endless human riot
Why don’t we start by changing our diet?
Life is for living – the animals agree
If they were meant to be eaten
They’d be growing on trees
So no more torture of our furry friends
In the name of food or scientific ends
The pressure is on – be antivivisection!
All our scientists are messing up – they don’t succeed
Let the psychics tell what the spirits think we need
Our super friends from other planets want to give advice
But the money-orientated business doesn’t think that’s nice
Come on, let’s educate the mutated human race
By the super power of amazing grace
The missing link of human evolution
Is sexuality – it needs a spiritual revolution
My individual god identity
Is what you’ve gotta meet
It’s the rhythm of the beat
Don’t kill the animals
Don’t kill the animals
The animals are free
Click here to get your free download of Don’t Kill the Animals.
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