After watching (some of) the PBS show last night on "protest music"

[T Wolf]

I started wondering where the 21st century version of this kind of political action is.

There is some, and being on the high side of 50, I am sure that I just am not hearing much of what is out there. But it does not seem as widespread and popular or have the impact that it has in the past.

Is this because music, like everything, has become homogenized and totally controlled by the large corporate interests?

Is it because young America, in the past the driving force behind societal change, is not as "active" as before?

And on a tangent, will we be seeing less of this kind of programming from PBS now that the cons are in charge?

[raccoon]

1. I'm on the high side of 50 also, and I'd say the answer to

all your questions is "Yes."

[katty]

53. very homogenized-corp tool of control, keep 'em down-music

is so powerful, why not manufature barbie/ken doll singers and deeply disturbing hypnotic noise--corp music is SOULESS and they want to keep it that way.

[raccoon]

54. Isn't that what they are doing now, in a sense?

"why not manufature barbie/ken doll singers"

and they may be doing the other, too,

"and deeply disturbing hypnotic noise"

[Union Thug]

2. System of a Down...! n/t

[sniffa]

6. bingo

outstanding protest music at that.

aLso, beastie boys, green day, eminem, kanye west, some country guy...

[HughBeaumont]

9. I saw them the other night.

Great band with a great sound. Too bad their message is totally lost on their GENERALLY hardcore-meathead following.

[T Wolf]

12. As the program moved closer to the present time, it did show that there

are current musicians who obviously are putting messages in their music. Do I just not hear that music? I would love to believe that I am just an out-of-touch old fogie who is too limited in his listening habits.

I acknowledge a nostalgia (old-folks disease) for what we thought was earth-shaking music. But it did seem to get more exposure in the mass culture. And even then, there were powerful forces to fight against.

Paranoid sidebar - The musical "Hair" comes out and is a direct threat to the status quo. The 5th Dimension records the song "Aquarius." They have a hit and become popular. We think they are continuing to spread the message. Big appeal to college kids. Their next song is "My Beautiful Balloon." Total co-option.

Now, with all the "programmed" formats, what is most widely heard is pop that does not rock the boat. Many cities do not even have alternative or progressive radio stations. Or, is radio a medium of the past?

We need more SoaD and Green Day and all the rest. It has to come from the young, because us oldsters are just to damn comfortable.

[Carni]

45. A lot of Rap (hip hop? Whatever the hell it is) sounds anti-bush regime

Please youngsters...cut me some slack/ I am 40 and clueless!

Getting to my point...I THINK I hear assorted bush bashing in the rap I hear at work.

Most kids now listen to this type of music, being stuck in my own old fartesque ways -- I didn't like it at first (at all) but it has grown on me.

If you put on "Hair" now for a kid they would look at you like you were from another planet! LOL!

You should see my daughter's face when she hears my old Pink Floyd CD's she is shocked and appalled.

[Mutley]

46. Being appalled at Pink Floyd is heresey!

And I'm only 26. My parents pushed on me what they called my "rock and roll education", and it's a good thing; otherwise I'd be stuck on the crapola that is out today.

[Carni]

50. I think the snorting noises in "Pigs" was too much for her lol

We were listening to Animals (very loudly one day) and received a raised eyebrow (Damn *That 70's show* to hell anyway! Parents don't need to be outed in such fashion! lol)

[HEAVYHEART]

19. I LOVE THEM!!!!!!

[flying_wahini]

3. yes, yes and yes

[bryant69]

4. Well I think there's a few other factors at work

I think the 1960s protest rock and folk have been a little over simplified. While there were protest singers (particularly Pete Seeger and Joan Baez) who were directly involved in political movements, many of the other bands were not, even if they sang about political themes. And there were plenty of bands who had nothing at all to do with politics.

Secondly, I think music is less hoogenized now than it was in the 1960s. Compare the amount of music available in the record store today with what woudl have been available in the 1960s. Now of course a large section of the people are going to go for Brittney Spears or Nancy Sinatra or whoever is putting out disposable pop music. But you can't argue that the record companies (both big and particularly small labels) aren't making alternatives available.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[HughBeaumont]

7. Actually, I CAN.

Back in the 70s and 80s, I was able to find everything I liked at record shops, no matter HOW weird. I was able to find even the most obscure thrash groups in some capacity at places like Camelot Music.

Now, I have to get 90% of my shit mailed to me via the internet, because even big-ass stores such as Borders just don't stock what I like or really ANYthing worth listening to. Forget about Worst Buy unless your tastes are rap or mainstream.

[bryant69]

30. Isn't that a problem of the record stores and not the record lables

You are complaining that it's inconvienent for you to have to order stuff online - ok, yeah, but it's still available.

[HughBeaumont]

38. No, cause even back then, major labels signed groups like

Testament, Exodus, Husker Du, Mr. Bungle and Vio-Lence despite them not even being remotely mainstream. Majors won't even come close to any band that does anything different nowadays. They see "risk" of any kind, they generally won't touch 'em. You can't really say anything in hip-hop can be deemed risky no matter how controversial their lyrical content because everyone loves it. It's now a proven genre. Even Trent Reznor attests that NIN wouldn't be the success that it is had they started today, because majors don't foster their groups.

And even with the lone examples of bands like Queens of the Stone Age and Mars Volta, they had to build followings in previous bands for a few years before getting to where they're at. The Arcade Fire was a DIY case that sold nearly a quarter million albums on their own. I'm still waiting for some band, totally unproven, innovative, risky and worth their weight, to be signed to a major in the modern era. That used to happen all the time in the 70s and 80s (i.e. Faith No More, Metallica, U2, Tool, Radiohead, etc) and the labels fostered their growth instead of demanding the hit single right off. Doesn't so much happen nowadays.

Availability is only part of the problem.

[bryant69]

49. Yeah but there are hundreds of smaller labels

I mean Dylan getting signed to Columbia isn't happening these days, but there are smaller labels out there. I guess my point would be that smaller labals have more ways to get their music out to the masses than they did previously.

[HughBeaumont]

51. The internet's definitely better than low-wattage college radio for that.

Back in the day, our "listening station" was either

* bootlegged tapes
* gambles (i.e. buy unheard)
* college radio stations that you had to be parked, car facing a certain point on the compass, to listen to (yet during the times they played music you didn't care to hear, of course they came in perfect).
* word of mouth
* rock magazine writers
* friends who worked in record stores or college radio stations

Nowadays, you get to preview music from just about ANY band online in some fashion. I would have KILLED to have had that luxury back in the mid 80s - would have saved me a lot of cash that I gave to bands that didn't deserve it.

[HughBeaumont]

5. Not only did Repukes see the advantage of controlling the media

after Dick Nixon, they also saw the value of controlling the music. "Angst" is now a hollow package with piercings, Docs and other assorted Hot Topic accessories. Young people today (with the exception of those who were at and supported in spirit, the Sept 24th march) are generally comforted and parented by PS2s and GameCubes to care about Bush sticking them with an 8 trillion dollar debt statement. The Rage Against the Machine guys are now in Audio-Styx (nothing against Styx, mind you, it's just a far and sad cry from what they used to do, and this isn't coming from a RATM fan). Activist music, much like activist ANYthing, is pretty much underground, since major (and even some indie) labels are too busy making money to care about silly shit like "statements" or "artistry".

When you homogenize everything into a focus package, even entertainment becomes as useless as it's counterparts on cable news channels when it comes to culture, activism, politics and awareness.

[triguy46]

8. After watching it, and Scorcese's Dylan documentary

It struck me that the left always has the poets, the musicians, the troubadours, and through history, those are who are remembered. Not the two bit celebrities marching out for the status quo or the dictators or the fascist. No, its the progressive left whose emotion is captured by the poets that endures. All the right has today are tinpot country singers praying and braying to the flag. None will be known 100 years from now. Bob Dylan, perhaps reluctantly on his part, will be remembered . Hell, we're 40 years there already and his music still lives as strongly.

[burythehatchet]

28. truth is eternal

all else is spin

[Stephanie]

10. Try Green Day & Radiohead

Here are some more:

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0419-29.htm

[T Wolf]

17. Thanks.

And American Idiot is now my ringtone.

[Carni]

44. I agree Greenday is sticking it to the regime EOM

[nomaco-10]

11. Whenever I think of the music of the Viet Nam era....

a song by Buffalo Springfield always comes to mind. It goes something like; "Stop children, what's that sound, everybody look what's going down". I can't remember the name of it.
I often wonder if it's my age or was the music really that much better back a few years ago. Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Queen, Pink Floyd, Motown. I know Rap is supposed to to be socially relevant, but I just don't get it. Maybe it's my age.

[zapp]

14. For What It's Worth

[rucky]

26. well? what's the name of the song?

kidding.

[flying_wahini]

18. Ohio - by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young

written by Neil Young....

[Zen Democrat]

13. My son listens to Rage Against the Machine and System of a Down

and they are as hard-hitting as anything we had in the 60's. Eminem also has some very strong stuff.

For the most part, we don't hear the protest music now for the same reason our parents and the "straights" (had another meaning then, didn't it) missed it in the 60's -- it hasn't been on the mainstream rock radio stations. SOAD and Green Day have gotten more and more airplay on the metal and alternative stations this past year -- as well as showing up on SNL, etc.

The real protest stuff usually runs under the radar, it seems.

[theboss]

15. I still think the 60s are remembered for economic reasons

There was music and art from other eras that was just as moving and powerful. "Strange Fruit" by Billie Holiday is as wonderful a protest song as you will ever hear.

The difference is that there were not 40 million Baby Boomers with unlimited disposable income to buy those songs then.

I mean, the simple fact that a mid-level group like Peter, Paul, and Mary can still sell out shows in 2006 is an indication to me that we are not talking totally about art here, but about commerce.

[johnnie]

16. There are lots of artists that are doing it

It's not the music that has become homogenized, it's the record industry. The big labels are ran by executives that wouldn't know a G chord if it crawled up their ass and ripped their colon out. The popular music industry is a joke.

Back in the 60s the industry was basically still in it's infancy and it has come a long way since the days when labels would record and release records based on the talent of the artists and not as much for the possibility they could make millions.

There are a lot of people out there making statements, but they are independent of the major music industry. Steve Earle is a prime example of this. I think many more "mainstream" artists would be willing to speak out but they are help too accountable to the suits who own them.

[jane_pippin]

20. Excellent point...

I'd add that in local clubs people speak out and make great music all the time. It's just that if you don't go to see them chances are you don't know the 'scene' exists. But it does.

[theboss]

24. I don't think the industry has changed that much

Bob Dylan never had a #1 hit. The Archies did.

It's really a matter of demographics and options. In 1966, you heard a song on AM radio or by buying an LP. That's it. Now, you have music channels, online distribution, terrestial radio, satellite radio, MP3s, CDs, etc, etc.

You simply are never going to have a unifying act like the Beatles again. Because 50 million people are never going to be watching one show at one time again.

[HEAVYHEART]

21. The Cranberries

You should check out the song Zombie. Excellent song!

[paineinthearse]

32. The "Zombie" video link was posted here a few weeks back.

Wish I had bookmarked it.

[HEAVYHEART]

40. I bookmarked it!!

Here's a direct link to the video:

http://www.peacetakescourage.com/someones.html

[paineinthearse]

41. Thank you. You'd probably appreciate Jim's Big Ego's "Asshole" video, too

I posted it in GEN where it got zero responses, it has been deleted (not even in the archives). :shrug: Was at http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4837746&mesg_id=4837746br%20/

If you want to comment on it, it's still active in the Massachusetts forum, where it also received zero responses. See http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=158x6583

[HEAVYHEART]

42. Saw it yesterday!!!

Loved it as well!!

[Carni]

47. Speaking of Irish bands

The old "Bullet the blue sky" by U2 is sounding pretty appropos lately--just substitute Iraq for El Salvador

(different decade different bush/same shit)

[rucky]

22. When The President Talks To God / Bright Eyes

"When The President Talks To God"

When the president talks to God
Are the conversations brief or long?
Does he ask to rape our women’s' rights
And send poor farm kids off to die?
Does God suggest an oil hike
When the president talks to God?

When the president talks to God
Are the consonants all hard or soft?
Is he resolute all down the line?
Is every issue black or white?
Does what God say ever change his mind
When the president talks to God?

When the president talks to God
Does he fake that drawl or merely nod?
Agree which convicts should be killed?
Where prisons should be built and filled?
Which voter fraud must be concealed
When the president talks to God?

When the president talks to God
I wonder which one plays the better cop
We should find some jobs. the ghetto's broke
No, they're lazy, George, I say we don't
Just give 'em more liquor stores and dirty coke
That's what God recommends

When the president talks to God
Do they drink near beer and go play golf
While they pick which countries to invade
Which Muslim souls still can be saved?
I guess god just calls a spade a spade
When the president talks to God

When the president talks to God
Does he ever think that maybe he's not?
That that voice is just inside his head
When he kneels next to the presidential bed
Does he ever smell his own bullshit
When the president talks to God?

I doubt it

I doubt it

[HEAVYHEART]

23. Oh hell yeah!

Another great tune!!! Woohooo!

[alfredo]

37. Link to video

http://tinyurl.com/a5znm

[Spike from MN]

25. The punks are still protesting. Actually, they never stopped.

Granted, punk isn't exactly "mainstream" but it never will be and IMHO that's a good thing. Corporate control has never really been a factor since the punks are really big on DIY. Are the punks politically active? Oh hell yeah. Pick up a copy of Maximum Rock'n'Roll and check it out for yourself if you are so inclined. Borders usually carries it.
I think my favorite issue is still the commemorative "Punks Not Dead. Reagan Is!" issue. Classic. ;)

[Armstead]

27. I think part of is that 60's music was more connected to "roots"

A lot of different branches from the historical grass roots grew and fused together into something totally new. By the time the corporate sector joined the bandwagon and made it more available to the mainstream, it had been through a long process of fermenting.

The protest culture grew organically. The white middle class branch started as a fringe group of "beatniks" who were the eccentrics in a sea of conformity in the 1950's and early 60's. meanwhile, black impatience was also starting to come to a boil.

In the 60's that tiny movement grew spontaneously into the folk scene, civil rights movement and early anti-war movement, until it became a widespread musical/political/social upheaval.

It was startling and powerful because that particular comboination on such a large scale was new, and was a whole diffeent set of perceptions and consciousness.

Today, those same impulses have been tamed and packaged into corporate "product."

IMO it is possible for the same spirit to remerge, but it's going to have to rise up from the grassdroots outside the system.

The next Dylan will probably be a guy who, like Dylan, doesn;t really give a shit what anyone thinksof him ultimately. Someone who'll say "Here's what I'm selling. Take it or leave it."

[burythehatchet]

29. I think you're right

someone like Ani Difranco who I think told the labels to take a walk.

My 6 year old son likes to listen to the Disney Channel on the sat radio. The Disney channel would have killed Dylan in his crib if they could.

[ZinZen]

39. Self-Evident by Ani DiFranco

is a great song

[paineinthearse]

31. "...being on the high side of 50..."

I hear you. Whenever I attend protests and forums in the Boston area, 90% in attendance are of our age.

Over the past few months I have seen the percentage of the X-generation and younger growing.

[nomaco-10]

33. The Rolling Stones just came out with a song......

bashing bush*. Keith Richards was worried it might cause a backlash and reduce record sales as if they needed the damn money and Jagger tried to deflect any controversy by trying to make out the lyrics didn't mean what clearly he meant for them to relay. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.... for greedy capitalism and and cowardly self preservation.

[laruemtt]

34. "high" side of 50 -

i like that. me too. :grouphug:

[izzybeans]

35. I think protest music today is more metaphorical than in times past

Sure there are some folkies out there who sing songs in a very straight forward manner, but there many many musicians in both hip-hop and rock that use a more prosaic style. Most of them however are on independent labels, but their songs are no less powerful than before, they just lend to more imaginative interpretation. To me these are protest songs: click on break our bones or riverside...there are huge numbers of songs by many groups with similar sensiblities. But this is just me and how I interpret them.

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=23025520&Mytoken=FC967DC4-AB82-C425-2505B97CAA63063689323223

[info being]

36. It is NOT centralized today...nothing is widespread because

it is disparate. I have a bunch of new protest music on my MP3 player.

[paineinthearse]

48. Same as the 60's

Sure there were leadership groups such as the free speech movement at Berkeley, SDS, weather underground, black panthers, yippies, but there was no central leadership. We thought globally and acted locally, mainly on college campuses.

We only came toghether after the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy. That "action" is still not beyond some elements of the right.

[Marleyb]

43. free protest music on the internet

is the way that real artists are fighting the corporations these days. There are hundreds of free songs here
http://www.benfrank.net/nuke/Free_Peace_mp3s.html

my current favorites...
Public Enemy on New Orleans-Hell no, we aint alright!
http://cleveland.indymedia.org/uploads/pe-hellno.mp3

K-otix on Katrina
George Bush doesn't care about black people
http://radio.indymedia.org/uploads/k-otix_-_bush_dont_care_about_black_people.mp3

Damn, it was all good just a week ago
http://houston.indymedia.org/uploads/01-audiotrack_01.mp3

[LisaM]

52. Well, there is no draft, so it changes the scenario quite a bit

I was dismayed that neither the Dylan show now last night's documentary mentioned Phil Ochs.

I was struck by how I personally had been less involved in the anti-apartheid movement than I should have been. I mean, I paid attention, and I participated in a few boycotts, but really wasn't as affected by it as I should have been.