I’ve spent all…damn…day…on the computer doing various frustrating things. Dig this, last night I thought I might go over to the CNN site and watch some live feed stuff from the DNC ’cause I haven’t seen any of it all week and, I had remembered that I had already set it up to be able to watch the live video there. You know, it seems like any time you want to stream any audio/video you got to go through some process first.
So, I click on the thing at CNN and it informs that I need to update Flash in order to watch the damn thing. So, I screw with that for a half hour because it doesn’t want to run the app. for some reason. I finally get it going and the live feed is done for the night.
This morning I’m checking email and some guy has sent me a YouTube about some ABC guy getting arrested and I got to watch it right now because our personal freedoms are being stripped away blah blah blah…so, I wait for the coffee and it’s slow because it’s well water full of good minerals and you have to clean out the coffee maker every couple of weeks and I always forget to buy vinegar. I click on the video, might as well get worked up about jack booted thugs while I’m waiting for coffee, right? I get to YouTube…nothing. Can’t play a video, some kind of gibberish script all over the screen…now I am pissed.
So, I do a little searching and I find out that there is some kind of bug between Flash and the new version of Firefox and if you try to watch any CNN video it will try to get you to download an earlier version of Flash because the CNN site doesn’t recognize the new version or some crap. Then I’m trying to remember if I ever installed the new Firefox and no, I have not. So, I go through that whole bit, install the new Firefox and suddenly, boom-problem solved. Go figure.
But, it got mundane from there on the tech side which I won’t go in to because you are here for a Friday Night Cage Match/Fondue Party/Evolving Conversation/Dancing About Architecture aren’t you?
Well, in my frame of mind and with the current goings on, I’m in a mood for protest. Oh and by the way, just in the last hour, I heard that some right wingers are getting all balled up because Bruce Springsteen is going to be headlining a Harley Davidson event and, simultaneously Van Halen has joined the ranks of the simpering because one of their songs was played at a McCain rally yesterday. It just goes on and on.
Do you get it? People are protesting the protest singers and the protest singers are protesting because people are playing the protest songs. Fuck!
So tonight, in protest, the FNCMFPECDAA is going to unveil yet another new way of going about it.
Tonight we have simply
Protest Song?
Now, to help you on your way, I’ve taken the time to do a little research. I found out that earlier this year Rolling Stone did another one of those cheesy lists. This one is compiled of editors and readers choices so, it isn’t just the cheesy RS contributors. Now, you would think that all I would have to do would be go to the Rolling Stone site and copy/paste the list and that would be it. No…No..No…Rolling Stone put the list in one of these cheesy, photo montage, slide show presentations so you have to click through 25 separate photos to get the info. So, I found another site that had already done the work and out of graciousness, I link to Vintage Vinyl News.
So, to get you thinking about the topic which, one more time is…
Protest Song?
…here is the Rolling Stone editors and readers list of 25 best protest songs.
1. Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival
2. Masters of War - Bob Dylan
3. Killing in the Name - Rage Against the Machine
4. I-Feel-Like-I’m-a-Fixin’-to-Die-Rag - Country Joe & the Fish
5. Sunday Bloody Sunday - U2
6. Blowin’ in the Wind - Bob Dylan
7. What’s Goin’ On? - Marvin Gaye
8. Anarchy in the U.K. - Sex Pistols
9. Born in the U.S.A. - Bruce Springsteen
10. War - Edwin Starr
11. Won’t Get Fooled Again - Who
12. Gimme Some Truth - John Lennon
13. For What It’s Worth - Buffalo Springfield
14. Fight the Power - Public Enemy
15. Let’s Impeach the President - Neil Young
16. Civil War - Guns n’ Roses
17. Redemption Song - Bob Marley
18. Working Class Hero - John Lennon
19. Revolution - Beatles
20. Ohio - Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
21. Street Fighting Man - Rolling Stones
22. When the President Talks to God - Brite Eyes
23. Get Up Stand Up - Bob Marley
24. A Change is Gonna Come - Sam Cooke
25. Ignoreland - R.E.M.
and, of course, discussion is in no way whatsoever limited to this list.
Related posts
Tags: dancing about architecture, Friday Night Cage Match/Fondue Party/Evolving Conversat, protest songs
Sans Direction wrote,
None of the above, although I like most of them.
Historically, I’d have to go with John Brown’s Body, which became the Battle Hymn of the Republic, or Amazing Grace.
Link | August 29th, 2008 at 7:13 pm
Pat Darnell and Friends wrote,
…branding, endorsements and tie-ins are responsible for the decline of Western Civilization…
That said… I can see I was giving this one too much thought. I didn’t initially see the above list as representative protest songs.. Mr Direction has candidly expressed my own sentiment in context of protestantism. It turns out that my favorite is “The Night they Drove Old Dixie Down,” [The Band version], and not just for its splendid alliterations, but for how it expresses a protestant attitude within a republic of revolutionary beginnings. So now you have to suffer some of my stodgy songs — proven melodies with evolving lyrics:
Now I don’t mind, I’m chopping wood
And I don’t care if the money’s no good
Just take what you need and leave the rest
But they should never have taken the very best
[1970; Original Lyrics written by J. Robbie Robertson, he was ranked 78th in Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time]
Most of my life experience is firmly stationed in Civil Disobedience Protest. And that leads me to “We shall Overcome.”
Oh, deep in my heart
I do believe
We shall overcome some day
[1900; Lyrics derived from Charles Tindley's gospel song "I'll Overcome Some Day" (1900), and opening and closing melody from the 19th-century spiritual "No More Auction Block for Me" (a song that dates to before the Civil War), note: royalties from the song go to support the Highlander Research and Education Center]
Now if you allow me to retreat even further: Kingston Trio — “MTA” flight of the bumblebee sort of political rampage… protest on raising the fare of public transport… probably first song I learned all the words to… forgotten till just now.
As his train rolled on
underneath Greater Boston
Charlie looked around and sighed:
“Well, I’m sore and disgusted
And I’m absolutely busted;
I guess this is my last long ride.”
{this entire verse was replaced by a banjo solo}
[I didn't know this stuff till looking it up,, the missing verse; Ha! funny one...]
and — another omitted verse from M.T.A. –
“I can’t help,” said the conductor,
“I’m just working for a living,
But I sure agree with you.”
“For the nickels and the dimes you’ll be spending in Boston
You’d be better off in Timbuktu.”
[In the 1940s, the MTA fare-schedule was very complicated - at one time, the booklet that explained it was 9 pages long. Fare increases were implemented by means of an "exit fare". Walter A. O'Brien lost the election, by the way.]
_____________
J. Robbie Robertson - The Band, 1970 Canaan Music / Joan Baez - Hits/Greatest & Others, 1973 Vanguard / Bob Dylan - Before The Flood, 1974 & 1990 Sony
Eileen Southern, The Music of Black Americans: A History, Second Edition (Norton, 1971): 546-47, 159-60.
The International Lyrics Server. . March 1998. Donnell King, email message, 29 Nov. 1999.
Charlie on the M.T.A.; http://www.mit.edu/~jdreed/t/charlie.html
___________________
Finally:”Protest can be lucrative” — M.T.A. history:
“Who was that San Francisco singer [who performed in a coffeehouse that inspired Will Holt's recording]?”
His name is “Specs” and he owns a tavern here in SF. He told me that a theater company was interested in the song and his friend warned him to copyright it before they got their hands on it… so he did. He told the two ladies who wrote it [Steiner & Hawes] about what had happened and they were so grateful about him saving it from being copyrighted by someone else that they cut him in 1/3 for publishing royalties.
When the Kingston Trio made their big hit with it in 1959 the money really started rolling in (back in 1960 a few thousand dollars went a long way) and to this day when the odd check shows up, people in the tavern Specs owns find themselves with a “drink on the house” sitting in front of them. (http://www.mit.edu/~jdreed/t/charlie.html)
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 4:27 am
Sans Direction wrote,
What surprised me was watching Gone With The Wind and seeing Ashley Wilkes say essentially that same line that Robbie wrote.
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 8:33 am
Margie wrote,
What’s the difference between a protest song and a patriotic ballad?
I feel it’s that iconic feel good feeling to hug a tree vs. stirring up emotion to rush out and chop one down.
The perfect musical challenge would be to nail the lyrics and rhythm in a perfect “protestriotic” jam session.
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Pribek wrote,
Sans-I remember learning “John Brown’s Body” as a kid. You know, going to elementary school in the early 70s and, I attended schools in various parts of the country, I remember that it was common to have these big group singalongs. The teachers would pass out lyric sheets and there would be one of the young teacher’s aids with a guitar strumming along and we would all sing folk songs and such. “John Brown’s Body” was one that we did and I remember being really taken with the word “moldering”. Great word…moldering
PD-I never really thought about “The Night they Drove Old Dixie Down” as a protest song even though Joan Baez did a version and I associate her with protest songs. Maybe protest by pointing out details of a situation in a matter of fact, collective, this is our cross to bear way. I don’t know if I’ve put my finger on it. It’s a similar perspective to Neil’s “Powderfinger” another favorite. Dixie Down by the way has a real musical oddity in it by the way. Levon does a snare roll that works with the phrase ..the niiiiight they drove old dixie down, at the beginning of the chorus. If you try to count out that roll, it’s like it’s a divion of a beat, not an odd number of beats so it isn’t a bastard measure it ends decisively between beats somewhere.
I like the idea of “MTA” as protest on a localized issue.
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Pribek wrote,
Oh man, I like “protestriotic”, yeah.
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 10:43 am
Pribek wrote,
“protestriotic”-you’re on to something Margie. My buddy Lou says, “Most all songs are either boy/girl songs or train songs. If you can come up with one that sounds like a train song but, it’s really a boy/girl song then, you’ll have success”. Let me know if I butchered that Lou.
So, “protestriotic”, if you could pull it off…that’s going to be tough for the opposing mind to find fault with.
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 10:50 am
Sans Direction wrote,
“Mystery Train” is a boy/girl song that’s a train song.
So is “My Baby Thinks She’s A Train”.
So’s Gram’s “Luxury Liner”.
Of course, they’re all three successes, ain’t they?
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 11:06 am
Pribek wrote,
Yeah Sans, it’s one of those things that sounds witty on the surface but, when you start thinking it through….
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Sans Direction wrote,
That’s the thing, isn’t it? To me, what makes a train song is the rhythm, the train rhythm, the one that comes from a passenger train going clunk-clunk down the rails. Once you got that, you don’t need words. When it’s “Orange Blossom Special”, you might as well not have them, because the one verse is the least necessary verse in musical history. If you do get around to writing words, you could make ‘em about love or sex or hope or freedom/escape (”Big Mouth Blues” — “Any ol’ thing besides going and a-leavin’ you can do on a train!”) but you have to have the mechanical beat. We get that steady, heavy beat from the locomotive, from the factory. It’s an industrial age thing. We have Industrial Music only in the post-industrial age.
“Powderfinger”: I like the song, but it always seems like there’s a part of the story that we’re just not getting. Is the white boat coming up the river their government about to go Waco on ‘em? Is it another government running their swift boats and looking for guerrillas?
Link | August 30th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
I want to say more but I know you get tired of my crap wrote,
There’s a verse in Orange Blossom Special?? When it’s “Orange Blossom Special”, you might as well not have them, because the one verse is the least necessary verse in musical history. And least known.
While giving deep thought to your comments… some examples jumped into my head… as in childhood I listened to my old man sing this [following youTube] in the shower every morning, and sing well enough to ingrain them into my subconscious: [clik HERE] Chattanooga Choo Choo — if you were about to get on a train what would you like to hear playing over the loudspeakers in queue ?? ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00giGIsauiQ )
Note:
This scene is 3:30 mins long, and it only has four camera angle changes… even in the tempo change stomp… can you imagine if they let the Nicholas Bros really cut loose? I have gotten nauseous sick and blind tired of rock music filmed in three second intervals / cut to new angle…. protesting bitching sibling that I am. MTV — One thousand one;one thousand two; one thousand three; switch… bleeechk! Where you running to? I have to wretch… pffffft!
How did we move into train songs? I don’t know either, but we may as well now turn up the reverBnatioN, to your left or right, and notice a high percentage of train related tempos and lyrics in “Trouble ain’t Over.” Eh? I would say a good 56% of it is in the genre of Sans “Industrial/ Alternative Rhythm of the[90's?]… and much of Pribek’s gist sends a message of Margie’s “protestriotic.” No opposing minds here on that point guard.
Damn trains are everywhere… no? I’ll say. I see it this way.. a protest can be jarring and quaking like a train wreck — and — it can be a psalm explaining routine that builds up to a protest… like a song that moves future protesters to make a difference. So I vote for John Goodman, City of New Orleans… as it chugs and chants, and gives music to mundane routine… all American all aboard..!![clik HERE City of New Orleans, Arlo Guthrie and Shenandoah, 19'78]
After thirty years, maybe there is a protest just around the next bend. I know the melody already.
Link | August 31st, 2008 at 12:32 am
Pribek wrote,
peace train-train protest song
Sans, I always kind of wondered about the “white boat comin’ up the river” too. Is this some obscure civil war reference or imagined oppression? Can a protest song be about an imaginary plight?
Link | August 31st, 2008 at 2:55 am
Sans Direction wrote,
Hear it yonder comin’, comin’ down the railroad track!
Hear it yonder comin’, comin’ down the railroad track!
It’s the Orange Blossom Special, here to bring my baby back!
Notice that it’s a 12-bar blues. Also, notice the total lack of content.
And I’d be glad if they were playing that. If they were playing “Wreck of the Old 97″, I’d think twice about stepping aboard.
“City of New Orleans” is a great song. For protest, I’ll take “A Dying Cub Fan’s Last Request”. Is “Sam Stone” a protest song?
Link | August 31st, 2008 at 7:30 am
Pribek wrote,
Sam Stone? I’m not seeing it. A junkie song, it might be implied that if the guy is a junkie because of the war. So-stop war end junkies? I don’t know.
Your Flag Decal Won’t Get You In To Heaven Anymore, is.
Link | August 31st, 2008 at 10:47 am
J wrote,
From FZ’s classic “I don’t wanna get Drafted”:
Wars are really ugly
They’re dirty and they’re cold
I don’t want nobody
To shoot me in the fox hole . . . fox hole
Aiieeeeeeeee . . . shot in the fox hole
Aiieeeeeeeee . . . shot in the fox hole
Aiieeeeeeeee . . . shot in the fox hole
Aiieeeeeeeee . . . shot in the fox hole
“Leave my nose alone, please . . . ”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlzJhXVc44M
Link | August 31st, 2008 at 7:47 pm