You are outraged, and have written a protest song. You’d like it to be a part of the catalyst for change; march out in the streets, sing it, have all the radio stations play it with a new anthem for a better world out there and change on its way. Well…it’s happened before.
According to Wikipedia, a protest song is “a song that is associated with a movement for social change and hence part of the broader category of topical songs (or songs connected to current events). It may be folk, classical, or commercial in genre.”
Let’s face it, these times are screaming for protest songs and yet new protest songs are not exactly filling our media stream in this era. They are being written, but not really reaching a big audience.
During the late 50’s into the early 70’s the protest song enjoyed a Renaissance. There was a Folk Boom blossoming in popular culture in the late 50’s, along with the actions of the Civil Rights Movement. “We Shall Overcome”, arguably the most iconic and sing-along-able protest number still in use today, seemed to be the triggering battle cry. Pete Seeger is largely credited for bringing the number to international attention; variations of the song were in the ether since at least the early 1900’s. Seeger heard the song in 1947 from folklorist Zilphia Horton, he altered the title from, We Will Overcome and brought a new sense of rhythm to it. So really it was a team effort.
How do we get new protest songs that help us all feel like a change can come? These days comedians are picking up the slack. Sometimes the greatest relief is hearing a comedian skewer the news of the day. They have daily access to your attention, sympathize with your frustrations and package it all by taunting the oppressor in a way that feels, oh, so just.
Jon Stewart’s shaming of Congress to pass the September 11th Victim Compensation Bill used the same kind of star power that allowed Neil Young to get the protest song “Ohio” on the radio across the United States only ten days after the Kent State Massacre. Neil Young is still writing protest songs, they are just not becoming anthems. He wants you to know how messed up Monsanto is. But his new material doesn’t get that massive level of attention these days.
We all can and should write protest songs. You can put them online, try adding them to spotify playlists, make videos for YouTube, and sing them at protests. Or maybe it is your role to find a song already in the ether, update it, and aid in bringing it to international recognition.
The modern pop music world needs to step up and use their star power to sing about something other than how fine their or your body is. Taylor Swift speaking out against Trump after he is already unpopular is a far cry from Bob Dylan’s “Masters Of War.” An August 2019 article in Vanity Fair stated, “Swift believed her public image would have made her something of “a hindrance,” but she’s gotten past that.” Well, I’m glad she is finally finding her voice, but it appears the latest musical pop stars may just be lacking substance.
Hopefully, the industry will enjoy a more inspired time where lyrics on the level of poetry make a comeback in Pop Music. That would surely aid in bringing forth more popular protest songs.
10 beautiful Protest Songs 1939-2019:
1) Nazi Punks Fuck Off- Dead Kennedys
2) Voicemail For Jill- Amanda Palmer
3) Billie Holiday- Strange Fruit
4) Johnny Cash- What Is Truth
5) I Ain’t Marching Anymore- Phil Ochs
6) Loretta Lynn- The Pill
7) Legalize It- Peter Tosh
8) Ani DiFranco- To The Teeth
9) Fuck The Police- NWA
10) The Revolution Will Not Be Televised- Gil Scott Heron
Let’s hope the protest song returns to prominence one day. It might just occur as folks begin asking, “Why is everyone getting so heavy? “Whatever happened to all of those great comedians from the early 21st century?”
Jack Grace is a composer, performer and writer, born in Brooklyn, NY and now resides in Peekskill, NY. He has been a contributor and radio personality for WNYC’s The Takeaway and Sirius/XM’s Freewheelin’.
5 Comments
Great piece. Here are the words to a song I wrote and have been playing around NYC. You can listen to it online.
In Germany it all began
With a separation plan
They sewed a yellow star on every Jew
Now fast forward to today
When there is a plan in play
To separate the nation of the Jews.
You can label all her goods
And in fact I think you should
Just make sure you get it right
“From the one democracy
In a sea of tyranny
Shining like a beacon in the night”.
Will you put that on your labels?
And forsake your myths and fables?
Take a stand for truth come don’t be shy
You might lose some misled friends
But you should know that in the end
You’ll be walking with your head held high.
Now those that push that BDS
They’ll be the first one’s to confess
Their aim to tear down the Jewish state
But don’t take it from me
Investigate and you will see
It’s a movement built on hatred and lies.
So which path will you choose
Well of course that’s up to you
But to me it’s clear as black and white
I’m with that one democracy
In that sea of tyranny
Shining like a beacon in the night.
Bruce Springsteen writes, sings, and plays protest songs to millions. Stevie Wonder does likewise. Marc Ribot writes, sings, and plays protest songs, perhaps not to millions at a time, but certainly to thousands all over the world, and is constantly out on tour, bringing it (and punk at heart, he also has a fondness for playing in small clubs in Brooklyn when he’s home). Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine is still raging and just recently performed a one-man show over several nights at the Minetta Lane Theater in Manhattan, playing his guitar that says “Arm the homeless” on it, just as Woody Guthrie’s said “This machine kills Fascists.” Practically everyone in the annual Vision Festival sings, plays, dances, and otherwise performs or performs to protest music. “Punk” bands everywhere in the world write and play protest songs. Toshi Reagon is a walking, talking, singing and playing protest song, unrelenting, as is her Mom. This is a protest against your article. You’re wrong, Jack Grace. Maybe you need to turn off your “media stream” and buy some recordings and get out to some concerts in order to know what is really going on with protest and the arts out here in the real world, especially if you live in Brooklyn. We have a crushing, violent, racist, extreme right-wing terrorist government right now, and it’s intimidating and silencing some, but some just won’t be, cannot be, silenced. And with their inspiration and leadership, as the man sang many years ago and as many others continue to sing in their own ways, “The times, they are a-changing.”
Hey Janet,
Thanks for your comment. I expected to be challenged and glad you did so.
Yes, there are protest songs. They are not getting the attention they once enjoyed. If you think my opinion is outright “wrong” , well I’m not sure opinions work that way.
But those are other beautiful examples of smart and talented people fighting the good fight.
I am actually out almost every night and sing protest songs and hear them. As far as my media stream goes, I’ll just say your assumptions are likely pretty far off base. But when I view the stream that reaches millions, I see a shortage of protest songs.
Here is the Billboard Chart-
That is the mass media stream I am referring to, considering how messed up our countries affairs are, it would be nice to see it reflected on a massive level-
https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100
Dylan’s Hattie Carol should be here or Hurricane. Gil Scott Heron’s Jose Campos Torres is far superior to Revolution and being about police brutality more relevant today. Johnny Cash’s stirring “The Ballad of Ira Hayes is far stronger than the song chosen here. Not known as protest sngers- Arlo Guthrie’s Victor Jara and Smokey Robinson’s Just my Soul Responding resonate deeper than a third of the songs chosen here. But the 1-2 punch of Stevie Wonders take down
of Rchard Nixon in You Haven’t Done Nothing nd his take on inner city injustice for Living For City should be here—somewhere!