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With all the turmoil going on in the world, I wonder why more mainstream artists aren't making more socially-conscious and/or protest songs? In my parents' day (late 60's - early 70's), lots of rock bands were releasing anti-war songs or protest songs. Nowadays, it seems like there are few bands making that kind of music. Top 40 radio is even worse - dominated by songs about clubbing or people bragging about how awesome they are.
I'm not going to try to prove you wrong, Passionatearts. I agree with you.
But the folks song movement of the 60's may not be repeatable. There is a vast difference in the generation that was so attracted to folk music that it became a Top 40 staple. The protest songs you mention were a big part of that attraction.
That Phil Ochs, Bob Dylan, and others became known as 'protest singers' now sounds odd- the very thought that a writer/singer who could make a living singing only protest songs seems ludicrous, looking back. The late 50's-early 60's were fat economic times in hindsight. The U.S. had very few of the knotty problems we face today.
But those times were a great period of social change- there was a lot of real poverty in pockets all over the nation, much racial inequality, and a lot of unfocused fear that came from the Cold War. The Pill caused a great social change as well, in a much quieter way- for the first time, people could have sex without fear of pregnancy, and that fear was a major reason for marriage. Illegitimacy was still a terrible thing in the minds of most folks.
Much of the protest music was centered around those issues, and later, when we became stuck in the swamps of Viet Nam with no end in sight, and a generation of boys unwilling to be drafted for a war that was seen as bad and purposeless, fueled even more protest songs. And real protests as well.
The outcome of all this was many of the causes were addressed. Laws were passed that cracked the Southern institutionalized racism, welfare laws created a wider social safety net that saved the poor from starvation, and eventually, the Viet Nam war ended.
By then, most of the singers who once made protest songs Top 40 material had already gone on to other music. Bob Dylan understood the trap he had made for himself early on, and went to writing different material, played with a rock band. Rock, by the late 60's, matured and became the music that the kids wanted to hear.
The kids wanted their music to be an emotional experience. Buying a new record became a shared experience; all the friends were invited over to listen to the new stuff, and the music was listened to intently in a way that's now not so common.
There was also a strong sense of history in the 60's. Kids were still taught history, and protest music was a part of our social history that had comparisons of earlier struggles to those that were happening currently at the time.
These days, most of this stuff is very different. Our problems back then were comprehensible to young people. They were all in Living Technicolor compared to our problems today. Those old problems could be understood in simple terms, but today, nothing is simple. Kids are kids- they didn't understand complexity much then or now.
The kids of the 60's felt empowered. They could protest, march, and actually change things to some extent. The kids today feel helpless. They are swept along by social currents they don't understand, and have no simple answers, so they're just along for the ride.
The kids today are very cynical as well. They have grown up seeing our nation becoming less and less able to make great changes, and don't have much faith in our political system or our government. The 60's mantra of Tune In, Turn On, Drop Out has come to fruition in the kids who were born as the millennium turned.
How is a person going to write about bad home loans? Or 2 wars that were put on the nation's credit card? Or Daddy being laid off, when everybody else is laid off too? All are subjects that are simply beyond 4 stanzas and a killer chorus. The kids would rather just dance, anyway. Words these days don't have the power they once had.
With all the turmoil going on in the world, I wonder why more mainstream artists aren't making more socially-conscious and/or protest songs? In my parents' day (late 60's - early 70's), lots of rock bands were releasing anti-war songs or protest songs. Nowadays, it seems like there are few bands making that kind of music. Top 40 radio is even worse - dominated by songs about clubbing or people bragging about how awesome they are.
Somebody please prove me wrong!
If people wasn't so ignorant about the rap industry; lots of rappers speak on these issues within their songs.
If people wasn't so ignorant about the rap industry; lots of rappers speak on these issues within their songs.
I know they do. Kanye West's big hit, "All of the Lights," addresses issues of poverty as do many of Eminem's songs. But, I still think they're in the minority compared the majority of hit songs I've heard, which seem to be mostly about escapism.
They are there. Rise Against's Help is on the Way touches the topic of Katrina and other rescue efforts. Their new single "Make It Stop" touches Bullying/Teen Suicide.
Rap is the only music style where protest songs thrive these days. If I was a kid (I'm 67 now), I would probably be a rapper instead of an old folkie. I mentioned that the folk craze of the 60's may not be repeatable, but in the form of rap, which is true folk music in the oldest tradition, it may be, under a different 21st Century form.
But one thing is certain- music goes around and comes around, always. Sooner or later, some kid who's a good instrumentalist is going to get with a good rapper, and we could see the return of protest music that is popular with everyone as a thriving musical form. All rap needs is the equivalent of 'Blowin' In The Wind', and it's a done deal.
The folk craze of the 60's started with singers who smoothed out the straight rawness of a lot of the old folk tunes and made them palatable for the masses who listen to all music only as a soundtrack to their lives. Eventually, some of the kids who were attracted to folk music sought out the sources, and learned to take the music for what it really was. Listen to a Doc Boggs recording, and you'll hear it yourself.
Only 40 years separate Boggs' death from the latest rappers. Rap first started less than 15 years after he died.
Important music and important songs always rise in time. I'm a witness, for sure- the 5-string banjo is becoming cool once again after a long fade. I'm just waiting for a black kid to take it up, start rapping with the banjo instead of a drum track, and the circle will close and be complete once again.
banjomike kind of hit a chord with me, speaking of the cynicsm of kids today. I think part of that cynicism is directed toward the music industry as well.
Secondly, if I were an artist, I'd shy away from any protest anthems simply because its already been done before. The 60's movement is all over VH1, the History channel, and whatever. As an artist, I'm not going to be accused by the cynical masses, of rehashing old themes to make a buck.
Further, ideals of one generation, don't necessarily translate to the next. As a Gen-X'er, I'm at piece with the 60's Baby-boomer's movements now, but in the day, me and my brethren were very cynical toward our parent's piece and love anthems. The only bands of that era we embraced were Black Sabbath and dark bands of the like. For the most part, we thought our parents overall had a pretty good life, but protested for the sake of change anyway.
Lastly, who is going to protest, and whom are they going to protest against? Nobody's happy. You can't protest the "status quo" when nobody wants the status quo. Do you rail against big government or do you protest big business? Do you protest against the Tea Party, or go after the Progressives? Maybe, a politically independent voice will arise and bring us all back to reality with a great tune. But I won't hold by breath.
I think even in the 1960s the most popular songs were generally not protest as such. Also the situation in the 1960s was different in that the under-30 population was much larger (in percentages at least), we still had the draft, segregation was just ending, and psychedelic drugs were new to people other than scientists or the rich.
The situation we have might be more similar to the Depression or the recession of Eisenhower's second term. Granted, unlike those times, we have wars but without a draft the effect of a war might feel more political than personal for many of us. Also we're withdrawing from the wars we had. Still comparing it to the Great Depression maybe just changes the question to "Well then why don't we have the kind of socially conscious music of that era? Where's today's 'Brother Can You Spare a Dime?' or 'Strange Fruit'?"
On one hand I'm not sure we don't. And on the other I think most of the popular music during the Depression wasn't that socially-conscious/protest. Another issue might be that recorded music is now old when back then it wasn't. People may feel that unemployment, poverty, etc have already been sung about well enough. Also back in the Great Depression there was maybe more idealism. People had movements they wanted to believe would make things better. I don't think today's young are as into alternatives or movements to the status quo. And if they are they're all too fractured.
These are kind of guesses though. Still it is perhaps interesting if we don't have anything equivalent to Woody Guthrie, Billie Holiday, or the like. (As I'm theorizing that analogies to the Great Depression work better than ones to the 1960s)
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