Protest song is back - with a vengeance

[Guest guest]

http://www.notinourname.net/resources_links/protest-songs-4jun04.htm

 

Protest song is back - with a vengeance

 

" There's always been protest songs against presidents,

but they have never been near to the level of venom

you're seeing now. "

 

Christopher Blagg

The Christian Science Monitor

June 4, 2004

 

The term protest music often conjures up images of

unkempt folkies strumming guitars and warbling their

dissent in Greenwich Village coffeehouses.

 

All that has changed.

 

Folk music no longer dominates the genre. Today,

rebellious political rhetoric can be found in hip-hop,

punk, country, metal, alt-rock, and everything in

between. Not only has protest music diversified, it

seems to be rapidly on the rise.

 

Some of the new songs, unsurprisingly, address the war

on Iraq. But whereas protest songs during the Vietnam

era were broadly antiwar in their message, the new

batch of political tunes aren't narrowly focused on

the recent war. It's more personal than that. Most of

the music is targeted at the actions and policies of

one man: George W. Bush.

 

And it's often incendiary stuff.

 

" For better or worse, Bush has stirred up a lot of

vitriol in the music community, " says David Browne,

head music critic for Entertainment Weekly. " There's

always been protest songs against presidents, but they

have never been near to the level of venom you're

seeing now. "

 

That isn't to say no songs are championing the

administration's foreign policy - country music has

produced hits such as Toby Keith's " Courtesy of the

Red White and Blue (The Angry American). " But they're

being drowned out by the sheer volume of musicians

working to oust the Oval Office's current occupant.

 

The musicians range from punk rockers to pop acts to

older artists like Patti Smith and Rickie Lee Jones.

In all, Mr. Browne reckons protest songs seem to have

been more numerous in the past year and a half than in

the late '60s. " There just wasn't that concentration

of songs during the Vietnam War, " he says.

 

Leading the charge in the current round of

Bush-whacking is Fat Mike, frontman for the veteran

punk rock group NOFX. Mike created the current

Billboard-charting compilation entitled " Rock Against

Bush, " a collection of sneeringly rebellious punk rock

songs including ones from mainstream acts like Sum 41,

OffSpring, and the Ataris. Twenty-six bands offered

songs for the compilation, and many more joined the

tour that followed.

 

The idea for the album emerged from the controversy

over the Florida vote count in the previous

presidential election. The outcome still rankles Fat

Mike, who believes the result was unjust.

 

" After the 2000 election I was pretty upset, " says

Mike. " I needed to come up with a way I could use my

celebrity to expose the fraud of the election. "

 

Mike also soon founded the provocative website

punkvoter.com, which aimed to harness the youth vote.

 

" Punk rockers have been against government policy from

the start, but it's never been specific, " asserts

Mike. " This is the first time we've been focused on

one thing - getting Bush out of office. "

 

Toby Veg, organizer and cofounder of punkvoter.com is

amazed at the genre's outpouring of bile aimed at the

president. " In one sense, the Bush administration has

been great for punk music. I mean, how do you

reconcile a genre based on anarchy? It really speaks

to exactly how much punk musicians dislike Bush, " says

Veg.

 

It's not just the punk rockers who are turning to the

microphone to assail the president. The Beastie Boys,

legends of hip-hop, are releasing their long-awaited

new recording, " To the 5 Boroughs, " on June 15, and

its lyrics are loaded with jabs at Bush. The personal

nature of the current protest music is something of a

modern phenomenon.

 

Alternative-rock heartthrobs and MTV darlings Incubus

have offered up perhaps the most strident attack on

the president with their latest single " Megalomaniac. "

The controversial video, which has now been relegated

to the marginal hours by MTV, depicts a " Leave It To

Beaver " family drinking crude oil instead of milk, and

a smarmy, baby-kissing Bush look-alike, all shown in a

graphic style eerily reminiscent of Nazi war

propaganda.

 

You'd think that the hip-hop, punk, and hard rock

bands would hand out the most spirited shots at the

embattled president, but that has been left to the

smooth, jazz-tinged tunes of singer Rickie Lee Jones.

The songwriter felt that the music community was

initially too quiet after the Patriot Act was passed.

 

" Everybody was afraid to speak out against him

[bush], " says Jones in a recent telephone call. " It

was a very dangerous time. The atmosphere was very

reminiscent of fascist Germany.... I've never been an

activist, but I wanted to start doing something. "

 

Jones makes no bones about her views about the

president on her new compact disc " Evening of My Best

Day. " Despite its soft atmospherics, the opening tune

off the track, " Ugly Man, " may be the sharpest attack

on a president to date, while the up-tempo bounce of

" Tell Somebody (Repeal the Patriot Act Now) " is

similarly self-explanatory in its rebellious

intentions. Jones wants to be clear that what she is

protesting is not the Iraq war, but the actions of

George W. Bush. Asserts Jones, " Call it what it is!

It's not a war, it's George Bush - the man wielding

the weapon is the problem. "

 

The goal for all these musicians is to create change,

but how effective can a song actually be? The audience

is primarily young, disillusioned non- voters. Fat

Mike says the Rock Against Bush concerts are a far

more effective tool. Audiences are greeted with a

barrage of public speakers in between sets, and those

who buy the compilation also receive a free DVD that

offers more detailed information and advocacy tips.

 

Volume II of the Rock Against Bush compilation will

come out Aug. 10 and includes such mainstream pop acts

as No Doubt, The Foo Fighters, Green Day, and

Yellowcard.

 

Whether this new burst of protest activity from the

music community will have an effect on the coming

election remains to be seen, but Fat Mike seems

confident nonetheless.

 

He says punkvoter.com is getting 14 million hits per

month and 500,000 unique users a month. Asserts Mike,

" On Nov. 4 there will be between 200,000 to 500,000

kids showing up to vote for the first time because of

Rock Against Bush and punkvoter.com. "