Why “radical” rockers need to write better lyrics.
By Ben Adler, Campus Progress
Tuesday June 6, 2006
Throughout my childhood, nearly every family car trip featured the same music album played on an endless loop. (The only non-musical exception was when we would listen to a book on tape, like From Beirut to Jerusalem — seriously, my family is that uncool, or cool, depending on how you look at it.) The album, Precious Friend, consists of Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie, son of the great Woody Guthrie, singing classic folk songs. I knew every word by heart. When I was around 10 my family went to see Seeger in concert, and the average audience member was six or seven times my age. (“Just follow the gray ponytails,” my dad joked, as we searched out the location.) Years later Seeger came to play at my college, and people lined up to get in. What is it about the folk music Seeger sang that made it appeal to such a wide range of age groups across such a long time span? And why does it seem that, despite the upsurge in politically engaged artists since Bush took office, no one is making music like that today?
One of the things that distinguish Seeger’s songs from the current spate of protest music is the timeless nature of the lyrics. Though Seeger and other folk singers did write and sing about specific issues (that album from my childhood featured a whole track about the Chrysler bailout), they mostly were about more general conditions. Obviously songs about poverty, the horrors of war, the struggle for racial equality, the value of nature and the importance of unions have political implications. In fact, they often are intended to point to a specific conclusion about a current issue (e.g., passing the Civil Rights Act, or ending the Vietnam War.) But they change minds through the power of poetry, not talking points.
Perhaps that’s why so much of this year’s biggest protest album, Neil Young’s Living With War, falls flat. The music is good, but when the lyrics are looked at plainly, they read more like the casually oversimplified criticism of the current state of political affairs that one might hear over cheap beers at any hipster bar. While I’m pleased to see Young voicing opinions I share (opposition to the Iraq war and wiretapping without a warrant), I find most of the album almost juvenile in its blog-like punchlines. (SNL ’s alternative title for the album, "I Do Not Agree with Many of This Administration’s Policies,” got it just right.) While Rolling Stone lauds Living With War for its sense of urgency (it was recorded in six days, and sure sounds like it), I wonder if a longer, broader view might have strengthened it.
Maybe that’s why the most moving song on Living With War is “Flags of Freedom.” Rather than discussing a specific war, much less a detail of it, Young’s lyrics speak to the broader human tragedy of war. The lyrics could be about any war (well, except for the references to flat screen televisions). Young sings about the pain of seeing loved ones go off to battle: “Church bells are ringing/as the families stand and wave/ some of them are cryin’/ but the soldiers look so brave.” This doesn’t zing the Bush administration the way Young’s mocking of the infamous “shock and awe” on a different track does. And yet its political implication is clear: War comes at a cost, and when the casus belli is as weak as the Iraq war’s has been, that cost is unacceptable.
Young himself was making music during the heyday of protest anthems. But he seems to be part of a larger cultural shift towards songs that are more snarky than sincere.
If I thought refrains like Young’s mantra on "After the Garden" — “We don’t need no stinkin’ WAR… Won’t need no haircut, won’t need no shoe shine” — were almost juvenile, I’m at a loss when it comes to describing the chorus from The Coup’s song “Head of State” on their new album, Pick a Bigger Weapon:
Bush and Hussein together in bed
Giving H-E-A-D head
Y’all motherfuckers heard what we said
Billions made and millions dead
OK, so I cracked up when I first heard it. But it also speaks to some of the major problems with protest music today. The first is the political viewpoint that much overtly political underground hip hop like The Coup represents (some of you may remember the controversy over their Party Music album cover, featuring images of the World Trade Center exploding shortly before September 11 which had to be pulled from stores). The Coup may have good intentions, but like so many of their predecessors, from the Poor Righteous Teachers and Public Enemy to groups like Dead Prez today, they espouse an extremist set of positions (anti-capitalist, filled with conspiracy theories, anti-every war, including Afghanistan, and in some cases anti-white) that, while perhaps useful in raising awareness, has little practical application in a country so far removed from their place on the ideological spectrum. Nor is The Coup’s sympathy for terrorists and sexist, homophobic theocrats particularly progressive. The song goes on to express support for the Iranian revolution and implies that Bush and Hussein are in cahoots. If your hope is to turn Americans against the Iraq invasion (which, to be fair, is clearly not the hope of The Coup), a reminder of the pain it causes back home, like Young’s, or a reminder of the pain of war generally, strikes me as the best way to do it. The Coup’s approach is guaranteed not to excite anyone but the radicals who are already convinced.
Perhaps that’s why the year’s best protest album, Bruce Springsteen’s collection of Pete Seeger covers, We Shall Overcome, is composed entirely of old songs. Even an older, immensely talented, current songwriter like Springsteen sees more value in reviving old classic progressive anthems than writing new ones. What’s unknowable to someone of our generation is whether Seeger’s songs were really the exception rather than the rule during his day as well. Maybe for every “If I Had a Hammer” there were 10 shallow, whiny songs about politics. But it is clear, if you look at the Vietnam era, when the government was spying on and lying to its citizens to justify an unjust war (sound familiar?), there were more great new protest songs than there are today.
Of the recent progressive albums, I think Springsteen’s has by far the greatest potential to open hearts and change minds. He chose a selection of songs about issues, not issues in the immediate newsworthy sense we, and Neil Young apparently, think of them today (e.g., Iraq war, the need for universal health coverage), but issues in the broader sense. The title track, “We Shall Overcome,” and “Eyes on the Prize” are about racial harmony and equality. “Mrs. McGrath” is a wonderful, under-recognized early 19th century gut-wrenching tune about an Irish woman who loses her son in war. Needless to say, a song about the Great Depression doesn’t explicitly say “George W. Bush is a bad president for failing to address domestic or global poverty,” but the inference can be made.
One of the most basic (if hardest to learn) lessons for any writer is that your reader will agree with your conclusion more strongly if you lead him to it but let him make the final logical leap himself, rather than stating it outright. Springsteen has learned this well from Seeger. If only more musicians would take note of it.
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Comments
right on!
— Adriel - Jun 8, 12:31 AM - #As much as we like to make comparisons between now and the Vietnam era, and as much as young politically minded folks care about Iraq, this was isn’t as relevant to most Americans. Great political music touches something that great swathes of people can relate to, and the fact is that without a draft and without a tax increase, the Iraq war exists only in newspapers and on TV for most Americans. There are a lot of similarities between that time and now, but the pervasive touch of the war throughout our culture is not one of them, and that’s going to affect the quality of the art produced about the war.
— Pete - Jun 8, 09:54 AM - #How timely – last weekend I saw Pete Seeger play a benefit, along with Jackson Browne and Dar Williams, for my local congressional candidate (John Hall, himself no stranger to protest songwriting with “Power”), and I was struck by the fact that while none of them played anything written after 1979, each song was totally appropriate to the issues we face today. Maybe this isn’t such a great thing – that we still need to play “Power,” an anti-nuke ballad, isn’t something I celebrate. Still, there is something about a great folk protest song that captures the issue in a way rhetoric does not that makes me hope we’ll never run out of ways to improve the country.
— Kelly - Jun 8, 09:43 PM - #I’ve always wanted to see Seeger in concert, but he doesn’t have a website. How can I found out when he’ll be where?
— Nathan E. - Jun 8, 10:39 PM - #You know, I don’t think the problem is Young’s topical songs. His best protest songs were always specific – like Ohio or Southern Man. (Incidentally, “Ohio” was written and released in a very short time as well.) Maybe those songs were just more well-written, but specificity is not the problem.
— Matt - Jun 8, 10:58 PM - #Excellent article! I work for a non-profit organization that is pushing for more protest songs and musicians to start getting more political; and write more provocative lyrics to get people fired up!
Check our website out!
www.jtmp.org
— Craig Gillette - Jun 9, 12:13 AM - #Though your arguments regarding the vapid nature of modern lyricism are quite valid, I don’t think picking on Neil Young really makes that argument too well. “Living with War” does a great job of being protest music. The only really bad things about it is that people are actually criticizing it for being direct and that so much youth music ignores the depth of discussion that “Living with War” is, seriously, it’s not “My Humps”. And SNL, gimme a f#$%ing break. The SNL skit illustrates a sad malaise that affects much of modern western popular culture right now, that being hyper-criticism which has an end result of the creation of the cynical consumers. It’s good for driving mass superficial consumption of culture and the products of pop culture. It’s not really good for fostering community or those “old folky days”. Perhaps I am making my own argument though. Personally, I just love “After the Garden”, it’s a beautiful song and it works on quite a few levels, you should listen to it a few more times.
— Sam Kelly - Jun 9, 05:36 AM - #AWESOME PROTEST SONG: “We Can’t Make it Here Anymore” -James McMurty
— Lauren Patrizi - Jun 9, 11:57 AM - #What about Ani DiFranco?! She writes amazing protest songs—and they’re all completely original—she doesn’t need to cover Seeger songs!
— Caroline Hallman - Jun 9, 01:40 PM - #DiFranco’s songs aren’t able to communicate to a large audience like Seegers.
— Charlie - Jun 9, 06:13 PM - #I agree with the gist of much of this article—many modern lyricists prefer to write snide little in-jokes rather than universal themes—however there are exceptions to every rule. I happen to think The Ataris wrote a fantastic protest song about the Iraq War, Heaven Is Falling , and it is very specific about Bush, his father, and their use of religious imagery. The link above leads to a page on my own website where you can read the lyrics and hear a clip. (Warning, the page automatically loads the 1-meg clip.) I also think that Pearl Jam’s latest, World Wide Suicide , is a fantastic protest song that is really only applicable to this particular war. I doubt either of these songs will still have the resonance 100 years later, like We Shall Overcome , but personally I anticipate being moved by both of these songs for many decades to come. They capture the moment in a big way and hold it up as a warning to the future.
— Kevin Wohlmut - Jun 14, 04:46 PM - #I don’t know, Ani is a folk musician just like Seeger and others were, and so is Connor Oberst (as Bright Eyes). Both write very strong social criticisms. They are succesful and popular, even if they don’t get radio play.
What I wonder is, why do we care about radio charts anymore. The radio is controled by the FCC and large companies like clear channel. Its paid for through coercive advertising and the quality sucks. The internet is where people go for music, and it is home to MANY brilliant artists who’s music is powerful and effective. One of my favorite bands is Boysetsfire and even though they are now retiring, their music is still relevant and their new album is an extraordinary commentary on the Iraq war and the sorry state of Bush’s America, here’s a slice of the first song:
Well I don’t wanna sing about freedom anymore.
I wanna see it! I wanna feel it!
I wanna know that it still sits beyond the lies that we’ve been told
beyond the wars that keep our families from home,
I know that there’s a way.
Dear God, let there be a way
to change the path we’re on (path we’re on).
..and believe in a better day.
I seriously recomend you pick up a copy.
— iandanger - Sep 25, 09:54 PM - #“The Last Century for Man”
and
“Especially True”
by Marillion
— Blono - Sep 26, 12:40 PM - #