Where is the music?
LOL This is just hilarious to be mentioned now.
The night he was elected, I said to my friends that I was looking forward to the onslaught of protest music like we hadn’t heard since the 60s. I’ve brought this up multiple times over the years and, as you’ll find in this thread, have only come across a sparse handful of songs. You have a very real point that’s going to be minimized by those attempting to prove you wrong with the mention of a single song.
I wasn’t around in the 60s but my impression, gathered from popular music at the time, was that a lot of people were anti-government, certainly anti-war. Music was largely how a generation of young people expressed themselves and the future of mankind will remember them. Today, they do so in fleeting moments on social media.
If you’re following me down this rabbit hole, consider that we’re living in a time that will be forgotten in the not too distant future. We all have the power to record and document our lives and feelings but no one is really listening.
Given that TikTok is our Woodstock, who’s documenting all this? People are protesting out there but who’s listening? People are making music but who’s brave enough to promote it? When the polarization of our politics is distilled down to the meme of the hour, who even remembers what happened two weeks ago?
It’s an excellent point–for those who live without memory, the mistakes of the past are bound to be repeated frequently. It’s why the focus on reporting “now” in the news is so destructive…a random car accident death in the grand scheme of things is much less important than a local city council decision but “if it bleeds it leads”. Combined with consolidation of media ownership (lack of diversity and voice), especially including corporate music dominance in publishing and distribution, is the death knell of protest, change and democratic participation.
The fact the youth of today mostly feel they only have a voice through Zuckerfuck and data scraping IG/FB OR Chinese state sponsored manipulation and data scraping Bytedance/TT certainly answers Ops question as to where the protest music is…
Clearly never heard of Run The Jewels
Also Nobody Speak is RTJ too, but produced by DJ Shadow.
Modest Mouse and LCD Sound System too. And a few other indie/electro/rap bands that came out of retirement after 2016.
It’s the billionaire pop artists who aren’t protesting, because they don’t want to risk losing 40% of their Spotify revenue.
Even in the 60s it was Neil Young and only a few others responsible for most of the protests songs. Then there were the Guthrey songs, but they all predated the 60s, and just became relevant at the time. And as a bonus, they (and all the previous protest songs) are relevant now too!
There’s this artist Jesse Welles who pivoted away from his electric rock band to acoustic protest stuff. Is this what you’re looking for?
Yeah this kid is a machine.
John Prine meets Bob Dylan with a little bit of Harry Nillson, but all very modern critiques of society, politics, etc.
Cranks out a new song every few days. Never seems to dip in quality of lyricism. His songwriting has all been done before, but it’s a fresh take.
