Protest Music Protest and topical music including comedy. We're interested in the history of protest music, for instance labor songs, civil rights songs, anti war songs. We also feature contemporary protest music and we particularly want to hear your protest songs. This is an open group. Please join and post your diaries. If you want to help manage the group message me and I'll make you a BlogEditor. Of course Protest Music is on topic. But it doesn't have to be both. Protest or Music. Protest is on topic. Music is on topic.

John Lennon a Closet Republican? Yeah right...

Note: I wrote this back when The Nation article was published and the issue was fresh. I didn't post it for some reason and when I came across it recently, I thought someone might enjoy it. Plus it's always appropriate to smack down republican propaganda. And this is republican propaganda of the most bone-headed kind. Some rightwing republicans are claiming John Lennon as their own. Man! Talk about revisionist history. What's next? Hunter S. Thompson was a Reagan Democrat? Abbie Hoffman's secret crush on Nixon? Apparently if you're a rightwing republican you get to just make shit up to suit you. It's what they do: WMDs in Iraq? Check. Trickle down economics? Check. Reagan was a great president? Check. Global warming is a hoax? Check. Trees make pollution? Check. George W. Bush wasn't an unmitigated disaster for America? Check. The poor need to shoulder more of the burden? Check. Cutting taxes for millionaires and billionaires creates jobs for the peons? Check. Now this. This is so weak and shameful it may be setting a new low.

Not Fade Away

I turned 60 recently. That's at least a couple of hundred in hippie years, though I don't know if anyone has ever worked out the conversion formula to any degree of precision. I should've asked Ben Masel. He would've known. But I missed my chance.

Donna Summer has passed away

This will be brief, but I will add as details become available.  Donna summer has passed away at the age of 63 after a battle with cancer.  I was not even aware she was ill. According to various sources, the five-time Grammy winner was working on a new album at the time of her death.  She is survived by her husband and three daughters.

Graceland: A Song of Rifts, Scars, Healing, Transcendence

"Good art shouldn't instruct, it should evoke." Linda Ronstadt Graceland was released in 1985 when I was three years old. I don't know when my mom bought that familiar casette, but I do know I was born in 1982 and I don't remember my life without that album and Paul Simon. We listened to it on endless repeat. When I was older, I dubbed my mom's tape so I could listen to it in my room and on my walkman. I still go through phases where the album is all I listen to, and sometimes I'll put the title song on repeat and listen to it endlessly. I've owned the album on tape, CD (twice), and MP3, and I'll never be without it. Lately, I've been unsettled mentally and emotionally. I'm a writer by trade, but I've realized that writer's block is real and it can be crippling when combined with unexpected tragedies and jarring emotional events. Paul Simon was going through something similar when he traveled to South Africa because he loved the music. Like Mr. Simon, I'm going through a divorce. Like Mr. Simon, I felt like I've been in a downward spiral. I'm starving for inspiration. So I put on Graceland. And the title track started. Paul Simon called it his favorite record. He said it was perfect, and I have to agree with him. So follow me over the fold and let's discuss the perfect song from a perfect album.

The Universe and Everything

Sometimes we have to back away and put things in context to see them clearly. The political system through which we view so many of our social and economic concerns is an exceedingly narrow lens. When we confine our view to that lens, it is akin to looking at the universe through a soda straw.

Do I Need This?

...is the question I ask myself all the time. Living in times in which it often seems harder to avoid new stuff than to accumulate it, I ask this question not just for the sake of a planet drowning in junk but for my own sanity. And it's not just physical things I get overwhelmed by. The onslaught of digital information and chattering, from emails to social networks to blogs to causes to advertising to news clips to films often leaves my head filled up but my soul empty. Everybody is talking and nobody is listening, so I try to choose my own words wisely, pondering first if the world really needs to hear them. Every now and then though I come across a project or a message that just feels right to be released, that the world indeed needs. One of them -- and not without irony -- is Kate Schermerhorn's movie idea currently collecting steam on Kickstarter, asking the very question: Do I Need This examines our culture’s excessive, often questionable acquisition of possessions and asks the viewer to stop and examine what they buy and whether they actually need what they are purchasing - does your newborn really need that baby wipe warmer? Does your dog need another overpriced squeeky toy...do you need that hot dog cooker you found in the Sky Mall catalog...will that uncomfortable pair of new shoes be a good idea simply because they were on sale?   Using humor, quirky and engaging characters, and no preaching, Do I Need This pushes viewers to think beyond today, beyond the instant gratification of walking away with a shopping bag or carload of stuff and to look at the impacts of our endless world of purchases, on ourselves as well as on our planet. The film will engage viewers who may not view themselves as environmentalists but can still make a world of difference with changes to their buying habits. ============== Kate Schermerhorn’s directorial debut, Seeking 1906 (KQED co-production), won her a Northern California Emmy for Directing and a nomination for Best Historical/Cultural Feature in 2007. The San Francisco Chronicle described the one hour documentary about best-selling writer Simon Winchester as "sublime and fascinating." Kate recently completed a second hour long documentary about modern marriage, "After Happily Ever After." The film, which Scientific American describes as "delightfully quirky” asks some often overlooked questions about the institution of marriage. "After Happily Ever After" recently won the Council for Contemporary Families 2012 Media Award for broadcast coverage of family issues. UPDATE,  5pm: Our very own Kossack Lorikeet just pushed Kate over 10k and thus the documentary is on!

RIP Donald "Duck" Dunn, legendary Stax bassist

There's sad news today about the death of legendary Stax Records bassist Donald "Duck" Dunn.  Dunn, age 70, passed away suddenly while on tour in Tokyo, after playing 2 sets at the Blue Note Night Club.

We are UPSET -- photo diary

This is the mission statement of UPSET, the newly formed activist education organization in Portland, Oregon, but it could well apply to many as school districts across the country deal with the austerity posed by shrinking funds available for education. We are a school community in crisis – we no longer believe that the State of Oregon can deliver the resources needed to facilitate a proper educational environment in our schools. We are teachers, parents, and students who have decided to take action directly and together as a community. We will not stand by and silently let any more resources be taken from our schools; resources our communities' youth so desperately need to give, thrive, find fulfillment, and lead in the 21st century. Follow the action below. Originally posted at Great Schools for America

"World Flutes Against Climate Change" — MA Benefit Concert, 5/19/12

On Saturday, May 19, the sixth “Playing For The Planet” benefit concert will showcase master musicians from three widely different musical traditions in a rare evening of pan-cultural flute styles, with all proceeds going to benefit the environmental advocacy group www.350.org.  The performers include Steve Gorn (Hindustani bansuri), Elizabeth Reian Bennett (Japanese shakuhachi), and the acclaimed Renaissance ensemble, Renaissonics, featuring the recorder virtuosity of John Tyson and Miyuki Tsurutani.  The music begins at 7:00 pm, at Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street, Boston.  Admission is $20; $15 students & seniors.  For information and online ticket purchasing, please visit the concert website.  Please like  "Playing For The Planet" on Facebook.

Which Side Are You On?

"Which Side Are You On?" is a song written by Florence Reece in 1931. Reece was the wife of Sam Reece, a union organizer for the United Mine Workers in Harlan County, Kentucky. In 1931, the miners of that region were locked in a bitter and violent struggle with the mine owners called the Harlan County War. In an attempt to intimidate the Reece family, Sheriff J. H. Blair and his men (hired by the mining company) illegally entered their family home in search of Sam Reece. Sam had been warned in advance and escaped, but Florence and their children were terrorized in his place. That night, after the men had gone, Florence wrote the lyrics to "Which Side Are You On?" on a calendar that hung in the kitchen of her home. She took the melody from a traditional Baptist hymn, "Lay the Lily Low", or the traditional ballad "Jack Munro". Florence recorded the song, which can be heard on the CD Coal Mining Women. Reece supported a second wave of miner strikes circa 1973, as recounted in the documentary Harlan County USA. She and others perform "Which Side Are You On?" a number of times throughout. The song is referred to by Bob Dylan in the song "Desolation Row". http://en.wikipedia.org/... Come all you good workers Good news to you I'll tell Of how the good old union Has come in here to dwell Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on? My daddy was a miner He's now in the air and sun He'll be with you fellow workers Until the battle's won Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on? They say in Harlan County There are no neutrals there You'll either be a union man Or a thug for J.H. Claire Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on? Workers, can you stand it? Oh, tell me how you can Will you be a lousy scab Or will you be a man? Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on? Don't scab for the bosses Don't listen to their lies Poor folks ain't got a chance Unless they organize Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on? Which Side Are You On? The men know the have nothing to lose but their chains and their Union to gain.

Hairy Larry blogs internet music promotion at Blow Your Own Horn Email Hairy Larry Copyright by Larry Heyl and Vivian Heyl