The Day the Music Died
Brent Staples article in today's New York Times strikes us as both correct and very sad: Protest music is unlikely to be heard on today's radio--because all the radio stations are corporate owned and don't want to take chances.
Pop music played a crucial role in the national debate over the Vietnam War. By the late 1960's, radio stations across the country were crackling with blatantly political songs that became mainstream hits. After the National Guard killed four antiwar demonstrators at Kent State University in Ohio in the spring of 1970, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young recorded a song, simply titled "Ohio," about the horror of the event, criticizing President Richard Nixon by name. The song was rushed onto the air while sentiment was still high, and became both an antiwar anthem and a huge moneymaker. A comparable song about George W. Bush's rush to war in Iraq would have no chance at all today. There are plenty of angry people, many with prime music-buying demographics. But independent radio stations that once would have played edgy, political music have been gobbled up by corporations that control hundreds of stations and have no wish to rock the boat. Corporate ownership has changed what gets played — and who plays it.Remember the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers? Paul Kantner wrote the song "We Can Be Together", a song protesting the establishment that included the line, "Up against the wall, motherfu**er."
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