The Soundtrack of the Arab Spring and the Occupy Movement
While researching a paper titled “Just Noise Outside of the Ringing of Revolution: The Music of the Arab Spring and the Occupy Movement”, which I recently presented at the Popular Culture Association of Canada’s annual conference, I put together a few playlists of songs performed or inspired by both movements.
If you have any interest in this topic and have a few hours to waste, you can find four of these linked to my YouTube account: the first includes songs from the Arab Spring (mostly from Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Syria, with a few produced by diasporic musicians); the second, songs inspired by the Occupy movement or whose video features Occupy protests; the third, live performances from Occupy sites; and the final one features non-musical appearances by musicians at Occupy sites (speeches, interviews, silent visits, etc.).
Enjoy!
Another update on Pussy Riot
As I noted in a previous post, a Russia court extended to 24 June the detention period of three members of feminist punk collective Pussy Riot who are currently detained on charges of hooliganism relating to events that took place on 21 February.
Today, Amnesty International issued a call for urgent action, encouraging members to write to the Prosecutor of Moscow’s Central Administrative District and the Prosecutor General to urge them to drop the charges against the three women and release them, as well as “immediately and impartially investigate threats received by the family members and lawyers of the three women and, if necessary, ensure their protection.”
You can find more details in Amnesty International’s Urgent Actions post here.
David Peel - “Wall Street Sucks” (live in Zuccotti Park, 6 November 2011). David Peel is probably best known for counterculture anthems like 1968’s “I Like Marijuana”, recorded with his band The Lower East Side, or for his friendship with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, which took him all the way to the David Frost Show on 16 December, 1971 to perform two songs (“The Ballad of New York City/John Lennon-Yoko Ono” and “Hippie from New York City”, both from The Pope Smokes Dope) with the former Beatle and his wife.
Nevertheless, Peel is still active at 68 and has been part of the Occupy movement, making regular appearances first in Zuccotti Park and now in Union Square to sing songs such as “Wall Street Sucks” (embedded above) and “We Are the 99%”, and appear with other musicians.
You can read more about Peel in a short feature published in The New York Times on 29 April.
“Barn av regnbuen” (“Children of the Rainbow”)/”My Rainbow Race”. Yesterday (26 April), an estimated 40,000 people, led by Norwegian folk singer Lillebjørn Nilsen, gathered in Oslo to sing “Barn av regnbuen” (“Children of the Rainbow”). As shown in this clip, the large crowd also sang the English-language original that Nilsen adapted in Norwegian, Pete Seeger’s beautiful “My Rainbow Race”.
This moving singalong was organized in response to the ongoing trial of accused mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, who has stated that he believes Nilsen is “a good example of a Marxist who infiltrated the cultural sector; he writes music that is used to brainwash children”. Nilsen’s song, which includes lyrics such as “Together we shall live/Every sister, every brother/Small [or “Young”] children of the rainbow”, was singled out for its message promoting a multicultural society.
You can learn more about the organization of this rally (including a partial translation of Nilsen’s song) here, and read an account of the events of 26 April here. You may also read an opinion piece about the singalong by English singer and political activist Billy Bragg in The Guardian, who concludes by noting that “By the simple act of singing [the song] together, [the gathered crowd has] drowned out the voice of hatred emanating from the Oslo courthouse.”
From a good piece by Noel Murray on The AV Club that looks at Pete Seeger, Phil Ochs and the shift from the political folk music of the 1950s and the early-to-mid-1960s to the folk rock of the latter half of that decade and the more personal, less political singer/songwriter sound of the 1970s.
You can read the rest of the article here.
