A Brief History Lesson
One of the things that I love about music is that it can be
used as a teaching tool. And although, “I’m just a bill sitting on Capitol Hill”
is a cool number, I am not just talking about School House Rock or the Alphabet
song.
Music can be the voice for anything; lyrics can tell you
stories and can project thoughts and images into the listeners mind just by
using the right words and the right colorful language. Sometimes you have to
dig deeper than just the lyrics, sometimes the message is hidden underneath the
words and you need to actually get out an Encyclopedia or a Dictionary just to
understand the true value of what you are listening to.
I will and have in the past admit that I am a pop culture
junkie, and I like knowing about current events, or just anything that is going
on really. But I like to ask “Why?” as much as I can, and I hope you do to.
Without sounding like a conspiracy theorist or cynical, I think it is important
that people ask “Why?” In my opinion you can watch the news all you want, you
can watch CNN or World News or anything like that, but they only have enough
time to tell you “what” but hardly ever do they tell us “why”
Ok, enough ranting against the media and questioning
authority, today I decided to get down and talk about some songs that teach us
about history. Most of these songs name names or tell a few dates but they don’t
teach you, so I did the research for you.
Keep in mind that I am only giving
you a brief skim off the top, and if you are intrigued by anything that I tell
you about , I implore you to look into it, find out what you can and spread the
word. Knowledge is power and without it, we are just funny walking monkeys.
So here we go, 5 songs inspired by historical events……
Sunday Bloody Sunday -
U2
The Event-
January 30th 1972
Ok, so this song puts you right in the middle of years of conflict
in the former United Kingdom, dating all the way back as far as the 1600’s.
Obviously I don’t have the time, and you might not have the patience to read
through all of that.
In a nutshell, I will get you caught up to speed where the
song is. At one point all of Ireland was
part of the United Kingdom, The British
Empire was a powerhouse and moving along. Unfortunately The wealth and the
industrialism was very much on the Great Britain side of the Irish Sea,
Eventually the Irish people were upset enough that in 1922 they left the United
Kingdom, but Northern Ireland Stayed as part of the UK.
Fast Forward to the 60’s, Northern Ireland entered a period
known as The Troubles. The basis of what was happening was a civil rights
movement, that I don’t want to compare to America but if it helps you
understand I will. Northern Ireland was predominantly Protestant and The
majority of the rest of Ireland was Catholic. In Northern Ireland, the
Catholics were discriminated against in a variety of ways mostly through shitty
employment and housing.
The biggest thing that was being done was internment without
trial, which was allowed by the Special Powers act of 1922 and the Public Order
act of 1951 and Operation Demetrius in
1971. Basically in a nutshell, this meant that if you were protesting or
marching or against anything that the Parliament of Northern Ireland deemed
true, then you could be fined or imprisoned, and trial was not necessary.
In 1972 things were pretty hot and The Northern Ireland
Civil Rights Association put together a march in protest of a lot of things
going on especially the number of people being held, which was believed to be
over 300 with an additional 7000 being displaced.
So an estimated 15,000 people showed up for this march and
proceeded through the The City of Derry especially into the Bogside
neighborhood. It was there that the
First Batallion of the Parachute Regiment of The British Army met up with them.
Through numerous investigations based on witness accounts
and evidence what happened next was deemed by British Prime Minister David
Cameron as unjustified and unjustifiable.
The British troops opened fire on the unarmed civilians killing 13 of
them and injuring another 14. Many of those killed were shot from behind, or at
close range in some cases both. Many of the dead were also trying to aid those
who had also been shot.
So that was the main event that inspired the song.
The Song-
This is an incredible song and has so many great elements to
it. The drumbeat has its’ own feeling to
it, and sounds like a marching anthem that you would take with you into war.
War coincidentally is the title of the U2 album that the song is on.
There is a beautiful violin that can be heard throughout the
song, played by a man supposedly met on the street that day. The Edge plays a
great guitar riff and Bono’s voice rips through it all, growling at points and
harmonizing at others he puts together the final piece of the web that really
pulls you in.
The songs lyrics don’t really allude to anything that
happened on that particular day other than to say that there were bodies strewn
across the street. The song takes a more religious tone at the end, mentioning
that we eat and drink while tomorrow “they” die, then of course stating that
the real battle just begun to claim the victory Jesus won on Sunday Bloody
Sunday. Which is more of a reference to Easter than anything else.
In later years the song has gone on to become an anthem
against wars and mainly useless bloodshed, the band alludes to the line “How
long must this go on” In a way of saying
things can be resolved peacefully and without war.
The song was played after 9/11
and in honor of the 2002 Bali bombings.
I think even though it is about an event in Ireland that
took place 41 years ago, it still holds a place as an important song about
peace and innocence. It’s a song that you wish wouldn’t be needed to remind
people of some of the atrocities of war and civil unrest, but inevitably the
song will be needed again, until then…
The Wreck of The
Edmund Fitzgerald – Gordon Lightfoot
I figured I would take
a break from controversial politics and talk about something that just sort of
happened, for no major religious or affiliated reason.
The Event -
November 10, 1975
This is one where I could just quote the song and you would
have all the details, also, most people from Wisconsin, and especially Sturgeon
Bay have heard this song or at least know of it.
The Edmund Fitzgerald was a Great Lakes Freighter that was
the largest ship of the Great Lakes when it was launched in 1958 and is still
the largest to sink in the Great Lakes. The mighty freighter would haul Iron Ore from
near Duluth Minnesota, to Detroit and Toledo and other industrial towns on the
Great Lakes.
It was a fast ship setting
many haul records and would play music over its intercom when it was going
through channels and Rivers, people would love to watch it as it came through
their port.
On the night of its last voyage, the Edmund Fitzgerald left
Superior Wisconsin and was headed to a steel mill near Detroit. However it got
caught up by an early winter storm on Lake Superior, there were high winds and
waves that were 35 feet tall. And without rhyme or reason at 7:10 pm the Edmund
Fitzgerald sank.
There was no mayday or call of distress, just a simple
report of difficulty and taking in some water. There were 29 people in its crew
when it went down and no bodies were recovered.
People have examined the ship and no one has been able to set forth a
conclusive reason as to why this happened.
The Coast Guard did not respond immediately when another
ship called in on behalf of the Fitzgerald. The Coast guard has said they did
not consider it urgent. Subsequently all that was recovered that night were
pieces of debris and lifeboats.
So that is basically it in a Cliffs Notes version, like I
said, most people sort of know the story and here in Sturgeon Bay we get to see
these huge ships on a daily basis and sort of sadly take them for granted.
The Song –
The song reached number 2 on the hot 100 chart in 1976. It
has an almost chant like feel to it and the tone climbs up and down throughout
the song.
Gordon Lightfoot wrote it
after reading an article about the shipwreck and released it 10 months after
the actual event.
The song basically just follows the biographic tale of the
last day of the Fitzgerald it adds a few things that were basically Lightfoot’s
fiction to liven things up a bit. He
even mentions the aftermath at the Mariners Church in Detroit and the ringing
of the church bell 29 times. The church
held a memorial every year with Lightfoot even performing the song there in
1985.
I will tell you that I hadn’t heard the song until I moved
to Sturgeon Bay and was enthralled by these giant Freighters and I looked into
them and tried to learn what I could. In Sturgeon Bay we still get to see ships
that worked side by side with the Fitzgerald and to me that is pretty cool. It
is definitely a song worth listening to and you can really feel it during a
cold November storm, so try it now while we still have time…
Ohio – Crosby, Stills,
Nash & Young
The Event-
May 4th 1970
Ok, so just a warning we are getting back into politics
here.
I think we all know
about the Vietnam War and if you don’t you can look that up when you are done
reading today’s post. Personally I don’t feel like I can explain it well enough
to even paraphrase what happened, but we all know with all wars there are
people that are against them and will protest against them.
On the last day of April in 1970 President Nixon let the public
know about military operations in Cambodia.
Most Americans were under the
impression that US forces were to be pulling out of combat at that point.
So obviously this got everyone excited again and people in
America were upset with their president and his actions so they began to hold
rallies and demonstrations. One of these demonstrations took place at Kent
State University in Kent, Ohio.
In downtown Kent people started rioting and vandalizing
property beginning around midnight on May 2nd. Police were called in and bars were closed
which actually made the crowd bigger and angrier. The protestors had no respect for the police
and were throwing bottles and swearing at them.
By the morning the Mayor of Kent met with city officials and
there were rumors threats that there were revolutionaries hell bent on taking
over the city and destroying it. Therefore the mayor called the Governor of
Ohio and requested the assistance of the National Guard. By the time the Guard got there it was too
late, buildings were burning as
thousands of demonstrators watched and cheered.
The next day the Governor came to town and said he would not
tolerate any of the ongoing events. He
issued a false martial law warning and then put the town under a curfew. That
night students gathered and had a sit in in hopes to speak with the mayor, but
the National Guard tear gassed them and even stabbed a few with bayonets.
On Monday May 4th the students and protestors
began to gather in the commons area of Kent State University, The National
Guard was there telling people to leave or face arrest, but no one was
interested in leaving. The Guard then tried tear gas, but the wind made it
uneffective and people threw the tear gas back at the soldiers, along with
rocks as they chanted “Pigs Off Campus”
So now the Guard had to try something else and began
advancing towards the angry mob with their rifles fully bayoneted. This got the
protestors to retreat and the Guard continued to stalk the crowd until they got
tangled up after heading in the wrong direction The Guard then got into a
firing position but never fired, instead headed back to the original site of
the protest.
Then the soldiers turned around and began firing at the
students. Firing 67 rounds of ammunition in 13 seconds; killing four students
and wounding an additional nine. The students were un armed and standing an
average of over 345 feet away (That is longer than a football field). The
students were unarmed and posed no threats to the soldiers. In fact, two of
those killed were not evern protestors and were just walking to class.
Obviously the aftermath was not as bad as it could have
been, students and protestors were ready for a war but faculty urged them to
leave and not make it any worse, knowing that it would be a slaughter if the
students tried to retaliate.
President Nixon seemed to not care, (I don’t know if he
really did, but media coverage I have seen of him shows him as a very harsh man)
Nixon was even quoted as to calling protestors bums and pawns of foreign communists.
Nonetheless, he put together a commission to study the unrest on campuses. That
study concluded that
“Even if the
guardsmen faced danger, it was not a danger that called for lethal force. The
61 shots by 28 guardsmen certainly cannot be justified. Apparently, no order to
fire was given, and there was inadequate fire control discipline on Blanket
Hill. The Kent State tragedy must mark the last time that, as a matter of
course, loaded rifles are issued to guardsmen confronting student
demonstrators.”
The Song-
This is one of my favorite politically charged songs and so
worth the listen. Neil Young wrote the
song after reading an article about the incident in Life magazine. The band quickly learned the song and recorded
it live in a few takes. David Crosby was supposedly crying by the end of the
recording.
The song was released in June of 1970 and banned from AM
radio because of it’s anti-Nixon sentiment.
The song made the counterculture of
America embrace the band as one of their own.
The lyrics are just repetitive, with one verse and one
chorus repeated in various fashions, but the guitar riff pulls you in write
away and you know you are about to hear something special. The song opens on
the line “ Tin soldiers and Nixon coming” and repeats the line Four Dead in Ohio throughout
the final fade out.
At the time when it came out it needed no explanation as the
event was still fresh in everyone’s mind. The song just sort of evoked all the
feelings that people had following the incident. Some people thought that the song was just a
capitalistic venture to make money on death and Neil Young even commented to
that irony in 1976.
Either way the song makes you feel something, and often
when you combine it with imagery creates anger….
As hard as it is to
move on after seeing those images, I have to. Sadly I move to another
politically and racially charged event. Please stay with me though as these
things are important.
April 29, 1992
(Miami) – Sublime
The Event -
April 29th, 1992
That date was just the beginning of the riots in Los Angeles
that would go on for 6 days.
I will give you just a little bit of background, and you
will have to look for the rest .
In March of 1991, an African American male named Rodney King
was arrested after leading police on a high speed car chase. King had two
passengers with him that were in police custody by the time that King got out
of the car. Rather than tackle King and handcuff him, the 5 police officers
instead tasered him, kicked him in the head and beat him with batons for over a
minute.
This become a hot issue as racial tensions were at a boiling
point in Southern Los Angeles, and many felt that the police didn’t care for
the African American community and treated them poorly. Many stories of arrests
like these with excessive police brutality were common. But this was different
because this time, the incident was caught on tape and was now being heavily
covered by the national media.
The Los Angeles District Attorney had no choice but to
charge 4 officers with excessive force they were tried by a jury in Ventura
county and after a week of deliberations, on April 29, 1992 the predominately white
jury acquitted 3 of the 4 and failed to reach a verdict for the 4th
What happened next should have come as no surprise, crowds
gathered on the Los Angeles courthouse in protest and throughout South Central
Los Angeles. Police officers ascended on a group at the intersection of
Florence and Normandie, but they were outnumbered and retreated. That group grew and began looting and
attacking vehicles and people in them . Beating several people to near death
and being covered by news helicopters.
In the days that followed it initially appeared that the
police in LA had given up, their presence was not noted in many of the
incidents. Korean shop owners had thus
begun using their own firepower against rioters and looters starting an all-out
war in South Central LA.
George HW Bush came on tv and denounced random terror and
lawlessness and said he would help the mayor of LA control the riots. He also
claimed that a Grand Jury investigation would be launched into the Rodney King
beating, (subsequently during the Federal trial two of the officers were found
guilty and sent to prison)
But what good is a TV address when you are trying to reach
an impoverished group, most of whom are outside beating the shit out of
everything?
The City issued a dusk to dawn curfew but, how the hell do
you enforce it?
You call in the National Guard, and when they are not
enough, military police, and Marines,
that should do something right? It did but the damage was already done. The town was destroyed, fires blazed on. In the end over
11,000 people were arrested and 58
people were dead with another 2000 injured as a direct result of the riots.
The Song-
Right off the bat the first thing that you notice is that the
song title references Miami, and then you find that Bradley Nowell the group’s
singer inadvertently says “April 26th 1992”. First, supposedly the
song was written in Miami. And as for the date, the band has said that Nowell
misspoke, but the take was so strong that they left it.
The song is a hard
driving almost reggae beat that Nowell raps over. Talking about the whole situation
that lead to the riots, the riots themselves and a general hatred towards the
police throughout the situation. Nowell references being a part of the riots
and basically making a list of stolen goods and places that he went to. This
has been interpreted as a shopping list of what would have happened if the band
was in LA at the time of the riots.
Another aspect of the song is numerous police dialogue that
took place within the Long Beach Police department during the riots. The end of
the song lists a number of cities where riots were supposedly taking
place. I have looked for records of
riots taking place in the towns listed, but can’t find any. There were
documented riots in San Francisco, and Las Vegas, and Toronto, but I can’t
confirm or deny the other towns named in the song.
Like I said, I can’t find proof to confirm all the towns
mentioned, but I remember my mom being fearful when me and my brother would
play outside. I mean we didn’t live in a major town, but my mom was always a
little crazy plus we were right smack dab in the middle of Chicago and
Milwaukee, but by no opinion were we in a bad neighborhood,, at least at that
time.
I guess I can say that for me, I have always loved this song
and felt sort of a connection to it. I was ten years old when this happened, so
it was one of the first major things that happened in my lifetime. I have never experienced the things in this
song or anything that happened in LA, but I have seen and been a part of my
fair share of crazy shit. In the end I guess I wish that these things didn’t
have to happen, but would things be better had they not? Are they better?
American Pie- Don
McLean
The event-
February 3, 1959-
The day the music died, and took some big stars with it. The
simultaneous deaths of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and JP “the Big Bopper”
Richardson.
The Winter Dance Party was a tour that took place throughout
the Midwest, with some of the biggest stars in music at the time all playing
together. The tour included the three artists who passed along with Dion and
the Belmonts. The tour kicked off in
Milwaukee, and was scheduled to end in Springfield Illinois 23 cities in just
as many days.
The musicians were on a bus that had no heat and everyone
began getting sick, the drummer for the tour was frostbitten so bad that he was
hospitalized. When the tour played Green Bay WI
Holly, Valens, and Dion took turns drumming for each other’s bands.
On February 2nd the tour played the Surf Ballroom
in Clear Lake Iowa and the musicians were growing more and more frustrated and
getting sicker and sicker with each stop. Buddy Holly decided to charter a
plane for himself and his band, to get them to the next stop in Moorhead, MN.
Waylon Jennings, who was in Holly’s band at the time, gave
up his seat for JP Richardson, as Richardson was ill and needed the rest.
Meanwhile Tommy Allsup, another of Holly’s band members gave up his seat for
the plane to Richie Valens, after losing a coin toss. Dion was also asked to go
on the flight but he decided that the fee of $36 was too much.
After the show at the Surf Ballroom had finished, the three
stars were driven to the airport where the boarded a Beechcraft Bonanza 35.
At around 12:55 am
the plane took off in light snow. The
owner of the plane reported it missing after he had not received any radio
contact from the plane after the takeoff, which he watched. He would later
board another of his planes to retrace the route that the flight was supposed
to take.
It didn’t take long for him to find the plane. It had
crashed less than 6 miles from the airport, The bodies of the musicians were
just lying there throughout the night exposed to the elements of a harsh
February winter.
I can’t say much else…
The Song-
McLean has never fully disclosed the meaning of the song,
and there are other cryptic messages throughout the song, but colloquially the
events that took place on February 3rd have been referred to as The
Day the music Died since this song came out.
McLean did state that he learned of the deaths of his heroes
as he folded the papers that he was to deliver that morning.
The song is a doozie at 8 and a half minutes long, and is
probably McLean’s most well known song, having been a number 1 song for 4 weeks
in 1972.
It starts with a somber piano as accompaniment to McLean’s
smooth tenor voice, then gradually builds into a decent slow rocking song.
This is another one of those songs that I like to think that
everyone knows. It has been said that the song also points out that in February
of 59 America and the world lost some of its innocence, Rock music got harder
and darker and the times had changed.
Take from it what you will, to me I hear the song and can
only think about the boys who lost their lives in Clear Lake Iowa.
With that I will put today’s history lesson to tan end.
Please remember that history isn’t just what is remembered or written about, it’s
also the feelings that you have inside of you, the smells and sounds that take
you back to a certain moment in time.
Feel free to question everything that I have written here
and dig deeper into all of the subject matter.
I have a few more songs to write about, so I will be taking up this idea
sometime in the future. Until then, don’t just read about the music, be a part of
it.
