A Brief History of Protest Music: Part 2

Summary

Ongoing History of New Music: A Brief History of Protest Music – Part 2

Host: Alan Cross
Release Date: February 18, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Alan Cross continues his exploration of protest music, tracing its evolution from the mid-1980s through to the present day. The episode examines how protest music responded to major global and political events, shifted in form and message across generations, and why its impact and visibility seem different today, even though protest music remains alive and well.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Endurance and Role of Protest Songs

• [00:33] Alan frames protest music as a powerful tool for rallying people and expressing discontent, emphasizing that protest music hasn’t disappeared, but remains ever-present in new forms and contexts.

The Troubles and Irish Protest Music

• [02:01] Focus on U2’s “Sunday Bloody Sunday” (1983) about the Bloody Sunday massacre during The Troubles in Northern Ireland.
  • Alan details the historical context, the violence, and the inspiration for protest in music.
  • Notable quote from U2’s Larry Mullen Jr.:

    “We're into the politics of people. We're not into politics. You talk about Northern Ireland... that's not what the song is about. That's an incident, the most famous incident in Northern Ireland... I don't care who's who. Catholics, Protestants, whatever. People are dying every single day through the bitterness and hate. And we're saying, why? What's the point?” ([05:18])

• Highlights other Irish protest songs: Stiff Little Fingers’ “Alternative Ulster,” Simple Minds’ “Belfast Child,” Paul McCartney’s “Give Ireland Back to the Irish,” Sinead O’Connor’s “Rebel Song,” and the Cranberries’ “Zombie,” underscoring the wealth of music generated by sectarian conflict.

The 1980s: Cold War, Nuclear Anxiety, and Political Anthems

• [06:23] The 1980s saw artists respond to escalating Cold War tensions and near-nuclear disasters.
  • Songs cited: The Fixx’s “Red Skies,” OMD’s “Enola Gay,” Pink Floyd’s “Two Suns in the Sunset,” Nena’s “99 Luftballons,” Rush’s “Distant Early Warning.”
• Alan singles out Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Two Tribes” as a chilling anti-war anthem, referencing its 1984 video that satirized Reagan and Chernenko.
• Music also protested political leaders:
  • Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher faced musical opposition through songs like the Ramones’ “Bonzo Goes to Bitburg,” Genesis’ “Land of Confusion,” Heaven 17’s “(We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove Thang,” The Beat’s “Stand Down Margaret,” and Morrissey’s “Margaret on the Guillotine.”
• Anti–poll tax protests in the UK resulted in songs by The Jam, Billy Bragg, and The Exploited.

Global Struggles and the Emergence of New Voices

• [09:35] Protest music addressed international conflicts and injustices:
  • Bruce Cockburn’s “If I Had a Rocket Launcher” (Guatemala),
  • U2’s “Bullet the Blue Sky” (Nicaragua, El Salvador),
  • The Specials’ “Free Nelson Mandela” (South Africa).
• [10:55] Australian band Midnight Oil’s “Beds Are Burning” brought indigenous rights to the fore after witnessing the treatment of Aboriginal communities.

The 1990s: Generation X, Fragmented Rage, and Expanding Themes

• [12:08] With a new decade came new issues:
  • Gen X faced economic recession, underemployment, the Gulf War, civil rights unrest, globalization, and the AIDS crisis.
  • Notable protests: The Rodney King beating and LA riots (1992), Tiananmen Square, post–Berlin Wall Europe.
• Rage Against the Machine’s “Killing in the Name” stands as a blunt protest against police brutality and racism:
  • “Still, one of the great angry rock and roll protest songs of all time” ([13:27]).
• Protest music diversified: no singular movement like Vietnam, but instead anger at institutional distrust, income inequality, identity politics, environmentalism, mass incarceration, and gender rights.

Riot Grrrl and Third Wave Feminism

• [15:00] Riot Grrrl punk bands emerge, pushing feminist issues and safe spaces in music.
  • Key bands: Bikini Kill (“Rebel Girl”), Bratmobile, Team Dresh, Sleater-Kinney, Huggy Bear.
  • Riot Grrrl culture included activism beyond music: zines, art, manifestos, and an ethos of inclusivity and sex-positivity.
  • Notable quote:

    “If we have to focus on just one group, my vote might be for Sleater Kinney.” ([16:17])

  • Fun anecdote: Bikini Kill’s Kathleen Hanna inspired Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” with an offhand comment to Kurt Cobain.
• Protest themes in the 90s became more confrontational and cynical, fusing personal struggles with societal critiques.

Other Notable 90s Protest Voices

• Hip hop’s role was “the most vocal,” notably NWA, Public Enemy, Tupac, KRS-One, Ice-T.
• Angry hardcore and metal: Bad Religion, Propagandhi, Fugazi, Ministry.
• Singer-songwriters like Ani DiFranco addressed feminism and LGBTQ rights.
• The 90s presaged the modern merging of personal and political struggles.

21st Century Protest: Pessimism and Personalization

• [19:43] Themes continue: war, racism, economic despair, LGBTQ and women’s rights, mental health, pervasive institutional mistrust.
  • The post-9/11 period, “forever wars,” the rise of oligarchs, social media fragmentation, and constant crisis mode (“Every time we wake up, we automatically wonder what fresh hell we’ll be confronted with today.”)
• Protest music now has a “lot more I in the songs and a little less us;” storytelling and journalism blur with lyricism.
• Hip hop continues to lead: Kendrick Lamar, Run the Jewels, Killer Mike, Little Simz, Childish Gambino’s “This Is America” as a modern indictment of systemic issues.

Modern Rock Protest

• [21:31] Rock bands continue political critique, e.g. System of a Down’s “B.Y.O.B.” referencing the Iraq War.
• Newer artists: The Linda Lindas, a young all-female band, wrote “Racist, Sexist Boy” in response to COVID-era racism and personal experiences.
  • “The song began as Idiotic Boy, but after some work it became Racist, Sexist Boy.” ([22:48])

Why Modern Protest Music Feels Different

• [23:40] Alan addresses why people ask, “Where is all the protest music today?”
  • The digital age fragments outrage; news cycles are “ultra short,” and issues come from all over the globe faster than ever.
  • The experience of the past: events like Kent State (1970) would “fester over weeks” (see the creation of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s “Ohio”). Today, crises are replaced almost hourly.
  • There are now “100,000 new songs... uploaded every day.” Protest songs exist, but it’s much harder for any single song to gain cultural traction.
• Final reflection:
  • “As long as there’s injustice in the world, people will write songs about it.” ([24:45])

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Notable Segment Timestamps

• [02:01] U2’s “Sunday Bloody Sunday” and The Troubles
• [05:18] Larry Mullen Jr. on writing about Northern Ireland
• [06:23] Cold War nuclear anxiety, anti-nuke songs
• [10:55] Midnight Oil’s “Beds Are Burning” and indigenous rights
• [12:08] Gen X, 1990s protest music themes
• [13:27] Rage Against the Machine, Rodney King, LA Riots
• [15:00–17:00] Riot Grrrl movement, Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill
• [19:43] 21st century, rise of personalized protest
• [21:31] System of a Down’s “B.Y.O.B.”—and Iraq War
• [22:48] The Linda Lindas and “Racist, Sexist Boy”
• [23:40] Why protest songs seem less visible today
• [24:45] Closing thoughts on the ongoing role of protest music

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Memorable Quotes

• Alan Cross [00:33]:
  “We wish to protest. Protest songs help coalesce thoughts and feelings about things like social, political and labor injustice... But make no mistake, this music is us against them—and the them needs to be addressed.”

• Larry Mullen Jr. (quoted by Alan) [05:18]:
  “We're into the politics of people. We're not into politics... I don't care who's who. Catholics, Protestants, whatever. People are dying every single day through the bitterness and hate. And we're saying, why? What's the point?”

• Alan Cross [13:27]:
  “Still, one of the great angry rock and roll protest songs of all time: Rage Against the Machine, and Killing in the Name of.”

• Alan Cross [22:48]: “The song began as Idiotic Boy, but after some work it became Racist, Sexist Boy.”

• Alan Cross [23:40]:
  “Our rage has been fragmented and individualized. Because access to information is instant, we process injustice differently... All you have to do is look at your phone. By the time you even started to process one crisis, the world has moved on in a hundred different directions.”

• Alan Cross [24:45]:
  “As long as there’s injustice in the world, people will write songs about it.”

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Episode Tone & Style

Alan Cross delivers the episode in a straightforward, informative, and occasionally wry tone, weaving personal anecdotes, historical context, and direct quotes into an engaging narrative. He maintains a balanced perspective—acknowledging disillusionment, but always circling back to the enduring power and necessity of protest music.

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Summary Takeaway

Protest music is as vital and prolific as ever, even if it’s harder for any individual anthem to rise above the noise of today’s fragmented, hyper-speed media environment. The forms, faces, and stories may have changed, but as Alan Cross underscores, as long as injustice exists, protest songs will, too.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

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[A]

Music is not only a powerful motivating tool, but it's also a way to get a message out to vast numbers of people. And when things hit the fan music can be used to let the powers that be know that we see what they're doing and we are not happy about it. We Wish to Protest Protest songs help coalesce thoughts and feelings about things like social, political and labor injustice. They help rally people to a cause and sometimes inspire action against oppressors or those who seek to abrogate rights, keep people down, and try to gain power by spreading lies and propaganda. Sometimes they call out specific people, organizations and issues. In other cases they're couched in metaphors and stories. But make no mistake, this music is us against them and the them needs to be addressed. This kind of music has never gone away and is still very much with us. Despite that, a lot of people ask, whatever happened to protest songs? Nothing. They're right here and they've always been right in front of us. Let me explain. This is A Brief History of Protest Music, Part 2 this is the ongoing History of New Music Podcast with Alan Cross.

[C]

Sunday Funny Sunday Fun.

[A]

YouTube from the spring of 1983. That is clearly a protest song and one of the most political songs U2 has ever recorded. It tells the story of the Bloody Sunday incident in Derry, Northern Ireland in 1972. This was at the height of the Troubles, the battle that pitted those loyal to the British monarchy, mostly Protestants, against the Republicans, people who were mostly Catholic who wanted the north to join the Republic of Ireland in the south. The violence began in the late 1960s, but the issues date back to the early 20th century, when Ireland was partitioned. Protesters were especially inspired by the civil rights marches that were happening in the US With Catholics demanding equality after decades of systemic discrimination in the North. When the British army arrived in 1969, this was seen as an occupation. Organizations like the Irish Republican army, headquartered in the south, and the Ulster Defense association, headquartered in the north, went at it There were shootings, bombings and assassinations. Many civilians died in the crossfire or targeted directly. And then on January 30, 1972, British soldiers opened fire on a protest march. 26 unarmed people were shot and 14 people were killed. Some were even shot while trying to help the wounded. And this only made the Troubles worse. There was a long inquiry, and as late as September 2025, 52 years after bloody Sunday, a soldier involved in the massacre was still facing trial. Meanwhile, the Troubles only got worse. And it wasn't until 1998, after more than 3,500 people were killed and tens of thousands injured, that peace was declared with the Good Friday agreement. But in 1983, when U2 was singing about the largest mass shooting in Northern Ireland's history, things were still very tense and people were still dying. Larry Mullen Jr. Said this about the we're into the politics of people. We're not into politics. You talk about Northern Ireland Sunday, Bloody Sunday. People sort of think, oh, that time when 13 Catholics were shot by British soldiers. That's not what the song is about. That's an incident, the most famous incident in Northern Ireland. And it's the strongest way of saying, how long? How long do we have to put up with this? I don't care who's who, Catholics, Protestants, whatever. People are dying every single day through the bitterness and hate. And we're saying, why? What's the point? The Troubles were the source of many, many songs. Stiff Little Fingers, a band from Northern Ireland, had Alternative Ulster and Suspect Device, among others. Simple Minds had Belfast's Child. Paul McCartney's debut song with Wings was called Give Ireland Back to the Irish, the most political song he'd ever written. This is a rebel song from Sinead o'. Connor. And how many people think that Zombie from the Cranberries is about the undead? Well, no. It is a 100% a Troubles protest song inspired by two IRA bombings in England in February 1993. Two children died and 56 people were injured. Hello again, I'm Alan Cross and this is part two of A Brief History of Protest Songs. We ended part one in the mid-80s, a time when there were many things to rise up against via music. Back in the 60s and 70s, there were three main buckets. Anti war anthems, songs about political and civil rights, and songs about women's rights. These buckets were still in use, but the topics were starting to get more granular. In 1984, the Cold War between America and the USSR was in danger of heating up. Ronald Reagan, a committed Cold Warrior was butting heads against two bitter Yuri Andropov and then Konstantin Chernenko. We know now that the two countries came dangerously close to nuclear war back then. It was a very scary time. In 1980, NORAD ran a training tape on a Soviet attack. Except that they ran it on the live systems and everybody thought a massive attack was actually happening. On September 1, 1983, a Soviet fighter shot a Korean airline 747 out of the sky when it entered restricted airspace, believing it was on a spy mission. On September 26, 1983, a Soviet early warning defense system went off saying that the US had fired multiple ICBMs towards the USSR. This news reached a Soviet submarine commander in the Atlantic. His name was Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov. He was the last guy in the chain of three officers. The other two demanded that he follow protocol, meaning that the sub was supposed to launch nuclear missiles against American targets. But something didn't smell right to Petrov. He was determined that it was a false alarm and did not nuke the us. So yeah, World War III came down to a decision by one guy in a submarine cut off from high command back home. A few months later, there was the Able Archer 83 incident. NATO was conducting war games that looked far too realistic to the Soviets. They mistook these preparations for the real thing and nuclear forces were put on ultra high alert. It wasn't until years later that we found out how close we all came to getting nuked. The world of music picked up on these Nuclear Red skies by the Fix, Enola Gay by OMD, Two Suns in the Sunset from Pink Floyd. 99 Love Balloons by Nina Distant, Early Warning from Rush. All these songs were anti war and pro peace. My favorite, this one from Frankie Goes to Hollywood from the summer of 1984. The video featured a wrestling match between Ronald Reagan and Konstantin Chernenko. It remains chilling to this day. Frankie Goes to Hollywood with one of the most popular anti war protest songs of the 1980s. There were many other concerns too. Since the 1960s, US presidents have been the targets of protest music. Ronald Reagan was a hard right Republican and when you have someone like that in the White House, chances are policies aren't going to be popular with young people. There were plenty of anti Reagan songs. Bonzo Goes to Bitburg from the Ramones, the Violent Femmes in Old Mother Reagan, Genesis and Land of Confusion. Meanwhile, Margaret Thatcher, a hard conservative at 10 Downing street was also unpopular. We don't need this Fascist groove thing by heaven 17 the English beat and stand down Margaret. And then in 1988, Morrissey released a song called Margaret on the Guillotine. Towards the end of the 1980s, musicians expressed fierce opposition to something known as the poll tax, a new system of taxation put in place by Thatcher. It was widely seen as unfair, especially on the poor. There were anti poll tax songs from the Jam, Billy Bragg, the Exploited and more. Bruce Coburn had a hit with if I Had A Rocket Launcher, an incendiary track inspired by a visit to refugee camps in Guatemala in 1983, a time when much of Central America was embroiled in all kinds of civil strife encouraged by proxy wars involving the US and the USSR. We could also throw in U2's bullet the blue sky into this Bucket. It was inspired by a trip Bono took to Nicaragua and El Salvador. Nelson Mandela's imprisonment on Robben island in South Africa continued to generate musical demands for his release. That included songs like Free Nelson Mandela from the Specials. Then we have the rise of hip hop. We were just on the cusp of gangsta rap, which drew much of its material from life in the inner cities. Police harassment and violence, drugs, gangs, government indifference and oppression of America's black population. Leading the way was Public Enemy, with songs like Fight the Power, Black Steel and the Hour of Chaos, Prophets of Rage and Don't Believe the Hype. Meanwhile, out on the West Coast, NWA came straight out of Compton with songs like F the Police, tackling things like systemic racism, the drug crisis and poverty. And we had an awakening when it comes to indigenous rights. One of the best spreaders of that message was Australia's Midnight Oil, especially with their 1987 album Diesel and Dust, a huge record all over the world. After touring the outback in the middle, 1980s singer Peter Garrett, who along with his bandmates had always been very political, saw firsthand how the indigenous peoples of Australia were living and being treated. And one of the results was this song.

[C]

How can we dance when our earth is turning? How do we sleep while our beds are burning?

[A]

One of the iconic protest songs of the late 1980s, beds are burning from Midnight Oil. When we come back, we'll look at the 1990s. Did Gen X have things they needed to sing about? You bet they did.

[D]

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[A]

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[A]

There was a seismic shift in music starting in about 1990. Generation X came of age musically and had no interest in the hair metal of the 1980s or the classic rock that came before it. The sons and daughters of the baby boomers were a huge demographic group and they were pissed off. The 1990s began with a brutal recession. Gen Xers were highly educated, yet underemployed. There was a real chance that they'd never have a standard of living equal to their parents, let alone something a bit better. We had the first Gulf War, more Republican presidents, more civil rights injustices like the Rodney King episode and the riots that followed all tied in with anti racism causes. The AIDS crisis was approaching its peak. For the first time, people began to push against globalization in significant numbers. And in Canada and other countries, including the US and Australia, there was continuing tension involving the rights of indigenous communities. On the other side, we had pro democracy demonstrations in Russia following the end of the Soviet Union. We were still processing the massacre in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in the spring of 1989, and the results of the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 were still playing out. Every single one of these cases resulted in music being made and because the best way to reach large numbers of young people with a specific message, even if it was just I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore was via a song on the radio and we heard a lot of angry protest songs. Some were subtle in their messaging, others not so much. Still, one of the great angry rock and roll protest songs of all time, Rage against the Machine, one of the greatest left leaning bands of all time, and Killing in the Name of and that's an example of a song generated by the Rodney King episode and the LA riots of 1992. Rage kept everybody honest with four albums between 1992 and 2000 covering many volatile topics. Let's expand on that. Like I said earlier, the scope of protest music expanded greatly since the 1960s and 70s. There was no single movement, as we saw with opposition to the Vietnam War. Instead, it was like, wow. Political disillusionment and distrust of the government, especially after the first Gulf War and things like the Iran Contra scandal were on people's minds. Institutional distrust, the growing gap between rich and poor, gender and sexual identity issues came out of the shadows. Environmentalism moved to the front. Hardcore bands and hip hop groups went after police brutality and mass incarceration, especially in the United States. Women's issues were also again front and center in the 90s. The most famous source of music was probably the riot grrrl bands. They were part of a very indie, very underground wave of feminist punk bands in the Pacific Northwest, starting around Olympia, Washington. The first Riot girls were tired of the testosterone filled dude heavy rock scene and demanded that they get a voice. So they took one and elbowed their way to the front with songs about sexism, women's rights, politics, the patriarchy, LGBTQ issues, and difficult subjects like sexual assault, racism and abuse. They also reclaimed the diminutive and sometimes demeaning word girls for themselves. And there was far more than just songs too. The riot girl scene was famous for its zines and stories and manifestos and activism and arts that all focused on the female experience. And if you went to a show, there was a girls to the front policy. Riot grrrl shows were made into safe spaces. Inclusivity amongst the sisterhood was priority number one, and the riot grrrl scene was part of something larger. It's considered a branch of third wave feminism, which was Gen X's push for individualism and diversity. It also included sex, positivity and women's roles regarding the environment, politics and society. There were many riot grrrl bands, all with message songs. Bratmobile, Team Dresh, Bikini Kill and Heavens to Betsy are a couple of examples. We can also consider bands like Courtney Love and Hole and Babes in Toyland to be riot grrrl. Adjacent Huggy Bear was perhaps the biggest of the British riot grrrl bands. If we have to focus on just one group, my vote might be for Sleeter Kinney, who came together in 1994. Not only did they become a key component for the riot grrrl movement, they're also important to the entire American indie rock scene. Sleater Kinney has about a dozen studio albums to their name. Let's go Back to the second call the doctor from 1996. This is the title track. Sleet or Kinney broke up in 2006, but reunited for more tours and records in 2014. Plus, guitarist Carrie Brownstein has gone on to become an acclaimed actor in shows like the Very Funny Portlandia with Fred Armiston. She's been a voice on the Simpsons, guest starred on a Curb youb Enthusiasm and in a bunch of movies. She's also a music writer and has a great memoir entitled Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl. I want to play another song from the riot grrrl scene. This is from Bikini Kill and it's called Rebel Girl. Bikini Kill featuring Kathleen Hanna. She was friends with Kurt Cobain and once noted that he smelled like a flowery, girly deodorant. He misunderstood, thinking that she was paying him a compliment about his punk attitude. And then he wrote Smells Like Teen Spirit. He had no idea that Teen Spirit was the name of a girly, fruity deodorant. Oh, and Kathleen is married to Adam Horovitz of the Beastie Boys. She continues her activism today. The 90s were loaded with angry songs protesting against just about everything. Hip hop was probably the most Vocal, thanks to NWA Public, Anime, Tupac, KRS1, Ice T and so many others. They basically documented racism, police brutality, the problems of urban America, and media spin in real time. Hardcore bands were mad, Bad Religion, propaganda, Fugazi, and Anti Flag, among them. Metal and industrial bands were motivated by war, the dehumanization of technology, and dystopian futures. Think Ministry, and pretty much all of the Psalm 69 album from 1992. And then there were folk singers and singer songwriters like Ani DiFranco, who mined feminism, LGBTQ issues, and personal politics for her songs. While this music did have much in common with the protest songs of past decades, it was much more confrontational. Cynicism was a big part of things. Hope. What's that? Forget it. Things became more focused into specific scenes and even geographic locations. And for the first time, personal struggles and personal politics were mixed in with critiques of society at large. The protest music of the 1990s set the stage for where things would go in the 21st century. And that part of the story is next. There has been no shortage of protest music in the 21st century. The familiar themes are war, racism, police violence, economic despair, LGBTQ rights, women's rights, civil rights, immigration, mental health, distrust of government, mistrust in institutions, and a basic bleak view of the future. And there's reason to be pessimistic. The world really hasn't been the same since 9 11. We had the forever wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have Vladimir Putin's evil, America's growing isolationism and belligerence, the financial crisis of 2008, the rise of the billionaire class, consolidation of media. Trump, Covid, Trump again. Every time we wake up, we automatically wonder what fresh hell we'll be confronted with today. And our phones are right there to deliver the latest bad news. Another observation. We're seeing the blurring of the lines between the storytelling and journalism in traditional protest songs as people add more and more personal experiences to the lyrics. You might say that there's a lot more I in the songs and a little less us. And this applies to protest music of all types. If one genre has to lead the way, it probably again is hip hop, thanks to artists like Kendrick Lamar, Run the Jewels and Killer Mike and Little Sims. And let's remember Childish Gambino and this indictment of the country he lives in.

[F]

I gotta carry em yeah yeah I'mma go into this yeah yeah this is gorilla yeah yeah I'mma go get the bed yeah yeah or imma get the pad yeah yeah I'm so cola yeah yeah I'm so dola yeah.

[A]

Swinging back to rock There are plenty of acts with something to get off their chest. System of a Down, for one. They are very active when it comes to criticizing war, especially with the plight of their Armenian people and the genocide they experienced. Let's look at the song for 2005 and the mesmerize album. It was inspired by the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, looking for weapons of mass destruction that did not and never did exist. System of Down's response to all this was byob, which in case you didn't know, stands for bring your own bombs.

[C]

Dancing in the desert, blowing up the sunshine, Blast off in potty time and we don't live in a fascist nation.

[A]

When Donald Trump was elected for the first time in 2016, I made the prediction that based on historical trends, we would see a rise in angry heavy rock music with plenty of angst and protest. But that didn't really happen. Instead, rock and alternative got a lot more introspective, and Covid probably had something to do with that. But songs of protest were still being minted. Take, for example, the Linda Lindas, the young, all female group out of Los Angeles who started making music before anyone in the band was old enough to drive the band's drummer, Mila de la Garza heard someone at her school make a racist remark. Apparently this kid's dad had told him to stay away from Chinese people like her because, well, who knows? It was her first experience facing such a thing. And Mila is part Chinese. She reported back to her bandmates and together they wrote a song over a zoom call while they were in COVID lockdown. The song began as Idiotic boy, but after some work it became racist, sexist.

[C]

Boy, you say me stuff in new clothing. Minds they don't like. You turn away from what you don't want to see. Racist actors.

[A]

We've spent two full episodes tracing the history of protest music, and I think we've proven that it never really went away. There's also more protest music than ever before. So why do people keep asking me, where is all the protest music today? I think I know the answer. First of all, all our rage has been fragmented and individualized. Because access to information is is instant. We process injustice differently. In the old days, the news cycle was much slower. Something like the Kent State massacre would fester over weeks as information slowly spread. In a world before the Internet, we had time to think about things, discuss things, and form opinions. And because access to information was limited, it was easy to focus all of our rage on just a few key things. The 24 hour news cycle was born June 1, 1980, when CNN signed on. Since then, news consumption went from reading the morning paper or watching the evening news to a constant firehose of crises and problems and wars. And not just from where we live, but from around the world. For example, if you were at a Vietnam protest in 1969, did you really know what was happening in places like Iran or Central America? Probably not. We weren't nearly as global back then. Thanks to social media, our attention spans are ultra short, to the point where the 24 hour news cycle has been shortened to 12 hours at best. All you have to do is look at your phone. By the time you even started to process one crisis, the world has moved on in a hundred different directions. How does an artist capture a moment with a protest song if that moment disappears in less than half a day? Let's go back to the Kent State shootings in May of 1970. The massacre happened on May 4th. That night, Neil Young heard about it on the evening news. A week later, he saw pictures in Life magazine. He wandered out into the woods to think and then came back with a song he presented to David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham nash. That night, May 21, more than two weeks after the shooting, they recorded Ohio at the Record Plant studio in Los Angeles. It was then Rush released by the record company, appearing in stores in early June, more than a month after the shooting. And that's when it became a hit. And it's still the gold standard of protest songs. Compare that timeline to today. Yes, technology has made it possible to write, record and release a song within hours. Bruce Springsteen did it, Billy Bragg did it. But who will know? Those are the exceptions. 100,000 new songs are uploaded to the streaming music services every day. Protest songs may come out every day, but because there are hundreds of millions of songs to choose from, and because everyone is now their own music director, there is very little chance for any of those songs to gain any traction like they did in the old days. They don't become hits. And let's face it, the world is a whole lot more complicated today. And we're always in touch with all of it. But protest songs still exist. As long as there's injustice in the world, people will write songs about it. If you want to get caught up on ongoing history shows, there's a massive podcast archive featuring hundreds of shows. They're all available for download on all the platforms. Take as many as you want. They're all free. I'm on most of the social media platforms doing whatever you do on social media these days. There's my website, ajournalofmusicalthings.com which is updated every day with music news and information. And while you're there, sign up for the free daily newsletter and send all email to AlanAlancross CA and I will get right back to you. Technical production for all this is by Rob Johnston. I'm Alan Cross.