Out of his legacy however, there would be one song in particular that would stand out to define a movement with a simple timeless phrase that is still relevant today.
Coming off of his second record of the same name in , the song dives into the short history of this country focusing on the wars we have waged in the relatively small amount of time we have been around. The opening guitar picking is quick, strong, and instantly recognizable as a generational battle cry.
Starting with the Battle of New Orleans, Ochs moves quickly and poetically through our most famous of battles including those during the long genocide of the Native Americans. After each he proclaims that he will never fight and kill again for this government with that famous title line. This style keeps consistent though out the short two and a half minute song driving in deeper the message as he moves through the decades and the wars in them. Where the song really hits home however is with the simple verse that follows.
These very words have echoed and resonated in politically charged songs for decades now, and has remained the message of those young Americans that are still sent to fight even to this day. Curiously he chooses to leave out the obvious, and reach for something deeper, the war that almost happened. Here, Ochs tapers one of his core, conclusively patriotic theses: that he, and his listeners, should be willing to lose some comforts to keep the world turning. Frustrated, he retreated from earnest topicality; his next full studio album, Pleasures of the Harbor , folded in lush, Sinatra-strings and ragtime piano, adding a poppier bend to his dour character studies of empty socialites and downtrodden flower vendors.
He became disillusioned with demonstrating; he and his Yippie party cohorts staged a protest at Democratic National Convention in Chicago, during which they nominated an actual pig for president name: Pigasus , but the mirth ended in a massive, era-defining riot between protesters and police.
He retreated from New York, his wife, and his daughter, drinking heavily, heaped his flagging idealism on the communist uprisings of Fidel Castro and the Marxist Chilean revolutionary Salvador Allende. He slept on the streets, got arrested, attacked friends.
But for a moment, Phil Ochs existed in pure conviction. It would be easy to stop marching in apathy or in defeat, but Ochs pushed for something greater: a righteous, excruciating, beautiful reclamation.
Small wonder his powerful polemics have been covered and updated by the Clash , Neil Young , Jello Biafra : His fight was never just his, never just of his time.
But I think he had righteous edge. There was certainly no shortage of topical material for Ochs and Paxton to draw upon, and both were doing a lot of recording for Elektra in the mid-'60s. We didn't wait three years, or two years, between releases.
Phil Ochs, he could have one out every six months. I learned a lot about the frequency of interaction between an artist and their audience from most of my singer-songwriters. We kept them recording. Undoubtedly the song that reached the widest audience was the title cut -- not just via Ochs's recorded version and concerts, but also via its subsequent adaptation as one of the anthems of the anti-Vietnam War movement, sung by crowds at innumerable demonstrations and still sung at some such events today.
All of those are good things. Enter your keywords. You are here Home. Available: November Also available as an e-book. Facebook Goodreads. Purchase from hardcover. Barnes and Noble. Chris Lombardi. Topics: Sociology U. The result is a highly original book, at once scholarly and intimate, exposing the clash between personal conviction and social expectation whose significance stretches far beyond the battlefield. Anti-war activists and civil libertarians will find aid and comfort in stories of those who just said no.
0コメント