Sticks of Fire: a Tampa blog

A story on the St Pete Times site caught my eye recently. Eric Deggans takes a look at the lack of widely popular protest songs, which he considers strange in the current climate. I would disagree with the idea that protest songs have disappeared. Instead, I would argue that hit music in general has been in sharp decline.

I posted the story to a politically active online board and asked for (and received) a list of current protest songs.  Deggans and I also had a bit of a back ‘n’ forth about the subject via email (hit the “more” button below).

But regardless of my opinion on the subject, it is nice to see one of our local papers producing material that is normally left to national outlets such as AP or the New York Times or to weekly news magazines like Newsweek and Time. I love that the Times went to the effort of producing a well written and researched piece that isn’t either a local news story, a reprint of other papers material, or simply a re-write of AP wire stories stitched together over a staff writer’s byline.

When national stories are covered by the Trib and the Times it seems they are just one of dozens of similar stories written by media outlets nationwide. This is different. Eric took an idea for a story nobody was doing (that I know of) and built it from scratch.

I wish local media would do more of these.

Email exchange is below.

from me to Eric Deggans:

Just thought I would let you know that I posted a thing on your story to a message board and got quite a few examples of current protest songs.

Who the f*ck listens to the radio anymore for new music anyway?

http://williamgibsonboard.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/286601…631052952#3631052952

and Deggans’ reply:

Hmm. Your email makes me wonder if you read the story, or just complaints about it. My piece was an attempt to look at why we don’t have huge hit protest songs like What’s Going On in the modern day.

So my piece was looking at pop stars and big name artists mostly. Cool as Steve Earle and Ani DiFranco are, they are not as popular as Marvin Gaye, the Temptations and James brown were when they started doing protest music.

Back then, these artists were the biggest pop stars on the planet. and they turned protest music into a Top 40 genre for a short while. That’s what Sunday’s story was about…

Here are three paragraphs about a quarter of the way into the story:

“While rock and pop artists such as Pink, the Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young have earned media coverage this year for their protest songs, that work hasn’t sold well or received much radio airplay.

For example, Young’s Living With War record has sold just 212,000 copies, and Springsteen’s protest revival The Seeger Sessions has sold only 526,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan. In comparison, Springsteen’s last record, 2005’s Devils & Dust, sold 220,000 copies in its first week.

The possible culprits are many: tightened radio play lists, a less turbulent social scene (no military draft to galvanize youth, a muted civil rights movement) and a fragmented audience that seems less tolerant of such controversial messages. Teens may download their own favorite protest songs these days, but that rarely produces the kind of cultural consensus that makes for enduring pop hits.”

So, as you can see, I never said all artists stopped writing them. But radio and the music establishment has stopped playing them to level needed to produce big hits…

I would also refer you to my blog –http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/media/ — to see what I’ve said about the reaction.

Thanks for the email, regardless….

Eric Deggans
TV/Media Critic
St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times
(727) 893-8521
http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/media/
http://www.sptimes.com/columns/deggans.shtml http://www.myspace.com/ericdeggans

to which I sent

I think there are plenty of protest songs out there but there are fewer musicians than ever who really are superstars in the sense of most of your examples. Marvin and James Brown were huge stars but at the time limited outlets for new music made it possible for individual artists to dominate particular genres of music more easily. In other words how many other artists were never heard because Geffen or Island of whoever was too busy promoting their two or three biggest names and securing them airtime to make those protest songs so famous. Your other examples are all, with the exception of Pink, old guys that have pretty limited appeal outside the AARP set. Today, when it is so easy to record, mix, and promote music you have more bands than ever that are able to carve out a niche of their own, this prevents any one group from gaining the traction in public conciousness nessesary to make the BIG PROTEST SONG that you are looking for.

This isn’t nessesarily a bad thing. More bands mean more music than ever, you just won’t find them on any top 100 list.

The end.

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