RATBAG SPIN

The protest song of our oral history. Protest songs help define our lives. They give a voice to people fighting a common cause. They can motivate the undecided.

In the early to mid 20th century Australian protest songs mainly emanated from a militant blue-collar working class generation. It was the workers in the big industrial centres which created the songs and provided a mass audience. The lyrics were born of the day to day abundance of hardship. The Depression, the boss, the landlord or a distant war. The only way to hear these songs was "live" because most people didn't own a radio or a gramophone. This militant industrial worker base has largely disappeared from the Australian landscape. There is a core group of musicians, especially folkies, keeping the songs alive, but most people rarely hear them. It's not on the radio and it's hard to find in the music shops.

With the post war emergence of the modern recording industry, we witnessed the mass marketing of music. A new music for young whites called rock and roll emerged. Minus the protest lyric it was basically black blues and hillbilly country music sung by cute white boys. The 45 rpm single was introduced for this huge new youth market. By the late 50's Rock and Roll was king. Conservative elements in the industry and the religious right couldn't handle all that hip swinging jungle music and rock and roll was denounced. A new group of nice safe acts like Ricky Nelson and Frankie Avalon were promoted in an attempt to save our youth. There were public burnings of Rock and Roll records. It had a big effect but the rock and roll movement had already spread.

It was the British Beat boom which relaunched rock and roll across Europe, the U.S and Australia. This coincided with an increasing social conscience in youth culture. One feature of this development was the emergence of the pop protest song.

The Vietnam war was the focal point of this genre along with the environment, women's issues, and indigenous rights. The pop protest song still had to abide by the rules for a smash hit. A great tune, a killer beat or a catchy hookline. The first Australian pop protest song I can recall was the 1969 hit "Smiley" by Ronnie Burns'. Smiley was the larrikin farm-boy in the two Smiley movies made in Australia in 1956 and 1958. Smiley, the carefree country boy is conscripted. Song writer Johnny Young later revealed that the inspiration for the song was Normie Rowe's National Service call-up.

From the 60's through to the early 90's there was a steady stream of Australian protest hits. Parody, satire and humour were popular devices to get the message across. Skyhooks, Richard Clapton, Midnight Oil, Ross Wilson, Redgum and others all scored hits with protest songs. In hindsight many of the most popular songs of that time were protest songs. Emerging from a Northern beaches surfing subculture, Midnight Oil arguably grew their following on protest songs. Australian Aboriginal artists in contemporary popular music have been very successful in getting their viewpoints and agendas onto the National agenda and into our consciences. Artists like Archie Roach, Kev Carmody and Yothu Yindi. They have used music as a tool to enhance Aboriginal political awareness. When I looked through my CD collection I was surprised just how many popular songs have canvassed Aboriginal issues.

It seems there are fewer protest songs being released these days. That's interesting given the current political climate. There's no shortage of material. Maybe it has something to do with the market.

Simon