1. The Protest Music In The 60’s
1. What were the main influences of protest
music in the 60’s?
How does King Crimson’s song – “21st
2.
Century Schizoid Man” reflect the protest in
the music of the 60’s?
.Presented by: Guy Ivtsan, Idan Matalon, Omri Lachman
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2. :Table Of Content
Introduction…………………………………………………pg.3
Influences of the protest music…………………………...pg.4-6
History of "King Crimson"……………………………….pg.8-9
Examining the song…………………………………….pg.10-11
Conclusion…………………………………………………pg.12
Personal reflections………………..……………………….pg.13
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3. Introduction
Due to several circumstances, in the 60’s began an increasing phenomenon
of music whose main goal is protest against the society, the government and
.different values
Our deep interest in music has brought us to cover this subject of protest
music in the 60’s. We wanted to know what the influences of these acts of
.protest were and what motivated artists in this era to protest in their music
.We also examined an example of a song which reflects the protest in the 60’s
The song we have chosen after many considerations is “21st Century Schizoid
Man”, written in 1969 by the British progressive rock band King Crimson. This
.song presents a picture of the society in the 60’s and protests against it
We will try to answer two questions in our project: 1. What were the main
?influences on the protest music of the 60’s
How does King Crimson’s song- “21st Century Schizoid Man” reflects the .2
.protest of the music of the 60’s
!Enjoy
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4. 1st Question:
What were the main influences of protest music
in the 60’s?
The influences of the protest songs at the 60’s:
The definition of protest song is a song which is associated with a movement
for social change and hence and consider under the title of “topical songs”
(songs connected to actual events).
The protest songs may be folk, classical, or commercial in genre. Among
social movements that have an associated body of songs are the abolition
movement, women's suffrage, the labor movement, civil rights, the anti-war
movement, the feminist movement, and Environmentalism. Protest songs are
frequently situational, having been associated with a social movement through
context.
Protest song texts have significant cognitive content.
The 60’s was a productive era for the genre. The protest songs mostly
influenced by Civil Rights movement, the status of counterculture groups such
as "hippies" and the New Left, and the escalation of the War in Vietnam.
The Vietnam War:
The Vietnam War, was a Cold War military conflict that occurred in Vietnam,
Laos, and Cambodia from September 26, 1959 to April 30, 1975. This war
was fought between the communist North Vietnam, supported by its
communist allies, and the government of South Vietnam, supported by the
United States and other anti-communist nation.
The antiwar music of the Vietnam era took the children of the 60’s to a
different level. This generation was not going to sit idly by while the
government lied to the people about what was going on in Vietnam. This
social climate, plus musicians who became the collective conscience of this
generation through their lyrics and music became the basis of ending a
barbaric and unjust war, which the government tried to hide by to calling it a
'conflict' or a 'police action'.
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5. Civil Rights Movement:
The Civil Rights Movement was a worldwide political movement for equality
before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. It was
accompanied by much civil unrest and popular rebellion. The process was
long and poor in many countries, and most of these movements did not
achieve or fully achieve their purpose. In the 60’s a lot of the musician’s
generation compose contrast songs about the terrible situation to bring
equality.
The Hippies:
The movement started as a protest movement against the Vietnam War, but it
evolved to be an ideological movement with influence on all areas of life.
The “flower children” called the human race to abandon the way of war, and
exchange it with culture of music, drugs and peace. They believed Marijuana
helps to see how beautiful is this world, and how unnecessary war is.
The hippies were young and came from every race and religion. They gave
everyone equal opportunities to join their “communities” were they lived
according to their ideology. Most of them were young and felt that their
parents couldn't understand them, and for this reason they chose to rebel and
start a new way of life.
The new left movement :
In Great Britain of the 60’s the movement of new left was created, because of
Khrushchev's speech on Stalin and the invasion of communism to Hungary,
after which many left Stalin’s communist party and joined the Trozky worker
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6. parties. Their main focus was world peace and disarming all nuclear weapon.
Later the movement spread to the USA, and like in Britain it was supported
especially by young students. Their ideology supported fight against
authorities and the collapse of human society.
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7. 2nd Question:
How does King Crimson’s song – “21st Century
Schizoid Man” reflect the protest in the music of
the 60’s?
Cats foot iron claw
Neuro-surgeons scream for more
at paranoia's poison door
Twenty first century schizoid man
Blood rack barbed wire
Politicians funeral pyre
Innocents raped with napalm fire
Twenty first century schizoid man
Death seed blind mans greed
Poets starving children bleed
Nothing he's got he really needs
Twenty first century schizoid man
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8. The history of King Crimson
An English rock band, founded in 1968 by guitarist Robert Fripp and drummer
Michael Giles. Typically categorised as a foundational progressive rock group,
the band has in fact incorporated diverse influences and instrumentation
during its long history, drawing from jazz, classical and experimental music to
psychedelic rock, heavy metal, hard rock, folk music, and electronica.
Originally from in England, the band has had a mixture of English and
American personnel since 1981.Throughout the 41 years of existence of King
Crimson, almost 20 different. musicians took part in the band, and only a
single musician remained in the band for the whole time. When asked about
this subject, Robert Frip explained that King Crimson is an independent,
evolving musical being, and that he is the only one willing to follow its
evolution consecutively. Robert Frip and brothers Michael and Peter Giles
started their first band in November 1968- Giles Giles and Frip, which later
upgraded itself with Greg Lake who was a singer and replaced Peter Giles as
a bassist, Ian Mcdonalds (composer, brass) and Peter Sinfield (technician and
lyrics writer), and changed its name to “King Crimson”. The band’s first album
was “In the Court of the Crimson King”, released in 1969. With the release of
their next albums, “In the Wake of Poseidon” and “Lizard”, King Crimson
defined the new musical complexity of Rock music, and passed through many
changes in its members. By 72 Frip was left with no band, but there were
many musicians willing to play with him. The new ensemble of the band
changed its familiar music genre. The band combined many different musical
genres, and especially created songs which were characterized in long
virtuoso electrical guitar, violin and drums solos. Not all rock fans liked this at
first, but it didn’t affect Frip and his band. In 1974 after releasing their album
"Red", which was considered as one of the most important albums of the
progressive rock, the band broke up. Frip wanted to start a new band so in
1981 king crimson was revival with only Frip as an original member until 1984.
In 1994 Frip started the band again with six new members and a similar
combination is working these days. King crimson is known as one of the most
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9. important and influence rock bands ever although it ever changing formation
and it break ups.
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10. Examining the song
Schizoid personality disorder
Schizoid is a personality disorder in which the main symptoms are avoiding
social and emotional connections with other human beings. Schizoids have a
tendency to living a solitary lifestyle. Schizoids feel tensed near others, and
.will often avoid any communication
Schizoids may seem cold, indifferent and disconnected. There are many
artists who are Schizoids, because of their special point of view and
.introspective way of thinking
Not sure that King Crimson understood exactly the meaning of this personal
disorder and its symptoms. By using the name schizoid they might meant
“crazy” as the crazy people the new world is creating. Even though, the word
schizoid can also be seen in the original meaning in this song- Schizoids
seem as if they don’t care from anybody else and think about themselves all
the time. Maybe the band wanted to hint with the use of this word of a corrupt
.society, where everyone takes care of himself only
Analyzing the piece verse by verse
First verse- the first verse refers to the crazy world of the 21st century. A world
where machines and living creatures will be mixed, (cats foot, iron claw),
where there will be new inventions (neuro-surgeons scream for more), even if
they hurt human beings, because everyone wants progress, there will be no
control on mechanization, and modernization will dictate the world order. With
the beginning of the 21st century the door of paranoia and insanity will be
opened (at paranoia’s poison door) and people won’t know what may attack
.them and when
This verse was written in a very naïve way, of a person who is afraid of the
"new" world, under the influence of seeing the very fast development of
.strange technologies, especially in the weapons field
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11. Second verse- In this verse there are many references to the Vietnam War,
where half of the casualties were innocent civilians (innocents raped with
napalm fire). This verse describes a world with never ending war (blood rack,
barbed wire), where there is no value to human life, where everyone has to
.take care of themselves, and you can hurt others in order to save yourself
The sentence “politician’s funeral pyre” may be a reference to Kennedy’s
.murder
The first two verses show the majority of King Crimson’s point of view- A point
of view which is pacifistic, against the destruction of nature by technology and
.pro peace and love and not war
Third verse- this verse too speaks about the individual’s worry for himself.
“Death seed, blind man’s greed” means greed will cause the people to blond
and sooner or later, death. While the greedy people will get richer they won't
bat an eyelid for the starving poets and bleeding children. In those lines the
band refers to the Schizoid disorder. In the band point of view the people of
the twenty first century will think only of themselves and all the values of
helping the weak and the poor will disappear. The band also criticizes the
modern culture which worship consuming and the need for money and being
rich. The song says that every thing that the greedy people have they don’t
.(really need. (Nothing he's got he really needs
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12. Conclusion
In this question, we tried to answer the question “How does this song reflect
protest in the 60’s”. We found out that this song is very connected to social
movements and ideas from the 60’s- the protest against the Vietnam War,
against mechanization and modernization and fear from the future that may
.be ruled by the same values they fight against
The world they were foreseeing in this song is still far from our 21st century
world, but it still got some similarities as corruption, selfishness, and wars.
Although it is not exactly the same our world is closer to the one in the song
.than what the world was in the 60’s the time the song was written
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13. Personal Reflections
Idan Matalon
The 60’s is an era that really interests me, especially the music in this era. At
the 60’s there was a lot of musicians that composed protest songs for many
reasons and events which influenced on there songs and ideas.
Just after we had made the project I understood more reasons for the protest
songs and the influences of the events on the songs (especially the song we
have chosen, “21st Century Schizoid Man”.)
Moreover, I learned from the project the chronology of the events and the
contents of them.
Omri Lachman
I always loved the 60's and the music of these years, but I haven't really
understood why artist protested. Through the work I understood the
connection between the content of the songs and the changes in the society.
Before we started to work on this project I didn't understand the song "21st
Century Schizoid Man", but now, after studying about it, I understand it's
content and message.
I believe choosing this subject was a good decision. It's a very interesting
subject for anyone and especially for people who love the music of the 60's.
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