Famous protest songs that you can learn with Fret Zealot
Music has been used for protest for centuries – especially in America. According to the First Amendment Museum, some of the earliest protest songs in the United States were popular songs with altered lyrics to reflect the sentiments of the time, since there was no recording technology available.
When radio, records, and other recording technology in the early 20th century helped bring popular music to the forefront of culture, music became an outlet for expressing protest against racism, sexism, war, pollution, and other systems.
Here are some famous protest songs you can learn with Fret Zealot.
Blowin’ in the Wind
One of legendary American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan’s best-known songs, “Blowin’ in the Wind” became one of the signature tracks of the 1960s and cultural revolution taking place among young people, including the protest against the Vietnam War. The music was derived from the African-American spiritual song, “No More Auction Block.”
Sunday Bloody Sunday
“Sunday Bloody Sunday” is one of iconic Irish rock band U2’s signature songs, and it’s one of their most political songs. The lyrics are from the point of view of “the Troubles” in Northern Ireland, focusing on the “Bloody Sunday” event of 1972 when British military shot and killed unarmed protesters in Derry.
Another Brick in the Wall, pt. 2
Part of a three-part composition on Pink Floyd’s 1979 album The Wall, “Another Brick in the Wall pt. 2” is a a protest song against corporal punishment and rigid and abusive schooling. The song was used by Black students in South Africa to protest their education under apartheid, leading to the song and its album to be banned there in 1980.
The term “Buffalo Soldier” refers to a member of the Black U.S. cavalry regiment known as the “Buffalo Soldiers, who fought in the Native American Wars (expanding American territories) after 1866. Those soldiers were given less than optimal supplies and even less recognition for their work. Bob Marley linked the fight of those soldiers to a fight for survival, and cast them as a symbol of Black resistance.
While not a traditional protest song, the lyrics of “Crazy Train” reflect the Cold War and the pervasive fear of nuclear annihilation that defined that time period.