I feel like there are lots of parallels between the eighties and now (recession/inflation, yuppies/inequality, skin-heads/fascists, hot-cold wars etc.) but there used to be protest music! Where is that stuff now? Music that’s intelligent and outraged - like we should be!
I’m out of touch now, so if it exists, educate me! Or have the protest songs been removed from tiktok by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act (UK specific, but suppression of protest seems to be everywhere)? (I’ve linked to the Levellers - maybe it really was better back in the day?)
edit: Maybe not the right audience, but if the song is old enough to vote then I might already know it! What’s happening now? Any songs from the last 10 years!
edit: Thanks for everyone’s insights. I’ve spent the day discovering music that I’d never have found otherwise. Really enjoying a load of these, but thanks to everyone! It seems like protest music is confined to certain genres/places, and lots of older songs - maybe they just last longer… which is maybe a little interesting.
You mention the UK, so I’ll just drop a couple of names of folks/bands talking about racism, immigration and toxic male culture.
Bob Vylan
We live here - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VFqhJyvly1g
Wicked and Bad - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KRJ-s7jRyAM
Idles
Danny Nedelko - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QkF_G-RF66M
Lambrini Girls
Lads lads lads - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IuLK56UrCL0
There’s a lot of good punk still happening.
Should also add Hacktivist. A few of their songs are politically charged, and several calls BoJo a cunt.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YWzwEPYIjYM
Good call.
@frazorth you’ve got going down rabbit holes … I wonder what I else I can do to scare a tory
Listen to Boris Johnson is a fucking cunt?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uGwCykQwgTU
Or just Fuck The Tories
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TppbFVcfBcU
Bob Vylan and Idles are great, will check the Lambrini Girls, thanks
Music created in the UK by people who are fucking furious is still alive and well.
Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes
Sleaford Mods
Kid Kapichi
Panic Shack
I know Sleaford Mods. Will check the others too, thanks
Frank Carter did this lovely little ditty with Joe Talbot from IDLES.
My Town.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gx59hOw2HcA
Guilty as charged. Good stuff - I’ll look out for these - my new years resolution is to see some live music.
All these bands being UK based, you should have an opportunity to see them.
I don’t know whereabouts in the UK you are, but you could find some new stuff at things like the Futurama festival in Liverpool.
https://www.cultureliverpool.co.uk/events/futurama-festival/
I’ll be seeing IDLES in a few months in Texas
Never fight a man with a perm!