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John Street, The Revolution Will not Be Televised: Protest Music after Fukushima. By Noriko Manabe., Music and Letters, Volume 98, Issue 2, May 2017, Pages 320–322, https://doi.org/10.1093/ml/gcx048
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Extract
Protest music has rarely enjoyed a good press. Even in the 1960s, when it was widely perceived to be enjoying its heyday, its leading representative, Bob Dylan, was quick to distance himself from the genre. Protest music came to be seen as worthy and a bit dull. It was polemical rather than poetical, and in an early version of today’s online echo chambers, was deemed to be preaching to the converted. Audiences were expected to agree with the song and the singer, rather than be moved by them. Despite these poor early reviews, the protest song still features in media coverage, but this time as part of a narrative of decline and neglect. Every year, or so it seems, stories will appear in the press asking after the fate of the protest song. Set against the backdrop of austerity and political dissent, journalists and other commentators will ask: ‘Where have all the protest songs gone?’