This episode is filled with songs that remind us of the conflicts around the world and in history. Enjoy the next ninety minutes blended with blues, soul, pop, rock, folk and reggae …
| Title | Artist | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Sunday Bloody Sunday | U2 | “Sunday Bloody Sunday” by Irish band U2, is about January 30, 1972, when British troops killed 13 Irish citizens at a civil rights protest in Derry, Northern Ireland which had a profound impact on U2 frontman Bono, who was 11 years old at the time. Bono was trying to contrast the 1972 Bloody Sunday massacre with Easter Sunday, a peaceful day Protestants and Catholics both celebrate. He stated that all musical instruments are useful for love and exhortation but only one is essential for war: the drums. |
| Zombie | The Cranberries | “Zombie” by Irish band The Cranberries was inspired by the IRA (Irish Republican Army) bombing in Warrington, Cheshire, England on March 20, 1993, when two children were killed. Lead singer Dolores O’Riordan claimed that “Zombie” speaks about “the Irish fight for independence that seems to last forever.” Like U2, it is a song for peace among England and Ireland. |
| War | Sinéad O’Connor | Irish singer Sinead O’Connor covered Bob Marley’s “War” in 2005. The lyrics of “War” come from a speech given by Haile Selassie I on October 4, 1963, when he addressed the United Nations. Selassie, also known as Ras Tafari and considered to be God, or Jah, in Rastafarianism, was advocating for peace and calling for unity in the face of discrimination. Sinead O’Connor was drawn to this song after learning about how Jamaicans were historically oppressed by the British. Like many Irish citizens, she believed her country had also suffered under British rule. |
| Get Up Stand Up | Bob Marley & The Wailers | “Get Up, Stand Up” by Bob Marley & The Wailers, released in 1973 is about taking action to avoid oppression. Marley wrote it with Peter Tosh, and the song was influenced by their upbringing in Jamaica, where they had to fight for respect and acceptance for their Rastafarian religion. Marley had taken the motif from the band “War” song ‘Slippin’ Into Darkness’. It was Bob Marley’s last song performed live at a show in Pittsburgh on September 23, 1980. |
| Aux armes et caetera | Serge Gainsbourg | “Aux armes et cætera” by Serge Gainsbourg is an adaptation of the French national anthem ‘La Marseillaise’ written by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle, performed as the ‘empire singing back’. It was recorded in Kingston with legendary reggae musicians like Bob Marley’s female backing vocals I-Three, including Marley’s wife Rita Marley, Judy Mowatt and Marcia Griffiths. |
| Food For Thought | UB40 | “Food For Thought” was the Birmingham band UB40’s first single. The song was inspired by the massacre of Kampuchea, which was a state existing from 1975 to 1979 in what is now Cambodia. It was run by the Khmer Rouge, a Communist group that controlled the state with an iron fist and murdered all who opposed it. The pre-Band-Aid song is a bitter meditation on third-world poverty, and an indictment of politicians putting politics before people, leaving them to rely on charitable institutions to relieve famine.” |
| Stoned Love | The Supremes | “Stoned Love” performed by The Supremes with lead vocals by Jean Terrell replacing Diana Ross alongside Mary Wilson and Cindy Birdsong is about the social issues of the time, including the Vietnam War, and the need for compassion. |
| War | Edwin Starr | This is a protest song about the Vietnam War, although it makes a broader statement of the need for harmony in our everyday lives. |
| Born in the U.S.A. | Bruce Springsteen | Because of the explicit chorus line this song is often perceived and used as a patriotic song. But Bruce Springsteen wrote it as a critic on how Vietnam veterans were treated when they returned to America. According to “The Boss”: “In my songs, the spiritual part, the hope part is in the choruses. The blues, and your daily realities are in the details of the verses. The spiritual comes out in the choruses, which I got from gospel music and the church.” |
| Fortunate Son | Creedence Clearwater Revival | “Fortunate Son” by CCR speaks more to the unfairness of class than war itself John Fogerty has stated. “It’s the old saying about rich men making war and poor men having to fight them.” |
| Gimme Shelter | The Rolling Stones | “Gimme Shelter” by The Rolling Stones was written by Keith Richards and is about the political and social unrest at the time, like the war in Vietnam and the race riots. Merry Clayton, a gospel singer, is the female vocalist. |
| 1969 | The Stooges | “1969” by The Stooges with Iggy Pop was released in 1969 before punk had been invented. So they had nothing to do in that society. Producer John Cale, a former member of the Velvet Underground, has squeezed everything he could out of them. |
| Welterusten, Mijnheer De President | Boudewijn de Groot | “Good night, Mr. President” is a protest song by Boudewijn De Groot of 1966, written by Lennaert Nijgh, about the war in Vietnam and about the responsibilities of American President Lyndon B. Johnson. |
| Dear Mr. President (ft. Indigo Girlz) | P!nk | “Dear Mr. President” by P!nk from 2006 is an open letter to the President of the United States at the time, George W. Bush asking questions covering many controversial issues, including war, homosexuality, the homeless, abortion, and drug abuse. |
| Goodnight Saigon | Billy Joel | “Goodnight Saigon” by Billy Joel, released in 1982, refers to the city in Vietnam where major combat operations took place during the Vietnam War. Joel wrote the song as a tribute to many of his friends who had served in the war. In the song, Joel imagines what it must have been like deep in the combat-addled terrain. |
| Lucky Man | Emerson, Lake & Palmer | Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s best known song. While Greg Lake started writing this song when he was just 12 years old the lyrics never changed he said. Although it was connected in a way to an era when there was a lot of war and drama the lyrics really got interpreted in a way in which he had never intended them to be as a kid. |
| Universal Soldier | Buffy Sainte-Marie | Buffy Sainte-Marie wrote this song in the basement of The Purple Onion coffee house in Toronto in 1963 after witnessing wounded soldiers returning from Vietnam. British folk singer Donovan covered it in 1965. The song became an anthem of the Vietnam Peace movement. |
| Sketches Of Spain | The Nits | “Sketches of Spain” by Dutch band The Nits in 1994 is about the Spanish Civil War, written by Robert-Jan Stips & Henk Hofstede (The) Nits are a Dutch pop / new wave band, formed in 1974 in Amsterdam (Netherlands). |
| If You Tolerate This Your Children will be next | Manic Street Preachers | “If You Tolerate This Your Children will be next” by the Manic Street Preachers, released in 1998, is about the Spanish civil war. The title of the song comes from a republican propaganda poster of that time. It is about the idealism of people from around the world who volunteered to join the International Brigade. All 4 members were childhood friends from Wales and spent practically all spare moments with each other while growing up. The band is very left-wing political and quite socialist, a consequence of the socialism during the massive unemployment in Wales when they grew up during the Thatcher Regime. Fidel Castro himself invited the band to perform in Cuba and was in the audience when they became the first UK band to perform in Havana. |
| On the Border | Al Stewart | “On the Border” by Al Stewart was released in 1977. “On the Border” explores the theme of the impact of political borders and conflicts on the lives of individuals. The first verse is about the Basque Separatist movement. In Spanish history there was an instance when “from Africa the winds they talk of changes coming” when Franco’s troops made it to Spain. “The hand that sets the farms alight has spread the word to those who’re waiting on the border” is exactly what happened in 1936 when the Franco troops conquered most of southern Spain. |
| Ride Like The Wind | Christopher Cross | “Ride Like The Wind” by Christopher Cross with vocals by Michael McDonald, tells the story of a condemned man on the run to Mexico. Cross, who lived in San Antonio near Mexico, found inspiration for the composition from the 1973 Paul McCartney & Wings song “Nineteen Hundred And Eighty Five.” |
| Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five | Paul McCartney & Wings | “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five” by Paul McCartney & Wings, is the climactic track from the album Band on the Run, released in 1973. It continues the album’s theme of escape by describing the singer achieving artistic freedom through love. The album was recorded in Lagos, Nigeria by Paul McCartney and his wife Linda with ex-Moody Blues guitarist and pianist Denny Laine. In 1985 the United Kingdom and Spain agreed to reopen the border between Gibraltar and Spain. After sixteen years of being closed under the rule of Francisco Franco in 1969, the border between Gibraltar and Spain was officially reopened during February of 1985. |
Sources
The information sources of the song facts include, but are not limited to, Wikipedia, songfacts.com, discogs.com, secondhandsongs.com, YouTube and artists’ related websites.
