33 REVOLUTIONS PER MINUTE: A History of Protest Songs, From Billie Holiday to Green Day has been ordered for the Conservatory Library collection. Until it arrives, read the review!
New York Times Review:“It is a short walk,” Vladimir Nabokov said, speaking of writers and critics, “from the hallelujah to the hoot.” It’s an especially short walk if you’re a pop singer who’s written a less-than-electric protest song. Think of Michael Jackson and “Earth Song,” or 4 Non Blondes and “What’s Up,” or Sting and “Russians.” Each of them, along with “We Are the World,” will be in heavy rotation on the Pandora channel in hell.
The lively British rock critic Dorian Lynskey — he writes for The Guardian, among other publications — spends some time in his new book, “33 Revolutions Per Minute,” chewing over why most protest songs are heaped with scorn. They can be “didactic, crass or plain boring,” he writes. Those who warble them onstage can seem “shrill or annoying or egotistical.” Read More
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