Phil Ochs Talking America

Leave the old and dying America and use your creative energies to help form a new America, which would be de-militarized, more humanistic, where the police are less hostile and closer to the community, where the wealthy are not given unleashed power for the exploitation of the people.
– Phil Ochs (quote from Broadside Magazine)

35 years after his death, Phil Ochs’ message remains as fresh as ever. i always have a place in my heart for such radicals and individuals not afraid to shout out loud what they believe in. i’m not talking about the Don Cherry types who are always yelling down others, accusing anyone who disagrees with them as leftwing bike riding pinko fags, but individuals like Martin Luther King Jr, John Lennon, and currently Julian Assange, who are brave enough to risk their own lives by promoting an alternative vision for a more peaceful world or by exposing corruption at the highest level.

i decided this week to revisit one of my favourite songwriters from the 60s, Phil Ochs. He is one of the great topical songwriters, an important figure in the history of popular music and his message is still relevant today.

Ochs moved to NYC in the early 60s and immediately made an impact on the folk scene that was raging in Greenwich Village, which included the likes of Dylan, Dave Van Ronk, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Pete Seeger. These heavyweights led the huge folk revival movement that swept America. Ochs was amongst the most political of the bunch. He was a political activist with a strong social conscience and heavily involved in both the civil rights and anti-war movements, lending his support to numerous benefits and protests.

In 1962 Broadside Magazine was founded, an underground independent press that became key to the cohesion of the folk movement housing folkies such as Ochs, Dylan and those too radical for the established underground. This magazine and its spirit has always intrigued me. It would be interesting to see if a publication like this could still work today.

Throughout the 60s Ochs would contribute numerous songs and articles to Broadside. Many of the songs can be found on The Broadside Tapes 1, a great showcase of Ochs’ abilities as a master writer of the topical song.

The rise of the 60s folk movement in large part ode its popularity to the emergence of The New Left in America. And vice versa. The New Left was a movement based around activism and direct action focused on attacking militarism, materialism and sexual repression. It was largely a youth movement centred around the college campuses of America. These large groups of youth on campus pressing for change provided a mass audience for folk singers like Ochs and especially Dylan, providing the conditions for them to become, like Lennon claimed, “bigger than Jesus.” These folks singers became the heroes of a generation.

One of my favourite Ochs tunes is “What Are you fighting for?” It’s still a good question to ask 35 years later and most relevant today as the Afghanistan War continues to rage on.

Is it unpatriotic to question war as folks like Don Cherry yammer on about every Saturday night on the CBC? Or it is honourable to ask tough questions of our government about its true interests? Are those interests to spread democracy and end sexual repression? Or is it to secure natural resources like British journalist Robert Fisk claims? Is it worth the sacrifice?

Read your morning papers, read every single line
And tell me if you can believe that simple world you find
Read every slanted word till your eyes are getting sore,
I know you’re set for fighting, but what are you fighting for?

What got me thinking about Phil Ochs again was a recent panel discussion followed by some excerpts from the new Phil Ochs documentary There But For Fortune on Democracy Now recently. Watch that segment here.

It’s been rather fun pulling out my Phil Ochs collection again and has also inspired me to delve further into his recorded career and message. The 60s ideals of love, compassion and peace could really give the current political discourse a nice shot in the arm.

Here’s a tribute from Billy Bragg to his hero Phil Ochs:

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* next post, coming soon – September 11th & the birth of Meat Song Tuesdays