Art Anon Magazine (NYC); Red Banner Mag (Ireland) IWW International Folk You! by Mike Marino In the Fifties, it was the Beat Generation that held up the poetic mirror to modern society, as modern as the space age Fifties could be. A generation of Americans were beat as far down as society could push them. Folk music blended with poetry in the coffeehouse circuit of the East Village in New York to North Beach in San Francisco. Allen Ginsberg was howling his ass off as the voice of a new generation, Kerouac documented it with a typewriter, and folk music was making statements with music and lyrics as the Fifties fronciated with the emerging Sixties. The bards and the poets of peace, love and understanding were on the march for civil rights in the south, American involvement in Vietnam, ban the bomb and nix the nukes. Womens Liberation was in full bloom and bras were burned joining the raging bonfire of draft cards and American flags. Bare breasts could now show off their purple mountains majesty from sea to shining sea from B Cups to D Cups. Along with the marchers, came the writers of protest such as Ramblin Jack Elliot, Phil Ochs, Buffy St. Marie, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger and so many others including some guy you may have heard of from Hibbing, Minnesota, Bob Dylan along with a young man named Guthrie..Arlo Guthrie. As for groups, the Mugwumps emerged from the gray streets of the East Village in New York. It was small club folk ensemble that included Cass Elliot, Denny Doherty who both later would become one half of the Mamas and Papas after they discovered California Dreamin. One member Zal Yanovsky who with a friend and fellow folkie and sometimes Mugwump, John Sebstian both believed in magic, would form The Lovin Spoonful. Listen to the song Creeque Alley by the Mamas and the Papas youll hear the musical journey of Cass and Dennys transition from Mugwump to Mom and Pop. Included along the Creeque Alley journey are good friends Roger McQuinn of Byrds fame and Barry McGuire who penned and sang Eve of Destruction.(McQuinn and McGuire, just a gettin higher in LA you know where thats at..and no ones getting fat except Mama Cass.) The stage was set...the music was about to turn further left and take its message on the road to the people as the folk scene grew more militant. It was time for a change, because as we now know and some of us did know then..the times were achangin , the generations were split like the atom at the Trinity Site and parents were told in no uncertain terms, Youre sons and your daughters are beyond your command. If the Fifties were sociologically antiseptic with Madison Ave. ring-a-ding ding martini lunches, Leave it to Beaver and consumerism cranked on overload, the Sixties were by comparison a plain brown bag holding a cheap bottle of wine that spilled out onto the streets of the south as the Civil Rights movement went on the march..no turning back...the point of no return had been crossed. In Greenwich Village in hard concrete gray New York, folkies were sounding the alarm through thought provoking lyrics set against an accoustic background. The scene was exploding as the Beat Generation began to take up the battle cry. The Village gave birth to a prolific folk scene that included notables from Bob Dylan and Joan Baez to Ramblin Jack Elliot and Phil Ochs. Although Bob Dylan has achieved the most reknown, it was Tom Paxton that jump started the whole shebang. According to Dave Von Ronk, Bobby was the most visible standard bearer of folk, but Tom really was its founder. Tom, hit the scene in the early 60s and began writing songs of protest that eventually included Bottle of Wine and The Ballad of Spiro Agnew which later the lyrics were changed to The Ballad of George W. In 1964, three young civil rights workers from the north were Kod by the Klan in the south, and Paxtons ballad Goodman, Schwerner and Chaney is still haunting today. Tom also put his guitar where it counted. He led a group of fellow travelers and fellow folkies to play for and lend support the striking coal miners in Hazard, Kentucky. As a musician in general, having a guitar line named after you is better than a cheap bottle of wine. In 2004 the Martin Guitar Company introduced the Tom Paxton Signature Edition acoustic guitar in his honor. Then along came the Folk Music Cowboy, Ramblin Jack Elliot. Born in Brooklyn, where most young kids wanted to grow up to be gangsters, Jack wanted to be a cowboy after sitting in the stands at many a rodeo at Madison Square Garden. Forget the Knicks. Shit kickin cowboys were busting broncos and busting balls in the arena and young Jack got caught up in frenzy. So, like any cowboy to be he left home at 15 and hooked up with a travleing rodeo and it was there he was influenced by a rodeo clown who wrote songs and poetry and played guitar. The die was cast and Jack was on the Santa Fe Trail blazing a path to the folk scene of New York. He taught himself guitar and eventually me Woody Gutherie and stay awhile with him learning to master the guitar and to write songs of social relevance. In an interview with Arlo Guthrie he stated that he was too young when his father died to really know him and it was Ramblin Jack that taught Arlo his fathers sons and style. Curiously he was not only a father figure to Arlo, but mistaken many times as the father of Bob Dylan! Interestingly enough, Bob who was heavily influenced by Ramblin Jack also wrote songs that Jack covered in concert. He would precede the song with This song was written by my son, Bob Dylan. Arlo and Bob can thank the fates that they had a father in Ramblin Jack Elliot.
Posted on: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 16:06:06 +0000
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