Visions of the gleaming Towers, of the spacious open Plaza which sat between then, of the elevators and lobbies and concourse; the shops and train stations, the basements hidden beneath public view; the throngs waiting to visit the Observation Deck, the sparkling Windows on the World soirees, the dizzying view from the roof. And the people whose lives were intertwined with the machinations of the complex itself. These all remain vivid, undeniably real. Neither hateful terror nor blind vengeance can ever fully disappear the visceral sounds and emotions which rang through the halls of the Trade Center. Today, with renewed fervor over espionage again threatening our airways, it’s easy to look back and recall not only 2001’s losses, but the history and culture of what once stood high above downtown Manhattan.

It was 1980 and I was a college freshman, majoring in music of all things, struggling to maintain grades and a part-time job. I tired of the painfully annoying role I lived several evenings per week as a supermarket cashier so when word got out that a security firm had openings for guards at the World Trade Center, I jumped at the chance. As a Brooklyn boy, the prospect of going to work in an important place like that, filled with dignitaries and visitors from all over the globe, in the City no less, seemed just so relevant.

It was a grey, overcast February afternoon which found me on the subway toward Queens, seeking out an application and uniform. Once inside the security agency’s Hillside Avenue office, my eyes scanned the fading paneled walls and aging desk. On the wall behind it was a crested banner which featured the profiled picture of a steely-eyed Spartan warrior brandishing a full head-dress and armor. The man behind the desk looked no less static, seemed no less intense than his warrior brother of another age. He seemed to be one who always wanted to be a cop but could never quite make it. It must have been the height requirement, I thought, standing uncomfortably in the small, close room as he shuffled papers, ignoring me for as long as possible, as a drill sergeant might do with a recruit. Here was the kind of guy who’d dare you to knock a battery off his shoulder. Does he have a framed picture of John Wayne at home? Am I really security officer material? But after reviewing my application and taking my fingerprints he told me to report to the sixth floor security office of One World Trade Center on Saturday. I’d be on the day shift, weekends and holidays. The pay was damned good at the time: $50. per day, so no one could complain. Least of all me; I was saving for a car. As I headed back out to the chilly blue-grey afternoon I examined the uniform’s billowy shirt, clip-on tie (yes, the sort they put on cadavers), navy pants and polyester beige jacket with its own miniature version of the warrior crest. Well, at least it was better than the paper hat and smock back at the supermarket.

On Saturday, it was still sort of dark when I left my house and descended into the subway. The ride took nearly an hour—all local stops—and the car was largely empty, save for other weary early morning travelers and the faceless people crumpled into corner seats. The train stopped right in the Trade Center’s concourse amidst a small maze of shops, restaurants and food stands which featured glitzy designer clothing, hurtfully expensive dinners and glowing signs. How odd this bustling, crowded space looked when the stores were still shuttered, the lights all dimmed and the only passersby were narcoleptic night workers or the lost and lonely homeless population which filled the crevices of each doorway and archway as the city slept. Warmed by discarded newspaper and a hide thickened from social scorn, the homeless were a significant presence at the World Trade Center in those Reagan-era years, when housing and psychiatric programs slammed shut around them and the rich-poor divide grew to previously unheard of proportions. They were a significant presence, that is, until the lights went on. Then they were ejected out of the sight of polite dignitaries, shoppers and visitors.

Make no mistake about it, the Trade Center was a world unto itself. For a while I had a cream assignment—guarding one of the stock market firms which inhabited a couple of the upper floors of building one, the North Tower. This agency would be all over the press come 9/11, having lost so many of its staff on that awful day, but twenty years earlier, it was just another marble-bedecked office filled with very expensive art. On weekends, though, things were quiet and I took the time to do homework, listen to a radio someone had conveniently left out, and drink lots of coffee. Sometimes it got so quiet, especially as the holidays approached, that one could get caught up listening to the building sway in the wind. By design, the towers swayed just enough to keep them from becoming damaged under the harsh winds which savagely whipped through the open terrain—this in a time when Battery Park City had not yet had a cornerstone laid, the World Financial Center was still an empty muddy lot and World Trade Seven was not even a concept. The wind was so severe that a stroll across the Plaza could be physically harmful on an icy day and the doors on West Street were nearly impossible to pry open. So when I say that you could hear the buildings swaying, this is no exaggeration. Sitting in my dim mausoleum of a post, the creaking, cracking, throbbing sound of the structure bending against the vicious jabs of icy blasts prayed on one’s imagination. What would happen if the Tower snapped—or collapsed? But then you stopped and chuckled about how far-fetched that all seemed.

From such a height, where the cars below looked smaller than toys and none of the sounds of Manhattan were audible, one longed for interactions with others. In such a desolate spot, I came to know the patrolling guards well—they looked for a place to have a rest and I needed the company. There was Lew Horowitz, a retired Brooklyn store owner who began working as a security guard on weekends to supplement his income years before. Just old enough to collect Social Security benefits, he said he’d stay on in his position as a Vertical Guard until he needed to retire from that job, too. “Vertical” referred to the assignment: he patrolled the stairwells and floors of the area known as Abel 3—floors 78-107 in Tower 1–and could get through his run quick enough to stop in and kibitz with me, especially whenever I made a pot of coffee. Lew enjoyed speaking about the neighborhood he grew up in, the Lower East Side, and he would spin on endlessly with funny quips and bizarre stories about the old days. Quite the working-class philosopher, he was a tall, sweet, awkward man who seemed to gain real confidence only when he could make you laugh—so he habitually hurled out one-liner after one-liner. When not in mixed company, Lew also engaged in the art of dirty joke telling and would try to absorb any new ones someone else might know so that he could fortify his already brimming repertoire of nasty stories.

Lew was often seen in the company of Si Feldman, an older man who’d worked as a municipal employee for many years but also saw fit to seek out a supplement via weekend security work. Another purveyor of classic old New York humor, Si could spit out jokes with all of the details of a master story teller without ever cracking a smile. A rotund, gentle sort when he wasn’t telling raunchy jokes or barking at you, Si had a long association with the Trade Center. Between Lew and Si, the entire history of the complex could be heard, peppered of course with a wild assortment of outlandish tales about strange co-workers and oddball happenings. I was amazed to hear that during the construction phase, security would have to man posts in upper floors which had not yet had the ceiling-to-floor window panels installed. Guards would sit huddled in the center of an open, wind-strewn floor avoiding at all costs the areas which might be frighteningly close to the edge. Those were the wild west days. They laughed about some of the other bizarre characters, some of which still worked there when I came along. I can recall Haley, a smallish, stocky man with slicked back grey hair and a bulbous, perennially red nose. Stories abounded of his odd behavior, particularly on the night shift when few might notice the flask in his back pocket. Haley had crashed the security golf cart into a wall of the Plaza some years prior to my arrival, thus guards were hence forth forbidden to operate any kind of motorized vehicle on premises. No one ever let him forget it, least of all Haley himself, but his was a different take. “They all say I am a drinker cuz I got a red nose, but this here nose ain’t caused by drinkin’”, he implored, “I got a medical condition”. Haley had also fallen several times on WTC property and apparently had sued the Port Authority but retained his job over the decades. I imagined the Port bosses wishing he’d just go away. “They can never get rid a me—I got dem by the short hairs”, he would proudly proclaim.

There was also a night shift supervisor named Coughlin who was a tall, dour man with a dry wit who one Saturday night attempted to actually heist a safe out of the Observation Deck. He’d arranged for someone in maintenance to wait in a basement level as he and another accomplice lowered the filled safe down the freight elevator shaft on a chain. Someone apparently spilt the beans and Coughlin ended up lowering the safe to the police waiting below and was arrested immediately. The next morning as we entered command post expecting to see Coughlin getting ready to go home, we instead found a sub who didn’t need a lot of persuading to relay the facts of the late-night escapade hours before. This could be an odd place.

Ah, who could forget Larry Heinz? Here was a wonderfully social man who’d lived a fascinating life, filled with poetry and literature and music. He also spoke French fluently and shared his knowledge of disparate facts continuously, but in a mild, soft-spoken manner. Larry had lived in Greenwich Village for many years, but had also spent some years residing in Paris and Morocco where he managed Jazz clubs, thus his wealth of knowledge extended into brilliance when he discussed John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and other giants. . But then he also offered tidbits such as, “Do you know the technical difference between a hobo, a bum and a tramp?” I feel the need to carry on the tradition and offer Larry’s explanation that a hobo travels seeking work, a tramp travels and sometimes seeks work, and a bum stays local and never seeks it. Perhaps this can be viewed as but politically incorrect, but I guess there is a pecking order in every social strata. Of course, spending some significant time in the concourse during early mornings, I did come to know some of the homeless and there were lots of travelers among them. Harmonica Harry stayed for a couple of weeks, serenading visitors from his corner with an open box and a sign out front which read ‘Music For Trade’. Harry explained that life had just gotten in the way and he was unable to stop and settle down; he also had never been able to stay sober long enough to finish school. But his music kept him going and often brought new people into his life. His charming, folksy performances remain with me. I guess parts of Harry did settle in somewhere.

Another old-timer of the security force was Roy Turner, who’d survived his tenure as weekday supervisor for years and years. A former Golden Glove boxer, he stood all of 5’ 4” tall but had a shoulders span to match his height. By the time I’d come to know him Turner was well into his sixties and his loss of teeth was apparent, but he maintained a thick head of silvery hair. A voice like a grinding wheel and a vocabulary which could only be described as classic New York, Turner spat out verbal jabs with the velocity of his right-hook in the ring; a cut-up but a serious boss, too. Until he’d obviously crossed one of the brass who took him down in a vicious manner: Turner descended from the supervisor’s desk to a lobby post which put him smack into the throngs of mid-week passersby; there was no hiding. Turner had no choice but to grin and bear it as his wife also depended upon his salary. We saw him often on weekends after that, always available for overtime, always hungry.

The old-timers were aware, too, of the divide which had existed between security officers who were white and those who were African-American. It seems that while the complex was still under construction, the security contractor hired two “classes” of guards—class A and class B, each who’d received a pay scale appropriate to their designation. But in this case the B really stood for “Black”. For some years in the 1970s, Lew, Si and the other whites worked for a higher amount than did the guards of color, up until the union came into the picture. By then, the tier system was done away with but some of the older Black guards remained suspicious. They were a mixed group of African-Americans and those originating in various parts of the Caribbean. Many were from Guyana and, in British fashion, preferred to be known not by their first names, but in the formal surname manner—Mr. Peabody, Mr. Palmer, Mr. Heffington, and Mr. Robertson among them. These gentlemen were dignified in their approach, with an appreciation for the arts and the ladies, and with a keen awareness of their surroundings. Mr. Heffington had been a police officer back in Guyana, moving up the ranks to Lieutenant before immigrating to New York and landing in one of those initial B-guard positions. Standing on post in one of the complex’s lobbies, he always stood taller than most and wore his uniform clean and starched.

I had the chance to move to the Vertical Patrol assignments, walking the halls and stairwells of both Towers, examining the silent weekend world close-up. At the time Tower Two was largely filled with New York State agencies and on Friday evenings when they closed up, the floors went dark and vacuum-empty. Tower Two’s sectors known as Baker Two (floors 44-77) and Baker 3 (78-106) were especially lonely places, with floor after floor of utter darkness. The security company never had enough working flashlights so you got used to bringing your own. Turning a corner down a pitch-dark hallway was like entering the inner sanctum. We had radios but often they were breaking down or subject to going out of range, so you felt alone. I recall waving my flashlight back and forth, desperately trying to fill the blackness with some semblance of light, but this only made you think you saw ominous movement in the shadows. Reaching out for doorknobs in the blinding dark, trying to make sure the offices were secured, one’s hand glided over the walls and hoped to never find a crouching psychopath waiting to pounce. It all seems bizarre with the passage of time, but there in the sealed-in blackness, listening to the grinding sway of the building, it was much too real.

Weekend security officers had whole other lives Monday through Friday, so come Saturday morning we could be cranky and short of patience with each other, at times the public too. Stuck with the economic need to be there, many of us hadn’t had a weekend off in years. Shortly after I began my job, I was able to bring in my girlfriend—now my wife—into the fold. If we could not have weekends free, at least we were both in it together. After braving a variety of posts, Laurie became our shift’s Security Dispatcher—a “6-3” in WTC lingo– which really made her second in command to the shift Supervisor, the “6-2”. She was an excellent 6-3, handling in-coming transmissions over the radio from security officers with problems and Port Authority operations brass with issues. She made up the schedules, answered phones, would trouble-shoot as needed and ran role call when the boss could not be there. She needed to be in at the crack of dawn, so by this time I’d made enough to get my first car—a rattly 1976 Chevette—so we drove in together. Home is where the heart is.

Our boss, Ray, was a man who’d become a dear friend. He’d worked there in security for a long time and would eventually work his way up to an Port Authority operations supervisor job. He was a stern, dark-skinned man with enough height and depth of voice that many on staff avoided his glare at all costs, but we came to see Ray as a giving, caring guy with a wicked, hysterical sense of humor. He had a deep appreciation for film and we visited with him and his wife Angela to watch the latest video discs (remember, this was the 1980s) he’d purchased. As often happens, after Laurie and I left the Trade Center we had only intermittent contact with Ray. We were deeply thankful, however, to learn that he’d received a transfer out of the WTC almost immediately before the 9/11 attacks. But a few others we knew had not been so lucky. They remain with us almost as myth, elevated through the fading years and tragedy. Among them were Lee, a large Chinese-American mechanic with a huge smile, thick accent and warm greeting. On weekends he could often be found hanging out with freight elevator operator Fernandez (yes, Army-like, people were often known only by last names) or maintenance men Sanchez and Alvalino. Often they were dodging the Port operations supervisor Russo, a harsh, abrupt man who hunted out problem employees like a shark. But I was told that when the building went down he was last seen running back in to help with rescues. His remains were never quite found.

During the majority of my run at the World Trade Center, I held the assignment of “6-4”, Key-Run. This meant that I carried the majority of the keys to the complex on a series of jailer-like key-rings weighing my belt down. I was quite skinny back then so the pants always hung a bit and my belt was now working over-time. I opened locked doors when they needed to be opened, activated elevators and escalators at the start of my shift and did a patrol of the concourse’s stores. I opened up the outside garage ramps, located out on West Street and Barkley Street, and also took calls from the operations and security supervisors as needed. When a problem with an elevator occurred, they called me to check it out and start another if that one had gone out of service. The purple-carpeted lobbies of both buildings were lined with shining, silver elevators which briskly took passengers up to the Sky Lobbies at floor 78 with a pop of the ears and a slight nausea to the stomach, the quickest way up. On weekends we kept just a couple of these elevators running, in eye-range of the guard assigned to the post nearby. On several occasions, trying to hurriedly get a car down from 78 to an angry group waiting in lobby, I found myself stuck in an elevator which crawled all the way down in its “inspect” mode, moving in slow motion for what seemed like an eternity. As I sat trapped, calls from annoyed Port bosses would be coming in and the jobs left to do would pile up. “Where the hell is the 6-4?!”.

Some of the operations brass could have a sense of humor, like Barry Galina who used the radio airwaves as a portal for dry humor. Calm in any situation, Barry knew his job well and relaxed everyone else with a laugh. And we enjoyed the company of another operations supervisor, Mick Evigan, a warm voiced detective-like character who loved talking about music and drama. A purveyor of the arts hidden beneath a classic “NYPD Blue” exterior, Mick always lent a hand to the staff beneath him. Best of all, he never made anyone feel that their station was of less importance than his own. Even his cohort, angry old Lou Russo, demonstrated a softer side at points: I can still recall him walking out onto West Street to participate in ‘Hands Across America’ one Sunday afternoon in May of 1986, clutching the hands of those at either side with eyes closed during that momentous fifteen minute interlude. But then there was Rob DeForn, a short, paunchy, easily agitated guy with untrusting eyes who was the textbook Napoleon complex case study. DeForn could only be recalled as a despot and every guard knew his wrath. We would trade DeForn war stories and several of the security and maintenance staff fully expected him to get jumped in the parking garage some night on his way home, left broken in a dumpster. A guy like DeForn, of course, was nowhere near the complex when trouble ensued. While, he may have been the worst of the worst, he was not unique in such a setting. More than a few of the characters one encountered in our weekend world-within-the-world could be harsh, desperately snarling at all who came near them. They were the ones who walked the sullen halls alone.

As Key-Run I came into intimate contact with all areas of the complex, from its sub-basement bowels up through the veins and arteries of its floors and stairwells. And one time in 1987 even to the roof of Tower One, normally only visited by the rare antenna technician; Tower One’s roof had no fence, no enclosed deck as did the South Tower. The occasion, forever burnt into my memory, was in preparation for the unveiling of the Statue of Liberty after several years of refurbishing; the scaffolding was now coming down to present a polished, torch-bearing beauty to a waiting public. At the same time, the nation was celebrating the bicentennial of the Constitution, so a huge fete was planned. A phalanx of ships were to fill the harbor that July 4th, a gigantic fireworks display was to illuminate the sky above the Trade Center and New York was going to play host to an Independence Day like none before.

The week prior, the complex was already in high security mode and the operations and security staff were working with police and emergency services toward a safe, festive coming weekend. I was called up to the roof of Tower One, where I had never been allowed to go before, to open up a caged-in electronics closet for the Port guys up there. Helicopters were scheduled to lower huge searchlights onto the roof, to light the ships down in the harbor during the big celebration. For me, getting up to that level was no easy feat; one had to have a special key from the Police Desk and then call in to the operations office to be buzzed in while turning the key. As the roof door opened up, a flood of sunlight momentarily pushed me back: here was the very roof of the 110th floor on a clear, bright summer afternoon. It took my breath away. I located the supervisor and handed him the key he needed. “Mike, can I hang around a moment? I have never been here before.” “Yeah, sure, John, go ahead. Everyone else is here,” he shrugged, looking toward the throng of cops, firemen and EMTs who were sitting along the edge of the roof, looking over in awe. I have always suffered from a fear of heights, truth be told, but it only kicks in when I am insecure, where I feel I may actually fall. So, here was a chance to look over the edge of the World Trade Center, from a view free of any kind of guard-rail, window or fencing. My worst nightmare, maybe, but one which was too tempting to pass up.

I moved over, precariously, to where the emergency personnel were sitting. The edge of the building was equipped with a sort of window seat feature—a platform area one could be caught in in the event of a powerful wind; it was designed to prevent you from actually falling over the edge of the building. But on that day, it served as a box seat for the first responders who were mesmerized by the rare view. I came near the edge and then crawled on my bottom to this balcony above the city, gripping the tar anxiously as I inched my way over. I held my breath as I moved from the roof itself into this safety platform, squeezing the railing around the lip as I painfully looked over. It was what the view must have been like from Mt. Olympus. Here’s why these guys were staring out with the calmest look on their faces I’d ever seen. We were out in the open, but well above the fray. The Good Year blimp floated below us, as did a couple of prop planes. We were sitting above even the clouds. Here’s the place where the sky met the steel girders and everything was right all around.

Laurie and I got married in June of 1988 and, moving onto our careers, we said goodbye to our weekend jobs, our many WTC friends and the enemies, too. The latter were easy to walk away from but the former posed a challenge. Over the next few years, we spoke regularly of these folks, the good and the bad, as they became a part of our historic fabric. We enjoyed our free weekends and then I suddenly found myself unemployed in 1993, floundering as one does when a job ends and Unemployment Benefits become a fact of life. The weekends bled into the weekdays and I longed to get back to work. Driving into lower Manhattan in February of that year, the traffic became ensnarled in an impenetrable mass of honking car-horns. Every approach was blocked—the World Trade Center had been bombed by a van filled with explosives. It had entered the complex through the Barkley Street Ramp that afternoon. The reports came out that the basement parking garage was destroyed and so was part of the lobby of Building One. My heart grew cold—did everyone get out okay? It had been almost 5 years since we’d visited the site but we still knew all the players. We got through to Ray’s house the next day and his wife Angela said that Ray WAS there in his office in basement Level 2 when the bomb exploded, but he was okay. I spoke to Ray and he said that the blast had literally sent him flying, yet he sustained no injuries. But the place was a mess. As I was out of work I was glad to learn that they were looking for experienced security guards, especially those with a knowledge of the complex and I surely had this. So I signed up.

My first day back was eye-opening, to be sure. The concourse stank of burnt ash and soot coated the walls and the air in front of you. The complex, now closed to the public, was one massive crime scene. I walked up to the makeshift command post and showed them the new ID I had been issued, as well as the security pass one needed to get anywhere. The regs now called for different color passes for different zones, different sectors, and the halls were crawling with ATF and FBI agents. Where a department store once thrived was now the operations center and the guards had traded their jackets and ties for navy blue jumpsuits with ‘Security’ splashed across the back.

The heat was mostly off, so I wore my coat beneath the jumpsuit during the mandatory 12 hour shifts. We were asked to bring our own flashlights and had to contend with a severe shortage of radios. Each guard was now on continuous Vertical Patrol, securing the vulnerable stairwells mostly, and a contingent of supervisors were flown in from around the country to lead special clean-up crews. Burning embers reddened our eyes and irritated our lungs and a gaping crater occupied much of what had been a gleaming lobby. It extended down several basement levels, looking ominously like the gate of damnation, smothered in brimstone. Like most, I was assigned to a special Vertical sector each day, without a radio so largely out of contact from any other human. We were watching for intruders and bomb-throwers, but God knows what we would do if we encountered them, sans communication or weaponry. The shifts were long, lonesome and cold and so I carried a couple of books with me to read during short breaks. Sitting in dimly lit stairwells, I got through two novels I’d always wanted to read, Frankenstein and 1984, both tales of utter isolation. I guess I am a glutton for punishment, but the need for some kind of culture had to be responded to under such harsh conditions.

Two or three months later I was able to get back to work in my own field (mental health, ironically enough) and my recent experiences in the Trade Center began to meld with those of a decade prior. The visions, faces and stories added to the legend, the one that lives apart from the everyday and is only called upon when old friends have a chance meeting. I gave little thought to my old haunt for some eight years until that bright September morning with the memorable breeze. As I drove to work, to a hospital in Park Slope, Brooklyn, I experienced an initial numbness at the radio announcer’s insane report of a plane striking one of the Towers. God, I thought, how in hell could they manage to hit that? Racing thoughts of old friends suddenly came to surface when the DJ broke in again: “Uuhhh, we just got another report…”. And then nothing was the same.

ONE YEAR LATER the awful stench of charred memories had dissipated but the gaping hole remained. The space where the Towers once stood was not the only emptiness we’d come to know. The loss of lives and lifestyles met the encroachment of civil liberties and the rise of suspicion. The war which erupted in the wake of the attacks, accompanied by opportunistic fear-mongering, caused many to see the Middle East as one amorphous threat and dissent had been deemed “Un-American”. On that first anniversary of the terrible, terrible day, Laurie and I walked the Brooklyn Heights Promenade overlooking the Hudson River and the pristine view of lower Manhattan. That evening as Brooklynites strolled silently, facing a Manhattan island which would forever remain altered, two glorious beams of light reached up ward, claiming and memorializing our weekends of so long ago.

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Another December, another Phil Ochs birth anniversary. Wow, he would have been 69 tomorrow. It’s also time for the stream of annual Ochs birthday concerts which have been occurring all over the nation each December since the singer’s untimely death in 1976. The movement has not had Phil Ochs to call upon for a long time, but none on the Left have forgotten his impact—and the impact his music continues to have upon us.

From the view of contemporary times, it is perhaps Phil Ochs (1940-1976), among other ‘60’s folkies, whom speaks most directly to us. His was a visceral kind of protest music. Ochs maintained an affiliation with the IWW throughout his adult life, though he was a self-described socialist who demonstrated an affinity toward anarchism; he detested the greed of capital and this poured out of his songs. Ochs was active in the fertile period that bridged the Civil Rights and anti- Vietnam War periods, with those of Women’s Liberation, Black Power, AIM, militant environmentalism and Gay rights. For an artist of conscience, there was much work to do, so Phil Ochs’ songs called for peace, equal rights and an egalitarian society. His songs damned the establishments that begat the murder of our progressive heroes and allowed organized labor to forget its true mission. He cried for our nation and praised its promise.

Ochs’ songs unashamedly revealed our faults but also offered the means to rectify them. Phil was a presence at demonstrations and other radical actions, not merely a voice on a record. He traveled to Hazzard, Kentucky during the bloody strikes in the earliest 60s, boldly performing for the pickets and in ear-shot of the threatening goon squads. Several songs document these struggles, including the hauntingly beautiful “No Christmas in Kentucky”. Shortly thereafter, Phil became entrenched in Civil Rights, traveling to many points on the Klan’s radar. His periods in the Deep South are chronicled in songs such as “Freedom Riders” and the brutally blunt “Here’s to the State of Mississippi” and “Too Many Martyrs, the Ballad of Medgar Evars”. His awareness of the power of song was keen, brazen.

In March of 1963, Ochs wrote in Broadside magazine of the importance of protest songs in the changing times of the day. It is amazing to note just how relevant this statement remains. Ochs described the core value of topical song—issue-based music relevant to progressive activism of the time in which it is created. But he also clarified, quite profoundly for such a young man, that the media stood in direct contrast to this music and that the songwriter needed to scour the news reports in order to find his or her material. It was—and is—a worthy duty. In this sense, Ochs’ statement lifted from the well of time stands as universal:

“The Need For Topical Music”
By Phil Ochs

“Before the days of television and mass media, the folksinger was often a traveling newspaper spreading tales through music.

It is somewhat ironic that in this age of forced conformity and fear of controversy the folksinger may be assuming the same role. The newspapers have unfortunately told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the cold war truth, so help them, advertisers…

The folksingers of today must face up to a great challenge in their music. Folk music is an idiom that deals with realities and ever there is an urgent need for Americans to look deeply into themselves and their actions and musical poetry is perhaps the most effective mirror available…One good song with a message can bring a point more deeply to more people than a thousand rallies…

Every newspaper headline is a potential song, and it is the role of an effective songwriter to pick out the material that has the interest, significance and sometime humor adaptable to music. A good writer must be able to picture the structure of a song and as hundreds of minute ideas race through his head, he must reflect the superfluous and trite phrases for the cogent, powerful terms. Then after the first draft is completed, the writer must be his severest critic, constantly searching for a better way to express every line of his song.

I think there is a coming revolution (pardon my French) in folk music …The news today is the natural resource that folk music must exploit in order to have the most vigorous folk process possible”. (1)

From Greenwich Village coffee houses to the national stage, Ochs sang his protest loudly. While his first two albums set the standard for topical singers henceforth, both All the News That’s Fit to Sing and I Ain’t Marchin’ Anymore offer stark moments of beauty. “One More Parade”, “I Ain’t Marchin’ Anymore” and, later, “The War is Over” gave us anthems that would carry the peace movement. “The Power and the Glory” spoke of his pride in our nation’s mission and greatness—even as the FBI began an investigation of him that would span a decade and fill 410 pages. “Cops of the World” spit back into the faces of the reactionary government. Ochs was nobody’s fool.

The music kept coming and Phil Ochs stood as a profound voice for his generation. Over the next few years, we’d hear the haunting “Changes” and on “Crucifixion” he emoted about the loss of John Kennedy, but wasn’t he also singing about the loss of innocence, perhaps conscience itself? When Bob Dylan had moved into other realms, focusing his lyrical content on matters of the personal as opposed to the social, Ochs maintained his stand as a topical artist, even as he dug deep inside. He never failed to strive for a wider sound, however, and in 1967 he relocated to the west coast, seeking change and the potential for a new scope both artistically and as a means toward the healing of his long-term emotional turmoil. Upon arrival, his producer paired him with pianist-arranger Lincoln Mayorga, already a fixture in LA studios as a member of the busy studio aggregation loosely known as the Wrecking Crew. The opportunity to work with Ochs posed an interesting challenge:

“Phil wanted some kind of classical styles behind his singing for “I’ve Had Her”, one of the songs on ‘Pleasures of the Harbor’, his first LA album. I suggested that I would incorporate different composers’ styles, changing them up with each verse. You know, Bach behind one, Schumann behind another, and so on. He loved the idea” (2)

From this start, Mayorga’s work with Ochs would be continuous. His keyboard playing and rhythm section arrangement helped Ochs to realize his visions, and he began to compose on piano, thereby incorporating more complex harmonies into his music. Mayorga often played a multitude of variations behind the folksinger’s endless streams of verses for each song. But he also contributed ideas beyond the styles of European concert music. On “Miranda”, the sound became that of the 1920s and to solidify this, Mayorga brought in a stream of great Jazz musicians from that era including the legendary reeds player Mattie Matlock and drummer Nick Fatool. Fatool’s syncopated services were retained for the song the album would perhaps become best known for, “Outside of a Small Circle of Friends”, which made wry commentary on the brutal murder of Kitty Genovese, which occurred in front of an apartment complex full of witnesses who refused to come to her rescue. Ochs used this vehicle to illustrate alienation in society and darkly mocked it by singing over ragtime piano, flailing tenor banjo and tap-dancing drum breaks. The song was a smash on college campuses across country, yet true fame eluded Ochs. This coupled with emotional turmoil wore him down over the next few years. As Mayorga explained, “Phil saw himself as the artist trying to destroy himself. He was in a bad place”.

Phil Ochs had been a major part of the protest surrounding the ’68 Democratic Convention in Chicago, performing his best topical material right in Lincoln Park. Later, he was called in as a witness for the defense on behalf of the Chicago 8, speaking sardonically of how he bought and paid for Pigasus, the pig he and the Yippies were nominating for president. But Ochs told anyone who’d listen that he felt he spiritually died in Chicago, as the police riot inflicted pain upon democracy itself. Working in concert with the Yippies’ vision of protest as a kind of theatre-of-the-absurd, Ochs was sure to help turn the defendants’ very trial into a spectacle. The following excerpts of the actual trial transcript, wherein Ochs is questioned by defense attorney William Kuntsler need no doctoring for they reflect the spirit of the times—and of the revolutionary acts they were involved in—quite clearly:

MR. KUNSTLER: Now, Mr. Ochs, can you indicate what kind of songs you sing?
THE WITNESS: I write all my own songs and they are just simple melodies with a lot of lyrics. They usually have to do with current events and what is going on in the news. You can call them topical songs, songs about the news, and then developing into more philosophical songs later.
MR. KUNSTLER: Now, Mr. Ochs, have you ever been associated with what is called the Youth International Party, or, as we will say, the Yippies?
THE WITNESS: Yes. I helped design the party, formulate the idea of what Yippie was going to be, in the early part of 1968.
MR. KUNSTLER: Now, were any of the defendants at the table involved in the formation of the Yippies?
THE WITNESS: Yes, Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman. ——-That’s Jerry Rubin with the headband and Abbie Hoffman— with the smile.
MR. KUNSTLER:. Did there come a time when Jerry and Abbie discussed their plans?
THE WITNESS: Yes, they did, around the middle of January at Jerry’s. Present there, besides Abbie and Jerry, I believe, was Paul Krassner and Ed Sanders. Tim Leary was there at one point. They discussed my singing at the Festival of Life. They asked me to contact other performers to come and sing at the Festival. I talked to Paul Simon of Simon and Garfunkel. I believe I talked with Judy Collins.
MR. KUNSTLER: After you arrived in Chicago did you have any discussion with Jerry?
THE WITNESS: Yes, I did. We discussed the nomination of a pig for President. We discussed going out to the countryside around Chicago and buying a pig from a farmer and bringing him into the city for the purposes of his nominating speech. I helped select the pig, and I paid for him.
MR. KUNSTLER: Now, did you find a pig at once when you went out?
THE WITNESS: No, it was very difficult. We stopped at several farms and asked where the pigs were.
MR. KUNSTLER: None of the farmers referred you to the police station, did they?
THE WITNESS: No.
PROSECUTOR: Objection!
THE COURT: I sustain the objection.
MR. KUNSTLER: Mr. Ochs, can you describe the pig which was finally bought?
PROSECUTOR: Objection.
THE COURTI sustain the objection.
MR. KUNSTLER: Would you state what, if anything, happened to the pig?
THE WITNESS: The pig was arrested with seven people.
MR. KUNSTLER: What were you doing when you were arrested?
THE WITNESS: We were arrested announcing the pig’s candidacy for President. Jerry Rubin was reading a prepared speech for the pig—the opening sentence was something like, “I, Pigasus, hereby announce my candidacy for the Presidency of the United States!”
MR. KUNSTLER: What was the pig doing during this announcement?
PROSECUTOR: Objection!
MR. KUNSTLER: Were you informed by an officer that– the pig had squealed on you?
PROSECUTOR: Objection! I ask it be stricken.!
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: I sustain the objection. When an objection is made do not answer until the Court has ruled. . .
MR. KUNSTLER: Now, I call your attention to Sunday, August 25, 1968. Did you have any occasion to see Jerry Rubin?
THE WITNESS: We walked through the streets following the crowd.
MR. KUNSTLER: And can you describe what you saw as you followed the crowd?
THE WITNESS: They were just chaotic and sort of unformed, and people just continued away from the park and just seemed to move, I think toward the commercial area where the nightclubs are and then police clubs were there too, and it was just a flurry of movement of people all kinds of ways.
PROSECUTOR: If the Court please, the witness was asked what he observed and that was not responsive to the question. If you would simply tell the witness to listen carefully to the question so he can answer the questions.
THE COURT: I did that this morning. TO OCHS:You are a singer but you are a smart fellow, I am sure.
THE WITNESS: Thank you very much. You are a judge and you are a smart fellow.
MR. KUNSTLER: Did you sing a song that day?
THE WITNESS: Yes, “I Ain’t Marching Anymore.”
MR. KUNSTLER: I am showing you what has been marked at D-147 for identification and I ask you if you can identify that exhibit.
THE WITNESS: This is the guitar I played “I Ain’t Marching Anymore” on.
MR. KUNSTLER: Now, would you stand and sing that song so the jury can hear the song that the audience heard that day?
PROSECUTOR: If the Court please, this is a trial in the Federal District Court. It is not a theater. We don’t have to sit and listen to the witness sing a song. Let’s get on with the trial. I object.
MR. KUNSTLER: Your Honor, this is definitely an issue in the case. Jerry Rubin has asked for a particular song to be sung. What the witness sang to the audience reflects both on Jerry Rubin’s intent and on the mood of the crowd.
THE COURT: I sustain the objection.
MR. KUNSTLER: Your Honor, he is prepared to sing it exactly as he sang it on that day,
THE COURT:I am not prepared to listen, Mr. Kunstler.
MR. KUNSTLER: Where did you see Abbie Hoffman first that night at the Coliseum?
THE WITNESS: When he raced in front of me on the stage when I was introduced to Ed Sanders. He said, “Here’s Phil Ochs,” and as I walked forward, Abbie Hoffman raced in front of me and took the microphone and proceeded to give a speech. I was upstaged by Abbie Hoffman.
PROSECUTOR: You say it was at the Coliseum, Abbie Hoffman upstaged you, is that right?
THE WITNESS: Yes. I was walking toward the microphone and he raced in front of me.
MR. SCHULTZ: And he led the crowd in a chant of “Fuck LBJ” didn’t he?
THE WITNESS: Yes, yes, I think he did.
MR. SCHULTZ: Now in your plans, did you plan for public fornication in the park?
THE WITNESS: I didn’t.
MR. SCHULTZ: In your discussions did you plan for public fornication in the park?
THE WITNESS: No, we did not seriously sit down and plan public fornication in the park.
MR. SCHULTZ: That is all, your Honor.
THE COURT: You may step down. Don’t forget your guitar.
THE WITNESS: I won’t. (3)

Not only the authorities, but Ochs toyed with fans too. He also mocked his own sense of doom when he titled his 1968 album Rehearsals for Retirement. Its cover depicted his own gravestone with the year of death listed as, of course, 1968. Continually plagued by demons, both inner and outer, Ochs struggled with bi-polar disorder, anxiety and alcohol dependence. Often, his performances became strained as lyrics were increasingly forgotten and melodies faded. In his later period, gigs became arguments with the audience. Ochs would see the end of the decade as a metaphor for the demise of the movement.

Ochs had become very pessimistic by 1970. The series of mishaps at his Carnegie Hall concert that year would eventually be released on record as Gunfight at Carnegie Hall due to Ochs’ verbal sparring with the audience as he tried desperately to play popular songs from his past, sporting a gold lame` suit and singing songs by Elvis, Buddy Holly and others. “Phil thought that America had no future—any good would come from its past, so he celebrated this earlier time”, pianist Lincoln Mayorga offered.

“He wore the Elvis suit, but it was more inspired by Liberace, who was so flamboyant in Vegas, but so popular. Phil was trying to find the answer. He even endorsed the music of Merle Haggard, the darling of the Right-wing at the time. He realized that Haggard had become a more effective voice for the Right than any so far on the Left, and he wanted to capture that. We played “Okie from Muskogee” and the audience just hated it“. (4)

Mayorga’s primary memory of the event was the bomb scare that was called in half-way through the concert. Phil, who’d been drinking wine to wash down uppers all evening, was onstage for an acoustic segment, alternating with the full band’s sets, and a police officer informed Mayorga about the bomb threat. He ordered that Phil close up early and tell the audience to exit. Mayorga went onstage and sat at the piano to get Ochs’ attention:

“Phil came over to tune his guitar and I leaned over and whispered in his ear, telling him about the seriousness of the situation. Phil slowly looked up at me, looking deep into my eyes and then put on his shit-eating grin. He slyly asked, ‘Are you prepared to die for rock-n-roll?’. And then he went and sang another song or two before coming off stage”

To the point of Ochs’ desperate need to reach back into the past—his own and that of the nation—we find his final album, Phil Ochs Greatest Hits of 1970. Not a ‘Best Of’ collection at all, but ten new songs, many of which indicate the genres of his youth. One can hear strains of Conway Twitty, the Everly Brothers, Hank Williams, even a Chevrolet commercial, all bracketed by the telling “One Way Ticket Home” and the very somber “No More Songs”. The album cover, of course featured Ochs in his Elvis suit and inside the liner notes jibe ‘50 Phil Ochs fans can’t be wrong’, a self-deprecating take on the claim by Elvis’ record label that ‘50,000,000 Elvis fans can’t be wrong’ in that artist’s press. By contrast, Phil’s record sales were pitiful and his contract was quietly cancelled. Mayorga reports that the last time he saw Ochs was in 1973, when he was called to perform with him at the Troubadour, an unrehearsed gig which was not without problems. “But I never dreamt that it would be the last time I’d see Phil; I thought it would go on forever”, Mayorga recalled soberly.

As the Vietnam war slowly came to a bloody, grinding halt, Ochs staged several ‘The War is Over’ concerts which featured many name performers in both folk and rock music, the largest of which occurred in New York’s Central Park in 1975. He would also travel to Chile and befriend the great songwriter Victor Jara. Shortly thereafter, the CIA-backed coupe would take the lives of Jara and thousands of others; this was a terminal assault to the faltering Ochs. By 1976, unable to prevail in this battle on every front, Phil Ochs would die by his own hand.

The protest song’s grandest voice dared to speak back to the criminal Nixon administration, uncovering and exposing with anger and wry humor. He alerted his audiences to corruption and brutality and especially to the right-wing’s manipulation of ‘the American dream’. Ironically, he also warned us that, “a protest song is something you don’t hear on the radio”. He dared us to care, at the expense of himself. And now, the silence has become deafening.
Noted folksinger Holly Near, who’d worked with Ochs on a number of occasions, recently spoke of her feelings about the star-crossed topical singer:

“The world hurt him. Artists who do this work must figure out how to articulate the broken heart of humanity—but do so without hurting themselves, without losing themselves in the process“. (5)
———————————–
REFERENCES:
(1) Ochs, Phil, “The Need for Topical Music”, Broadside #22, March 1963; source: Cunningham, Sis, Red Dust and Broadsides: A Piece of People’s History in Songs, Poems and Prose, self-published, 1990, page 37
(2) from the author’s interview with Lincoln Mayorga, Chatham New York, 6/19/09
(3) excerpts, court transcript, Chicago, 1968
(4) from the author’s interview with Lincoln Mayorga, Chatham New York, 6/19/09
(5) from the author’s interview with Holly Near, 11/7/09

—John Pietaro is a cultural worker from New York City. This article is an excerpt from his forthcoming book ‘THE CULTURAL WORKERS: RADICAL ARTS AND REVOLUTIONARY ARTISTS IN THE USA, 1900-TODAY’ – www.flamesofdiscontent.org

–A MODIFIED VERSION OF THIS ARTICLE WAS PUBLISHED IN ‘POLITICAL AFFAIRS’ MAGAZINE ONLINE, DECEMBER 2009–

Dear Santa,
I have been extra good this year, so I have a long list of presents that I want. Please note the size and color of each item, and send as many as possible. If it seems too complicated, make it easy on yourself: just send money. How about tens and twenties?
…All I want is what I have coming to me. All I want is my fair share.

Sally Brown “A Charlie Brown’s Christmas” (1965)

Forty-four years ago–December 9, 1965–cartoonist Charles M. Schulz brought life to his comic strip ‘Peanuts’ and gave the world its first anti-capitalist Christmas special. As the Cold War raged and LBJ reportedly made the world safe for democracy, pop culture received an unexpected push Leftward with ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’. It seems pretty clear that the CBS executives who approved of the special viewed it as simple family fair, but the show broke ground on several levels, not the least of which was the stand against the corporate opportunism which has become the hallmark of Christmas, indeed all of our major holidays. And this in a time before items such as outdoor lights for Halloween or Valentine’s Day existed. Back in 1965 and even into the ‘70s, NO Christmas-themed commercial aired on television until Thanksgiving evening. My, how times have changed.

Schulz’ message throughout this powerful cartoon is the search for the true meaning of Christmas and to illustrate this, his protagonist Charlie Brown encounters a series of overtly commercial angles, schemes and machinations, attempts to baldly profit by the holiday. While Charlie Brown rebels against these at every turn, his friends, his little sister and even his dog are roped in and become a part of the glitz. Ever the dysfunctional depressive, Charlie seeks out faux psychiatric help and is encouraged to serve as director of his school’s Christmas play. But even the so-called “doctor”, schoolmate Lucy Van Pelt, offers that she is regularly disappointed with the holiday take, for she never gets the gift she seeks: real estate.

Lucy tells Charlie that Christmas has indeed gone commercial as it is, “run by an eastern syndicate”, apparently exposing the very Madison Avenue businesses which sponsored the program. Schulz was brilliant. More so, Charlie Brown’s seemingly innocent sister, Sally, turns out to be the preeminent profit-seeker, crafting a letter to Santa which states that she has been very good and thus expects an exceptionally long list of gifts, but ultimately will settle for cash. When her brother gasps at this crass display of self-indulgence, Sally’s absurdly candid reply—“I just want what’s coming to me”—stands as metaphor for the worst kind of greed. Sally just wants what she feels is due her; there really is no innocence after all.

Charlie Brown’s attempts at organizing his friends in the play are earnest; momentarily, he has a sense of purpose and feels his talents can help to forge a worthy production. But here again Schulz throws a monkey wrench into the works when Charlie ‘the Organizer’ is thwarted almost immediately after rehearsal begins by Lucy’s interrupting shout of “Lunch break! Lunch break!”, in the classic union shop style. Yes, the Organizer is stymied, it would seem, by the Shop Steward. Was this another display of attempts to trump the worker or perhaps Charlie, now in the director’s chair, takes on the role of boss and in this sense becomes the target for rebellion? It’s anybody’s guess. Schulz was certain to never really let on what his political views were.

Charles Schulz was a quite religious man who, for many years, taught in Sunday School. Christian values were important to him and this is evidenced by the moving speech Linus makes in the Charlie Brown Christmas special, a direct Biblical quote from the Gospel of Luke. Later, however, Schulz described himself as simply a “Secular Humanist”. Charlie Brown, at his core, was a symbol of man’s isolation and whether we see that as a struggle for recognition of the common worker in the face of capitalist greed or simply as loneliness, the message remains the same. We can’t make it out there alone. But the issue of A Charlie Brown Christmas, more than any other, is how the true beauty of such a holy day can be crushed in one felt swoop of commercialization, how the spiritual and community-based holiday has been pre-empted by corporate greed. The rising popularity of ‘Peanuts’ and all of its characters during the later 1960s, embraced by the counter-culture even more so than the children of the day, also speaks to the message inherent in it.

Perhaps the saddest example of corporate greed as it relates to A Charlie Brown Christmas was the airing that happened last night on ABC, when a variety of lines were cut from the show to make room for—more commercials.
Hark, the herald advertising executives sing.

"Power to the People"--more than just a song title, Lennon stood with the Black Panther Party and was seen as a revolutionary in his own right.

JOHN LENNON’S REVOLUTIONARY HEART

There is a chill in the evening air as shoppers hurry through metropolitan streets, clinging to shiny bags and expectations. “Walking in a Winter Wonderland” and “Frosty the Snowman” have been blaring over store intercoms since at least Thanksgiving (or was that Halloween??), and the merchants have gone all-out in their decorative pursuits of cheer, like carnival barkers peddling holiday spirit. Jingle-jangle-jingle, its Christmas time in New York–in the days of war and financial madness.

But early December, especially in New York, carries another connotation. The eighth of the month, for people of conscience, is reserved for thoughts of John Lennon. “It was 29 years ago today”, some hack will usually write in the entertainment section of a newspaper, reminding us of how old John would have been this year or wondering how many albums would have followed ‘Double Fantasy’ IF ONLY. And then conversations in real time or on the blogosphere will inevitably ask, “where were you when you heard?” and all of us old enough to recall will. Sure, I was listening to WNEW-FM that night in my Brooklyn apartment and the D.J., nearly 11PM, broke in and said he’d gotten a strange report that John Lennon was apparently hurt in a shooting. Huh? It seemed to me that Lennon was simply engaging in a wild publicity stunt now that his first album in years had been released shortly beforehand. No one dreamed he could have already been dead. That came a few minutes later as the jock became choked up and stumbled over his words, reporting this unimaginable news. Ironically, I cannot recall which jock it was that night. Could it have been Dennis Elsas? No matter, his words and delivery remain in my head, especially in early December.

Yes, Virginia, we lost John to a crazed assassin’s bullet nearly three decades ago. This incredibly gifted and crafty writer of songs, preeminent rock singer, powerful rhythm guitarist who’d founded the Beatles and wrote or co-wrote some of the greatest and most lasting music of our time was taken. But there’s so much more to ponder. Lennon could easily have continued being a Beatle, or even writing Beatle-like tunes as a solo artist, but he didn’t, couldn’t. John Lennon, in maturity, discovered his own radical heart. Where he’d established a persona in Liverpool as being something of a rogue, a ‘Teddy boy’ who preached rock-n-roll to anyone who’d listen, Lennon would shape that anger into revolutionary fervor as the late ‘60s exploded not only in the streets but on your turn-table, too.

Rather than simply reflect on what age John would be now or how wonderful his latter-day albums may have been, we on the Left often imagine what John would have done during the Reagan years, fighting the false bravura of hiding behind the flag with agitational pop that could only come through his snarl. And can you even picture the extent of the material this man could have gotten from George W. Bush’s catalog of stupidity, lies, criminal actions and stable of corporate whores. Wow. I could see room for a 4-CD set dedicated to the Ashcroft years alone and perhaps composing the soundtrack to a Michael Moore movie along the way. But Lennon, ever the revolutionary, was unafraid to offer fight-back to any politician. While it seems all too obvious that he would have been among those campaigning for Obama in ‘08, one wonders how John would have responded to the grave choice for military escalation in Afghanistan now, as well as the continuing war in Iraq, the overwhelming jobless rate across the nation, the rising reports of intolerance and of course the Right-wing’s onslaught of barely hidden racism in their own wild-eyed drive for dominance. No way would he have remained silent.

John Lennon’s heart would never have allowed him that much of a retirement…

*****

In 1969, as the Beatles were in the process of going through a slow, painful disintegration, John Lennon began to loudly voice his protest against the Vietnam War and speak out in support of radical social change, even as he experienced the full wrath of the Nixon Administration’s ire. Lennon’s songs such as “Power to the People”, “Give Peace a Chance”, “Working Class Hero”, “Woman is the Nigger of the World” and especially “Imagine” opened up, for mainstream audiences, new realms of progressive ideals and angry dissidence. Though a ‘legitimate’ rock star, Lennon by the early 1970s could be found performing at large peace rallies and also the benefit concert for anti-war activist John Sinclair’s defense, following the latter’s framed arrest for drug possession. Working closely with the Left-wing radical artist Yoko Ono, his life mate, Lennon replaced his mop-top image with that of a bearded, long-haired, counter-cultural force to be reckoned with. Lennon’s voice in support of Sinclair, Angela Davis and the Attica Prison rioters, as well as time spent in the company of Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin and other members of the Yippies, was of great importance to the movement, adding a credence that lesser-known artists could not have.

Lennon’s endlessly long FBI file clarifies the US government’s belief that he was a political revolutionary, and his eventual ability to secure citizenship and rebuff the forces of reaction which tried desperately to deport him were a testament to the power of the youth culture and the New Left. His crowning achievement of protest art is the album Sometime in New York City, which includes songs about the Attica uprising, the Yippie movement, the case against Angela Davis, the trial of John Sinclair, the struggle for women’s equality, the Black Panthers’ fight for survival, the imperialistic violence in Northern Ireland and other issues of great importance to the political Left– Old and New.

The rock star’s battles with the Nixon Administration and the agents of J. Edgar Hoover were well-documented in the 2006 documentary ‘The US vs John Lennon’. The film depicts the machinations of Nixon’s increasing paranoia as well as the continued hysteria of the Cold War, a virtual minefield of Rightist reaction for Lennon as he sought citizenship. The underground, arch-Right working with elected officials was a constant threat to any progressive, let alone one of such high notoriety (we’d seen the same happen some twenty years earlier as the neo-fascists closed in on movie actors, writers and directors). Hoover remained closeted, as the case may be, but all-powerful. COINTELPRO was operating at full force and Washington was run by this secret government not seen before in the annals of American history—at least not until Cheney went into hiding in his bunker. Lennon’s songs heard in the film, and also seen in historic performance footage, stand out as deeply relevant to the people’s fight-back.

“Power to the People”, a song from his Plastic Ono Band period, stands out as anthemic. With this piece, Lennon was responding to his own trepidation of just three years before; his Beatles release “Revolution” refused to actually commit to the action of its own title. By 1971, he was more than ready. And while “Power” was a great rallying cry, it went even deeper. This song also addressed the sexism that is often evident in the movement, so it offered empowerment—and exposition–beyond the obvious. Once this song actually went to the pressing plant, there was no turning back for Lennon.

While ‘The US vs John Lennon’ soundtrack includes the usual suspects, so to speak, special attention has been placed on rarely heard numbers. And herein lies the treasure. “Gimme Some Truth”, a Plastic Ono Band number from ’71 is a classically angry protest song though it is slow and deliberate in nature and artfully arranged (including George Harrison’s soaring slide guitar). Surely this selection could be about rebellion from anyone’s perspective, especially that of a teenager. In this sense it’s timeless, yet it’s also very much a timely song, what with the politics Lennon encountered.

“Attica State” is a recording made as Lennon and Yoko Ono performed at the Michigan rally in support of Sinclair. Supported by acoustic guitars and, apparently, a thumping foot, Lennon and Ono sound about as raw as can be expected. Unwelcoming feedback from the sound system creeps up more than once, but this just adds to the immediacy. Lennon is even heard commenting on the stripped-down nature of the performance: “I haven’t done this in years”. Another song from the same concert, “John Sinclair”, offers some specifics on the case of the peace activist. But most important is Lennon’s opening statement to the crowd: “We came here not only to help John, but also to say to all of you that apathy isn’t it. We can do something. Okay, so Flower Power didn’t work—so what? We start again”. With this, Lennon gave acknowledgement to the gorilla in the parlor—the reality that the youth movement did not immediately change the nation’s direction—but in identifying it, he also insisted on the need to maintain the fight. This is the difference between a musician of social commentary and one of social protest.

Also present on the CD is “I Don’t Wanna Be a Soldier Mama, I Don’t Wanna Die” from 1971. Credited to “John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band with the Flux Fiddlers”, here one can appreciate Ono’s effect on Lennon: repetitive motives with an almost droning harmonic structure, improvisations atop that structure, with extra musicians added for an orchestral feel, and emotive vocals all point to Yoko’s own experiments in the Fluxus art movement. 1969’s “Bed Peace” is a brief slice of Lennon and Ono’s campaign of ‘bed-ins for peace’. Most profoundly is the song “Give Peace a Chance”, a work which has since become immortalized due to its use at major anti-war rallies during the Vietnam era and today. As Nixon and Hoover both knew, a globally popular rock star with political awareness is perhaps the most dangerous weapon against the confining, repressive grip of the status quo.

And this message carries beyond the boundaries of time and space.

(A MODIFIED VERSION OF THIS ARTICLE APPEARED IN ‘POLITICAL AFFAIRS’ MAGAZINE)

-John Pietaro is a cultural worker and labor organizer from New York. His website is www.flamesofdiscontent.org