Analysis of Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival by Inès Manach

Hello bloggers!

Here is your devoted writer, the one who tells you the truth and only the truth! 

Today I am going to explain you the mean of the very famous song created by the band Cleerence Clearwater Revival : Fortunate son 

But first, let me tell you who this band is.

Creedence Clearwater Revival

is a 70's group from California composed by John Forgety, the singer of the band, Tom Fogerty (his brother), the guitarist, Doug Clifford, the drummer and Stu Cook, the bass player.

John Forgety created the band in 1958 and they stopped their shows in 1972.

 John Fogerty

 Their song "Fortunate son", written by the singer, has been released in America while the Vietnam war was going on, in 1969. This song was a part of the album "Willy and the Poor boys".

 

The context : the Vietnam War

It opposed the North and the South Vietnam during almost 20 years from 1955 to 1975.

The North part was a Democratic Republic headed by Hô Chi Minh. It was a communist regime supported by the Soviet Union, China and the Viet-cong (communist people who lived in the South Vietnam).

The South part was also a Republic but it was anti-communist and its government was supported by the United States.

In 1961, the President of the United States of America, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, sent soldiers to Vietnam in order to help the South part. This was not really approuved by Americans so in 1970, the President Nixon decided to take off the soldiers from Vietnam.

Fortunate Son

Here are the lyrics of this really famous song.

Some folks are born, made to wave the flag
Ooo, their red, white and blue
And when the band plays "Hail to the Chief"
Ooo, they point the cannon at you, Lord

It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no senator's son, son
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate one, no

Some folks are born, silver spoon in hand
Lord, don't they help themselves, y'all
But when the taxman comes to the door
Lord, the house looks like a rummage sale, yeah

It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no millionaire's son, no, no
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate one, no

Yeah, yeah
Some folks inherit star spangled eyes
Ooh, they send you down to war, Lord
And when you ask 'em, "How much should we give?"
Ooh, they only answer "More! More! More!", y'all

It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no military son, son
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate one, one
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate one, no, no, no
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate son, no, no, no

The song is not explicit in its criticism of that particular Vietnam war, but the clear attacks on the elite classes (the families that give birth to "fortunate sons") of America and their withdrawal from the costs of nationalistic imperialism are easy to contextualize to that conflict.

Thanks to the lyrics, we can see that Fogerty critics many sorts of fortunate sons:

- the senator's sons

- the millionaire's sons

- the military's sons

So that we understand that some men can be fortunate thanks to their father because these are powerful or very rich.

Moreover, Fogerty said. "It's the old saying about rich men making war and poor men having to fight them."

He was not a fan of Nixon (the president of the US when he wrote this song) and though that people who were close to the president had some privileges.

He supports the soldiers figthing in the war because they were from a working class so thet did not have any contacts to get them out. The song has a perspective of one of these men.

INFORMATIONS ABOUT THE SONG

It is the soundtrack of the movie Forrest Gump and it has been covered by U2, Bob Seger, Cat Power and so much more..

Protest song

So, we can cleary say that "Fortunate son" is a protest song because it is anti-war, even if it is not explicit about that, BUT, it is really explicit about its attacks on the elite classes.

Forgerty critizes those people who support the use of military force whitout to pay the costs : financially or because they don't go to the war.

Thanks for reading this post bloggers, hope you enjoyed!

See you next time

Inès



For what it's worth -Buffalo Springfield-- Julie Donias (1S4)

Hello everyone ! Welcome on this blog ! Today I will present you a famous protest song of the 60s : For What It's Worth, by Buffalo Sprinfield. Enjoy !

The lyrics 

There's something happening here

What it is ain't exactly clear

There's a man with a gun over there

Telling me I got to beware

I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

There's battle lines being drawn

Nobody's right if everybody's wrong

Young people speaking their minds

Getting so much resistance from behind

It's time we stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

What a field-day for the heat

A thousand people in the street

Singing songs and carrying signs

Mostly say, hooray for our side

It's s time we stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Paranoia strikes deep

Into your life it will creep

It starts when you're always afraid

You step out of line, the man come and take you away

We better stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Stop, now, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Stop, children, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Video

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIoKr9VDg3A

Buffalo Spingfield is a band of the 60s, from Los Angeles, who had a really short musical carrier. Released in 1967, For what it's worth is their only hit. Ranked 63^rd on Rolling Stone's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, it is considered as an important protest song in the USA, we can hear it in famous movies, like in Forrest Gump for example. 

Lyrics analysis and context 

 

Let's start by taking a look at the title: For what it's worth is a kind of question to people like “do we really need to go that far?”. Even if the title is not mentioned in the song, it's like a call to people to show them a sort of disproportion between what people do and how the government answers. The legend says that Stephen Stills, the member of the band who wrote the song gave it to the band telling them: “I have this song here, for what it's worth, if you want it.”.

The song starts with “There's something happening here”, it sets up the atmosphere of the song, there are changes, something new and not really good. This is actually an allusion to what the government did a year before the released of the song. They changed the law about the curfew and closed bars and night clubs to prevent young people to hang out late at night.

We understand that the song targets the young people, those who are concerned by this law. The words “young people” are said and the chorus calls them directly:“hey children”. The third stanza shows that young people were not passive and demonstrated. There were “a thousand people in the street” to fight for their freedom. We can link this to an event that happened a year before the song was released. Indeed, in the summer of 1966, in Los Angeles, happened what we call the Sunset Strip Riots. This is a period after the decision to change the hour of curfew. Among the demonstrations that took place, few members of the band assisted to one of them, in a night club, the Pandora Box. Teenagers came to claim their rights and the police answered roughly. The song actually evokes something violent: “there's a man with a gun” and “battle lines”, what makes think of a conflict. By the way, the end of the song shows that people don't feel safe in the world they live. There is “paranoia” and they are “always afraid”.

With the time, people thought the song was about Vietnam war, as it was happening in the same time. But the real inspiration of the song came from this riot in LA. We can link it to another song, written few years after, by another member of the band, Neil Young. Ohio is also about fights between students and police that led to the death of 4 students.

Gimme shelter and the 60’s

On the 5th of December 1969, the Rolling stones released a song that might their best ever :  Gimme shelter. This song is about the decade it has been written in. As Mick Jagger says himself, “it's a very rough, very violent era : The Vietnam War, Violence on the screens, pillage and burning. And Vietnam was not war as we knew it in the conventional sense. The thing about Vietnam was that it wasn't like World War II, and it wasn't like Korea, and it wasn't like the Gulf War. It was a real nasty war, and people didn't like it. People objected, and people didn't want to fight it..." . Then he explained the objective of this song : it was meant to be kind of apocalyptical, with a very dark atmosphere in order to awake people’s conscience about the hard time they were going through… it might be necessary to do a quick review of this time

The 60’s are now know as a time of political trouble with the Cold war and the civil right movement in America. But, even if gimme shelter speaks about violence in general, it focuses more on the Vietnam war. 

As the cold war was in its higher stage, USA and USSR were both in need of influence territories all around the world. Indochina (Laos, Cambodia an Vietnam) was once a French territory, consequently ally with western block. But when the independence war showed Vietnam as winners, the country was divided into two parts : Northern Vietnam, a communist government and southern Vietnam, a pro-American country. Somehow Ho Chi Minh wanted the unification of those two countries and decided to invade southern Vietnam. meanwhile, the viet cong organized guerrilla action in order to get supported by village population. The US, desirous to have influence in Asian territories, decided to help defending southern Vietnam. 
An enormous war power has been deployed to crush communists fighters. But actually, they were fighting against an invisible enemy, into the jungle. even though their striking force (air force for instance) was huge, they had to retire from Vietnam and declare their defeat. It is still today the most savage and useless war in people's minds.

Let us now analyse the lyrics of our song.
 

Oh, a storm is threat'ning   
My very life today
If I don't get some shelter
Oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away

Mick Jagger places himself as a Vietnamese. the storm is a reference to the operation "Rolling Thunder", which is a continuous air strike during several years, touching civilians.

 
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away

The chorus shows American's indifference in front of all the violence commited by GIs. "It's just a shot away" says that it is far, so it does not matter.

 Ooh, see the fire is sweepin'
Our very street today
Burns like a red coal carpet
Mad bull lost its way

This verse is about napalm, an incendiary  component used during this war. "Mad bull" refers to American government, who authorizes such subhuman practice.

 Rape, murder!
It's just a shot away
It's just a shot away

this part is sung by Merry Clayton. she breaks her voice singing, giving more strength and emotion in it. It shows violence commited by by GIs to civilians, all suspected to be part of the viet cong. So rape and murder of innocents were not that rare.


 The flood is threat'ning
My very life today
Gimme, gimme shelter
Or I'm gonna fade away

We can analyse this verse saying it speaks either about the flow of western soldier in Vietnam or about the use of defoliant, chemical substance used to strip leaves out of trees in order to find the Vietnamese fighters, which is really dangerous for civilians because of the damages it causes on cultures.
 
 I tell you love, sister, it's just a kiss away
It's just a kiss away
It's just a kiss away

This last part is a reference to the protest movement caused  by this war in America. the hippie movement advocated peace and love, not war. it is a bit of hope at the end of this apocalyptic song.

Russians-Sting (Michaël Maxime 1S4)

Hello and welcome on our blog! Today we will present you an article who talks about the very famous song of Sting : “Russians”. First we will show you the lyrics and the video, then we are going to explain the context of the song. Finally, we will analyse the lyrics. We hope you will enjoy your reading.

“Russians” from Sting extract from The Dream of the Blue Turtles in 1985 :

In Europe and America, there's a growing feeling of hysteria

Conditioned to respond to all the threats

In the rhetorical speeches of the Soviets

Mr. Khrushchev said we will bury you

I don't subscribe to this point of view

It would be such an ignorant thing to do

If the Russians love their children too

How can I save my little boy from Oppenheimer's deadly toy

There is no monopoly in common sense

On either side of the political fence

We share the same biology

Regardless of ideology

Believe me when I say to you

I hope the Russians love their children too

There is no historical precedent

To put the words in the mouth of the President

There's no such thing as a winnable war

It's a lie that we don't believe anymore

Mr. Reagan says we will protect you

I don't subscribe to this point of view

Believe me when I say to you

I hope the Russians love their children too

We share the same biology

Regardless of ideology

What might save us, me, and you

Is that the Russians love their children too

Context :

Between 1947 and 1991, the USA and all the West side are against the East side lead by the USSR. This kind of opposition is named the cold war. The iron curtain is defining each side, it is symbolized by the wall of Berlin. It’s not only an opposition of countries, it’s an opposition of ideologies. The marxism for the Eastern countries and the liberal democracy for the Western countries. Sting has certainly  written this song before 1985, the presidents of the two sides were Reagan for USA and  Khrushchev for USSR. Even if it seems anachronistic today because Gorbatchev became the president of USSR in 1985. We can understand it as a Sting's will to generalizes to all the Cold war and not just the year of publication of the song (1985).

Analysis :

Sting is an opponent to the war, he qualifies the cold war as an "hysteria". In the chorus, he criticizes errors of judgement of the americans and russians adults which conduces to dangerous decisions for everyone. He uses the symbol of children to foreground the lack of responsability of people wich are supposed to be advisable. He increases the symbol of the parents-children because the nuclear bomb is named "Oppenheimer's deadly toy". The children are in the text to point out the violence of the war. The singer opposes the differents ideologies and does not support either side while he is from the occident side (and at the west of the « Wall of Berlin »). But with "I hope the Russians love their children too" he accuses the USSR. He talks about biology and not about ideology, he wants to say that there is no reason to make the war. He wants to show the violence of the war who could start with the sentence "There is no historical precedent". The next sentence shows us that the politicians are actually unable to stop the war "To put the words in the mouth of the President".

This poster of Daily Mail was publicated in 1962. It may be linked with “Russians” because it also shows the childish of the Presidents of the two sides. Even if it is a real arm-wrestle between the two countries (Cuba Missile Crisis in 1962), it is still a child’s play.

"GOD SAVE THE QUEEN" Sex Pistols

Hello my bloggers ! Today I put an article about de song "God save the queen" of the Sex pistol a punk group of music. I think that they have a message for you, young people ! So, good reading ! 

Context:

« God save the queen » is the second single of the Sex Pistols who is a punk rock music group. The track was released during the 25th accession of the throne of the Queen Elisabeth II. In 1977, the track reached the second position of the britain hit parade. The lyrics and the image on the cover did controversy and the song was removed to the BBC.

This song is about rebelling against British politics. A lot of young people felt alienated by the stifling rule of the old-fashioned royal monarchy. The Queen (Queen Elizabeth), was their symbol.

http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=1621

Lyrics:

-"God save the queen" → It's a criticism of the political regim so of the monarchy, they saiy that the England ist racist and fascist. It's also a reference of the English hymn.

-"The fascist regime" → It's a direct attack to the contested power

-"They made you a moron" → Because of the government the population became a moron

-"She ain't no human being" → It's a dehumanization of the Queen

-"Don't be told what you want" → They want a total and individual liberty, that nobody dictate the laws or have the power

Don't be told what you need

-"When there's no future" → For them the future is a problem. Leave for today, makes them more free, so more happy. It resume with the sentence « No future »

-"In England's dreaming" → It's to show that the England it's all but not magical it's ironic.

Your favorite blogger

Agathe Lebeau

Wings and consumer society Héloïse Rhita

                Wings, an apology of Nike?

          Macklemore in this song relate his childhood and his first pair of Air Maxes. The first Air Maxes by Nike was created in 1987. The singer begin the song by : "I was seven years old when I got my first pair".

 He explain the sensations what those amazing shoes provide, "I'll go so high, my feet won't touch the ground". He had the impression that those shoes make him fly. In the first verse, he said: "this is the best day of my life", so he is overjoyed to have those Air Maxes. He felt powerful compared to his friends in school because he could offer this shoes while his friends are less wealthy. He possessed the pro's shoes and for a little boy it is fantastic.
 "On the court I wasn't the best, but my kicks were like the pros." This little boy was ambitious just because of this shoes, Mike Jordan was his model. "I wanted to be like Mike, Wanted to be him,             I wanted to be that guy, I wanted to touch the rim...". During the first part of this song, it seems only a story of his sweet childhood but after, in the second part, the song takes a new turn.

          Macklemore tell the story of a friend's brother who was murdered for his shoes, in a poor American racketeering was common. Starting from this anecdote, the singer want to show the bad aspects of the consumer society.
          Macklemore sing : "My movement told me be a consumer and I consumed it". With this sentence, he wants explain that the society encourage the population to consumption but "We want what we can't have, So expensive !".    In this words, he  said the main things of this song. We are continuously push into doing expenditures : advertisement, televisions, and we are marginalized if you cannot have fashion (and expansive) clothes, shoes... Macklemore denounce the consumer society and the social disparities who became obvious because the brands. Macklemore finished his song by : "Consumption is in the veins". It is a metaphor : consumption is like the drug, we become addict and it infects us.  "We are what we wear, we wear what we are."




          To remain in the consumer society theme and especially shoes, we can make a link with the song "My Adidas".


It may be noted common points between the two songs. First, the shoes are considered as their friend:
We make a mean team, my Adidas and me
We get around together, now and forever
Me and my Adidas do the illest things

Also in the two songs, it talks about racket.
A sucker tried to steal em so I caught em and 
I thwart em
Racketeering is justified by the fact of social inequality in America.



At school, they want to be the strongest and accepted as they are the only ones to have them, often a lot.
Now enough Adidas possessed by one man is rare
Myself homeboy got fifty pair

According to them, these shoes make them stronger and they jump higher.
With the heal inside make me 10 feet tall


          The society play an important role in the education of children during their childhood. They are influenced by the brands and want to stand out from others. With these two songs, we saw that a pair of shoes, they gain confidence in themselves.   



                                                                        Rhita Abdelkhaleq , Héloïse Esnault

Introduction

Hello everyone. Welcome to your space of expression. You are here to write an article about the protest song of your choice. Good luck!