Saw a folk music get-together/reunion on PBS recently..yes, great music revived and love the throwback BUT I have to write off the song-EVE OF DESTRUCTION....
All about the world near an end...uh....that was 40 years ago when it ws new and a cause for protest..now it reminds me of singingPUT ANOTHER NICKEL IN THE NICKELODIAN, or crank up that old grammiophone...won't happen, and dragging it out again now is just for the sake of 'wasn't that a we're over it song'?

people have been predicting the end of the world for millennia. doesn't mean they wont be right one of these days. as your momma used to say, "it only takes once."

Saw a folk music get-together/reunion on PBS recently..yes, great music revived and love the throwback BUT I have to write off the song-EVE OF DESTRUCTION....
All about the world near an end...uh....that was 40 years ago when it ws new and a cause for protest..now it reminds me of singingPUT ANOTHER NICKEL IN THE NICKELODIAN, or crank up that old grammiophone...won't happen, and dragging it out again now is just for the sake of 'wasn't that a we're over it song'?





You just don't get it, do you? If you REALLY listen to the song, it is not about some religious concept of Armageddon it has to do with humans destroying this earth through war.  That song is just as relevant today as it was 40 years ago. Why? Because there are certain people in Washington have NOT learned the lessons of 40 years ago. So now we are even closer to being on the "Eve of Destruction" because more nations have nuclear capability than they did.


Cat

You just don't get it, do you? If you REALLY listen to the song, it is not about some religious concept of Armageddon it has to do with humans destroying this earth through war.  That song is just as relevant today as it was 40 years ago. Why? Because there are certain people in Washington have NOT learned the lessons of 40 years ago. So now we are even closer to being on the "Eve of Destruction" because more nations have nuclear capability than they did.


Cat


I avoid the 'religious' comparison only because look at all those who have long died after year after year being told 'tomorrow may be our last day'...and yet here we are.

The song has been around enough that we've had a generation or two gone by already..worry worry worry it seemed to promote...and again with a nuclear threat...how long has it been siince an outrageous attackon nuclear facilities 0000000000000000! Any accidents that were recorded were from HUMAN ERROR....and nuclear facilities of today are so much better built....I'm sleeping okay these days.

Maybe couldn't get into an old hippy singing about end days...catchy song but prefer love and peace songs or folk.

I avoid the 'religious' comparison only because look at all those who have long died after year after year being told 'tomorrow may be our last day'...and yet here we are.

The song has been around enough that we've had a generation or two gone by already..worry worry worry it seemed to promote...and again with a nuclear threat...how long has it been siince an outrageous attackon nuclear facilities 0000000000000000! Any accidents that were recorded were from HUMAN ERROR....and nuclear facilities of today are so much better built....I'm sleeping okay these days.

Maybe couldn't get into an old hippy singing about end days...catchy song but prefer love and peace songs or folk.



If nuclear attack isn't an issue these days, why is the Bush Administration trying to sell us on the fact that Iran MAY be building a nuclear plant.


Ok, nukes aside, how about the fact that just about anyone can build a bomb. It doesn't have to be from nukes.

I too, prefer love and peace but not just in songs but in the world.



Cat

Barry Maguire has been a born-again Christian for decades.

If nuclear attack isn't an issue these days, why is the Bush Administration trying to sell us on the fact that Iran MAY be building a nuclear plant.


Cat


Well, when you turn into the MAD Scientist...world fear and domination brings them more power..Russia has plants..it's the little freaks that need to have their lights extinguished..you don't think IRAN wants to build nukes for low power costs to their peoples' houses do you....

The song has been around enough that we've had a generation or two gone by already..worry worry worry it seemed to promote...


Context, people, context!

1) It's not religious, it's literary.  In the 60s, whether you were a Christian or not, the Biblical apocalypse was part of a shared cultural/literary heritage that kids grew up with.  References to it are like references to Star Wars to an Xer, or to Pokemon to a Y-er or Millenial.

2) In the context of the 60s, it was about the escalation of the proxy wars (in the past, North Korea, and at the time of its popularity, specifically Vietnam) between the USA and USSR escalating into a civilization-ending global thermonuclear conflict.

3) Remember, folk music has always been about "rewriting" it to suit the times.  Its lyrics are traditionally considered to be in the public domain, free for any other people to sing or modify.  The tradition goes back to the middle ages.

If you want to argue against any particular modern re-writing of it, you can do so on logical grounds -- in that the only time the destruction of one nuclear power station had the potential to end civilization was Chernobyl... and not because of the radiation released, but because the West spent the years from 1986-20?? burning fossil fuels and generating CO2 instead of splitting atoms.  But something tells me the hippies really wouldn't like that version either :)

Maybe couldn't get into an old hippy singing about end days...catchy song but prefer love and peace songs or folk.

I can't get into the idea of hippies singing about the end of days either.

Unfortunately, I can't find a Youtube link to Sigue Sigue Sputnik's M.A.D. (Mutual Assured Destruction).  Catchy song, and it had samples from everything from Dr. Strangelove to War Games.  WW3's supposed to be fun!

I'm glad there's somebody around who appreciates the finer points of Sique Sique Sputnik!  "Fleece the World!"
:D

I'm glad there's somebody around who appreciates the finer points of Sique Sique Sputnik!  "Fleece the World!"
:D


"The idea of the music of the group is really simple.  Take Elvis, put him in Blade Runner.  Give him Donna Summer's rhythm section, with two drummers.  Let's get Mark Bolan on guitar, let's put the whole thing in dub, add a bit of rap, add a bit of sound effects, mix in the sound of movies like Clockwork Orange, like Blade Runner, like Scarface... that's what Sigue Sigue Sputnik sounds like."
  - "From the Gutter to the Stars", on the Y2K re-release of Sci-Fi Sex Stars

SSS were the Sex Pistols of the 80s, right down to actually pulling off the Great Rock and Roll Swindle.  And on EMI, no less.  I remember seeing actual "news" articles (video news releases; the sort of total PR fluff authored by the sponsoring company and shipped off to random news stations in the hopes that one of them will be short on content and air the VNR instead) about this interesting new way that record companies have devised to help finance up-and-coming recording artists, actually selling ad space on the record itself!

For further information, ((and an MP3 of their new material to download, holy crap, it's as awesomely sample-laden as it ever was!)) contact the Sputnik Corporation.  Pleasure is ((still!)) their business.

"The idea of the music of the group is really simple.  Take Elvis, put him in Blade Runner.  Give him Donna Summer's rhythm section, with two drummers.  Let's get Mark Bolan on guitar, let's put the whole thing in dub, add a bit of rap, add a bit of sound effects, mix in the sound of movies like Clockwork Orange, like Blade Runner, like Scarface... that's what Sigue Sigue Sputnik sounds like."
   - "From the Gutter to the Stars", on the Y2K re-release of Sci-Fi Sex Stars

SSS were the Sex Pistols of the 80s, right down to actually pulling off the Great Rock and Roll Swindle.  And on EMI, no less.  I remember seeing actual "news" articles (video news releases; the sort of total PR fluff authored by the sponsoring company and shipped off to random news stations in the hopes that one of them will be short on content and air the VNR instead) about this interesting new way that record companies have devised to help finance up-and-coming recording artists, actually selling ad space on the record itself!

For further information, ((and an MP3 of their new material to download, holy crap, it's as awesomely sample-laden as it ever was!)) contact the Sputnik Corporation.  Pleasure is ((still!)) their business.

Yes, yes, I remember it like it was yesterday....