PHIL OCHS 1940-1976
28 years ago today, he took his own life. Take a moment to remember his life, not the death. Then light a candle.
edit: it's not that i can't do math. it's that i genuinely think that it's still 2003.
I miss him even though I never knew him. I think this country really needs his guidance, his lyrics, his mordant wit, and most of all, his music with its hidden hints of optimism, especially now. It's a shame most of his protest songs have been thrown into obscurity by Dylan's having eclipsed him.
Lest he never be forgotten.
http://www.cs.pdx.edu/~trent/ochs/
Some quotes:
"It is wrong to expect a reward for your struggles. The reward is the act of struggle itself, not what you win. Even though you can't expect to defeat the absurdity of the world, you must make that attempt. That's morality, that's religion. That's art. That's life. "
"Leaving America is like losing twenty pounds and finding a new girlfriend."
"A protest song is a song that's so specific that you cannot mistake it for bullshit "
"And if there's any hope for America, it lies in a revolution, and if there's any hope for a revolution in America, it lies in getting Elvis Presley to become Che Guevara."
"Leave the old and dying America and use your creative energies to help form a new America, which would be de-militarized, more humanistic, where the police are less hostile and closer to the community, where the wealthy are not given unleashed power for the exploitation of the people.
"And, mostly because it's now a matter of life and death, reassert an ecological balance with the environment, which means the people in the oil companies and the car companies and the space industry and all the other industries will have to be brought into account, so that there will be a new definition of government which has to be closer to the people and less close to special interests which are far more harmful than any revolutionaries."
edit: it's not that i can't do math. it's that i genuinely think that it's still 2003.
I miss him even though I never knew him. I think this country really needs his guidance, his lyrics, his mordant wit, and most of all, his music with its hidden hints of optimism, especially now. It's a shame most of his protest songs have been thrown into obscurity by Dylan's having eclipsed him.
Lest he never be forgotten.
http://www.cs.pdx.edu/~trent/ochs/
Some quotes:
"It is wrong to expect a reward for your struggles. The reward is the act of struggle itself, not what you win. Even though you can't expect to defeat the absurdity of the world, you must make that attempt. That's morality, that's religion. That's art. That's life. "
"Leaving America is like losing twenty pounds and finding a new girlfriend."
"A protest song is a song that's so specific that you cannot mistake it for bullshit "
"And if there's any hope for America, it lies in a revolution, and if there's any hope for a revolution in America, it lies in getting Elvis Presley to become Che Guevara."
"Leave the old and dying America and use your creative energies to help form a new America, which would be de-militarized, more humanistic, where the police are less hostile and closer to the community, where the wealthy are not given unleashed power for the exploitation of the people.
"And, mostly because it's now a matter of life and death, reassert an ecological balance with the environment, which means the people in the oil companies and the car companies and the space industry and all the other industries will have to be brought into account, so that there will be a new definition of government which has to be closer to the people and less close to special interests which are far more harmful than any revolutionaries."