Peace On Earth and Re-Birth 2000

Ginger Snaps asked a group of us: "The soul of The Renaissance was religion, the soul of The Enlightenment was science, the soul of the Industrial Revolution was technology. Could it be that the soul of the 60's was Music?"

Yes.

My soul ch-ch-ch-changes as I change, and 'music is the engine of change'. Some people carryin' signs say that the world is absurd and immoral, always was, always will be! Well, maybe... and I would add this thought: the struggle against absurdity and immorality is its own reward. I discovered that during the early part of my "journey". Music accompanies as well as fuels my journey.

When I first heard the massive sound of a pipe organ in a cathedral, I remember experiencing vividly the power of music. I was 4 or 5 years old and I was awestruck by the heavenly sound, was that the voice of god? I felt uplifted by the organ *grin* and choir music, closer to god, and I felt comfort in the church experience.

When I was 12, a white city bus driver, spying the R&B albums under my arm, said "Hey kid, let's see what ya got there... man, those ni***rs sure can sing..." The bus driver and I lived in Philadelphia, "The City Of Brotherly Love"... Do you remember when you first realized that you lived in a world where people loved black music yet hated black people? And do you remember that some of those bigots sat near you in church and pretended to be disciples of Christ? I'm convinced that our generation's love of blues, R&B and soul music was a major factor in the ability to break through our ancestors' legacy of hate. When I watched a TV reporter interview a line of people, young and old alike, boarding a bus in downtown Philly headed South to join a freedom march, I found myself falling in love with those people.

At 13, I first heard Peter, Paul and Mary sing "Blowin' In The Wind", I wanted to join the crusade. That song and others like, "Keep Your Eyes On The Prize" and "A Change Is Gonna Come" became anthems of the civil rights movement and I realized, how powerfully, music could stir the human soul. The sweet voices of "right" attracted me more than the voices of "might", "This Land Is Your Land" had more soul than "The Ballad of the Green Berets".

At 16, I listened to a priest's sermon about the righteousness of "our" war in Vietnam. With god on our side "we" would prevail. My pals were hearing the same hypocritical message in each of their churches and synagogues. I heard the disillusionment in our voices when we tried to reconcile the failure of American "holymen" to practice what they preached. I found myself quickly falling out of love with the church and I developed a lasting disdain for all organized religions. I attended my first teach-in that questioned the legality and morality of the Vietnam War, the discussions didn't take place in a church, they happened in a head-shop.

At 17, I took my first trip on the magic bus, "driver where you takin' us?" Civil rights had been twisted by the system into civil war. Watts, Detroit, and Newark blazed during the summer of "Light My Fire". During a Solidarity March of volunteers to repair some of the damage to black homes and black businesses after the insurrection in Newark, some fat guy yelled at us, "When you leave, we'll get rid of them all" and "Heil Hitler". That was a "good" amerikkkan talking about his neighbors. After sundown, we went home and dropped our first tabs of acid and sang, "We gotta get outta this place..."

At 18, I had a draft card and America had a nervous breakdown: the Tet Offensive, Lyndon "Hey, hey LBJ, how many kids did you kill today" Johnson burnt out and dropped out of the presidential race, Martin Luther King was killed, cities in America were burning, citizens were being shot in the streets, Robert Kennedy was killed, the Chicago Police rioted and the whole world was waiting as American soldiers murdered hundreds of men... women... children... AND BABIES... in My Lai. One of the accused G.I.'s offered this explanation, "It was a nazi-type thing..." and the war went on and on and on. "Blood in the streets it's up to my ankles, blood in the streets it's up to my knees."

1960 began a decade of hope, the air was rich with promise and I was 10 and the luckiest kid in the world because I lived in the USA. The red, white and blue worm did turn for me when the first drops of blood fell in 1963 and a hard rain was gonna fall. And fall we did. In his historically and creatively inept film, THE DOORS, Oliver Stone got this much right, America had a nervous breakdown in 1968. And as history details, the world was on the verge of a global holocaust. There was fighting in the streets everywhere and we sang "don't follow leaders, watch your parking meters, it takes a weatherman to know which way the wind blows." When I think of that decade I get the chills, what promise, what waste. When I remember the heroes, I remember the hope. When I remember the journey, I remember the changes. And when I remember to live for today, I live. John Steinbeck says that we are all parts of one big soul, do you feel it...? do you hear it...? Sure you do. "Nothing else can survive a holocaust but poetry and songs" (JDM in "The Rolling Stone Interviews").

gettin' mah kicks (before the WSHGUIF)... dharma boots