Resistance & upraising songs for 2021-22
In December, I came across Van Morrison's trio of anti-lockdown songs (below). Before and afterward (!), I haven't heard any good new “covid mandates resistance” or anti-lockdown song from well known musicians. None!!! Please, prove me wrong!!!
Freedom Song by Roving Crows (February 2022)
I Will Not Comply by Blind Joe (November 2021)
Liberté, je crie ton nom by Chloé (September 2021)
This Has Gotta Stop by Eric Clapton (August 2021)
1984 by Lukas Lion (August 2021)
I Will Not Be Leaving Quietly by Five Times August (July 2021)
God Help Us All by Five Times August (January 2021)
Danser encore by HK & Les Saltimbanks came out in December 2020. Many flashmobs around Europe since then! "Danser encore", a song, happenings, and a movement for the reopening of places of culture.
Kaddour Hadadi's page
Beginning in November 2020, Claudia Fernety, a lovely new voice on the scene, also released a trio of songs: It's Not Normal, They Showed Their Faces, and The Great Reset.
At the end of 2020, Eric Clapton and Van Morrison have collaborated on the anti-lockdown song Stand and Deliver:
“Stand and deliver / You let them put the fear on you / Stand and deliver / But not a word you heard was true,” Clapton sings on the bluesy track which, like its predecessors, accuses the U.K. government of stripping personal freedoms in order to contain the spread of the coronavirus. “But if there’s nothing you can say / There may be nothing you can do / Do you want to be a free man / Or do you want to be a slave?”
Beginning in September 2020, Van Morrison released a trio of anti-lockdown songs — Born to Be Free, As I Walked Out and No More Lockdown — that drew widespread criticism, as well as applause.
Van Morrison: “I’m not telling people what to do or think, the government is doing a great job of that already. It’s about freedom of choice, I believe people should have the right to think for themselves.”
The Resistance by Skillet:
This is how we rise up / Heavy as a hurricane, louder than a freight train / This is how we rise up / Heart is beating faster, feels like thunder / Magic, static, call me a fanatic / It's our world, they can never have it / This is how we rise up / It's our resistance, you can't resist us
The paranoia is in bloom / The P.R. transmissions will resume / They'll try to push drugs, keep us all dumbed down / And hope that we will never see the truth around, so come on
Another promise, another scene, another / Packaged lie to keep us trapped in greed with all the / Green belts wrapped around our minds and endless / Red tape to keep the truth confined, so come on
They will not force us / And they will stop degrading us / And they will not control us / We will be victorious, so come on (whole song)
From the musical Les Misérables and from the movie Les Misérables:
Do you hear the people sing?
Singing a song of angry men?
It is the music of a people
Who will not be slaves again!
When the beating of your heart
Echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start
When tomorrow comes!
Get Up, Stand Up — lyrics by Marley Bob &Tosh Peter:
Get up, stand up: stand up for your rights!
Get up, stand up: don't give up the fight!
Get up, stand up: stand up for your rights!
Get up, stand up: don't give up the fight!
The Times They Are A-Changin’ — written by Bob Dylan as well:
Come gather ’round people / Wherever you roam / And admit that the waters / Around you have grown / And accept it that soon / You’ll be drenched to the bone / If your time to you is worth savin’ / Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone / For the times they are a-changin’… (whole song)