The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised ( The Revolution Will Not Be TV is transmitted ) is a poem and song of Gil Scott-Heron (1949-2011), which he wrote about 1969/70. The title line has become a household word since its publication .

The text criticizes the materialistic and consumer-oriented character of society in the United States, and in particular television as the most important medium that propagates this way of life. In the spirit of the American civil rights movement , it is an appeal to African Americans to break free from the passive role of media and drug users and to take action themselves to address the racism and racial segregation that were deeper anchored in American society at the time to fight, to overcome and to improve one's own living conditions.

content

In The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Scott-Heron is aimed at his black fellow citizens, especially the black media consumer who is faced with a media world dominated by whites, in which his own world does not play a role.

The text unfolds over a rhetorical pattern of allusions to slogans from television advertising and popular television programs , soap operas , actors, etc. As the cause of the passivity and lethargy of the people who prevent them from getting up and taking their fate into their own hands, In addition to television and the consumption-fixated behavior it promotes, drugs (heroin, alcohol ...) are also denounced.

  • “You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out” is an allusion to the slogan “Turn on, tune in, drop out” coined by Timothy Leary , with which he promoted the use of LSD . "Cop out" means something like shirking, being passive.
  • "You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip. Skip out for beer during commercials ”, refers to the disinterest of drug addicts (“ skag ”is colloquially for heroin) in the world outside of their intoxication.
  • "The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox, [...] by the Schaefer Award Theater", the usual televised phrase satirizes "this program will be presented by ..." and calls example, the technology company Xerox and of Schaefer Beer sponsored broadcast Schaefer Award Theater .
  • "The revolution will not [...] star Natalie Wood and Steve McQueen ."
  • "The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal", alludes to the advertising slogan "give your mouth sex appeal" for the Ultra Brite toothpaste from Colgate-Palmolive .
  • "The revolution will not get rid of the nubs", takes up the slogan "get rid of the nubs" for Schick razors from Wilkinson Sword .
  • "The revolution will not make you look five pounds thinner," satirizes the promises of the beauty and diet industry.
  • " NBC will not be able to predict the winner at 8:32," refers to the predictions broadcast by television stations on the outcome of elections.
  • "The revolution will not go better with Coke ."
  • "The revolution will not fight the germs that cause bad breath" alluded to the advertising slogan "fight the germs that cause bad breath" for Listerine mouthwash from Johnson & Johnson .

In a TV interview, Scott-Heron said:

"You have to change your mind before you change the way you live [...]. So when we were saying that the revolution would not be televised we meant that the thing that is going to change people will be something that no one will ever be able to capture on film.
(Before you can change your lifestyle, you have to change the way you think. […] So when we said that the revolution is not shown on TV, we mean that what will change people is nothing that ever will someone will be able to capture on film.) "

In Message To The Messengers on his album Spirits from 1994 he took up the topic again: “Hey, yeah, we the same brothas from a long time ago. We was talkin 'about television [...] "-" Hey, yeah, we are the same as we were a long time ago. We talked about television […] ”. He turned to the young black musicians, especially the representatives of hip-hop and rap , which had become popular and influential among the new generations , to exhort them to be aware of their responsibility, not to forget which fights were earlier Generations fought for their rights and not let themselves be blinded again by television, money and supposed power.

In 2005, in an interview with the taz , he again stated that for him revolutions primarily take place as a change of consciousness and not as street battles, which is too often confused.

Publications

A first version of the poem set to music was heard on Scott-Heron's debut album Small Talk at 125th and Lenox (1970), where his spoken chant was accompanied exclusively by percussion ( bongos and conga ). On the B-side of the single Home is where the Hatred is for the album Pieces of a Man (1971) it appeared for the first time in a recording with a band (Gil Scott-Heron with Pretty Purdie And The Playboys). It was released again in 1974 on the album The Revolution Will Not Be Televised , named after the text that has now become popular. It is also included on some best-of albums: The Best of Gil Scott-Heron (1984), Glory - The Gil Scott-Heron Collection (1990), Evolution (and Flashback) The Very Best of Gil Scott-Heron ( 1999).

Musical meaning

Gil Scott-Heron set his poem to music with a rap-like chant. The Revolution Will Not Be Televised is considered to be one of the first forerunners of hip-hop and rap. With this spoken word performance, the song paved the way for a new style that made its breakthrough years later with bands such as the Fatback Band , Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five or The Sugarhill Gang .

The piece has been quoted many times by musicians. In Elvis Costello's Invasion Hit Parade (1991) there is the line “Incidentally the revolution will be televised, with one head for business and another for good looks, Until they started arriving with their rubber aprons and their butcher's hooks.” - “Incidentally, will the revolution will be shown on television, with one head for business and another for appearances, until they come with their rubber aprons and butcher's hooks. ”The stage actress Sarah Jones wrote Your Revolution, a feminist version in which they widespread in hip-hop misogyny attacks ( "your revolution will not happen between thesis thighs" - "your revolution will not happen between these thighs") . The rapper Common begins his piece The 6th Sense with: "The revolution will not be televised, the revolution is here." The German rapper Spax picked up the poem in The Revolution will not be live and the Hamburg rapper Telly Tellz sampled the poem Beginning of his song Kein Parra , which addresses poverty in so-called problem areas.

By the British weekly New Statesman was The Revolution Will Not Be Televised in 2010 as one of the 20 most important political songs chosen. The music project 1,000 Days, 1,000 Songs published the title on its website in February 2017 as a protest against the policies of US President Donald Trump .

Web links

swell

  1. ↑ The 90’s . American TV format and a. produced by Skip Blumberg. Episode 306: Race And Racism - Red, White, And Black. Minute 19:38
  2. ↑ Christian Broecking : "You take the kids too seriously" , the daily newspaper , November 18, 2005
  3. ↑ Discogs : Gil Scott-Heron With Pretty Purdie And The Playboys - The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
  4. ^ The Revolution will not be televised , broadcast on Funkhaus Europa on August 31, 2010.
  5. ^ New Statesman : Top 20 Political Songs: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised - Gil Scott-Heron - 1971
  6. ↑ 1,000 Days, 1,000 Songs. Dave Eggers & Jordan Kurland, accessed March 27, 2017 .