The Mamas and the Papas said it in1965, Creeque Alley
I hope this isn’t too much of a hijack, but I saw ‘Joan Baez’ and was instantly reminded of something I saw not too long ago.
I don’t know whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, but:
A popular Japanese voice artist/singer released a cover version of ‘Dona Dona’ earlier this year, which I know wasn’t originally done by Baez, but she definitely popularized it.
Only, this version is a techno remix. :eek:
At least, she’s not been forgotten. I boggle at the concept, though.
ducks out
I would say the death knell was sounded by Peter, Paul & Mary singing “I dig rock and roll music.” Fortunately Iris Dement either did not hear it or chose to ignore it because she is still singing, performing live and recording and is fabulous.
“I Dig Rock and Roll Music” was satirical. The point of the song was that the singers hated how rock and roll had crushed what little chance folk music had to be the hot thing. They also hated how some of their fellow folk singers had crossed over into rock and roll.
Seconded. Pay attention to the lyrics.
Folk music as they knew it was dead by that time. By the time of Album 1700, which contained “I Dig Rock and Roll Music,” they themselves had mostly shifted over to a pop sound. This worked very well commercially - and aethestically, since that’s a terrific album, but it was essentially their swan song as a group.*
As I said earlier, folk lived on but never as the commercial genre it once was. It morphed into folk-rock or folk-pop or moved into smaller non-commercial settings. And it splintered into a thousand varieties of folk art, which is the equivalent of saying that it is dead as a genre.
- Yes I know they continued to make a few albums. Look at what those albums were, though, and look at their commercial success.
You say that like it’s a bad thing.
Paraphrasing Spider Robinson, who was paraphrasing Martin Mull: “Remember the great Folk Music scare of the 1960’s? That shit almost caught on!” 