“Quote a song lyric that sums up your year”

You know that end-of-the-year quiz I do? This one question is taking up too much space.

Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

It would be easy to stick previous years’ songs on the list.

Logical Song by Supertramp

I said, Now, watch what you say, they’ll be calling you a radicalA liberal, oh, fanatical, criminalOh, won’t you sign up your name? We’d like to feel you’re acceptableRespectable, oh, presentable, a vegetable

Monster by Steppenwolf

America, where are you now
Don’t you care about your sons and daughters
Don’t you know we need you now
We can’t fight alone against the monster

Virtually all of Elephant Talk by King Crimson

And especially The Trouble With Normal by Bruce Coburn

The trouble with normal is that it always gets worse 

Resistance?

Then I saw a HeatherCox Richardson video from August 7 titled Forms of Resistance and Reasons to Believe It’s Working. From about three minutes in, she said: 

Those sorts of ways of recognizing quietly, of making a statement quietly, matter because people hear them and recognize that they are not alone.

Do you hear the people sing?Singing a song of angry men?It is the music of a peopleWho will not be slaves again
When the beating of your heartEchoes the beating of the drumsThere is a life about to startWhen tomorrow comes
Will you join in our crusade?
Who will be strong and stand with me?Beyond the barricadeIs there a world you long to see?Then join in the fightThat will give you the right to be free
Related

That was set in France in the first third of the 19th century. Here’s a song set in France, slightly earlier.  Marat-Sade as sung by Judy Collins:

Marat, we’re poor and the poor stay poor

Marat, don’t make us wait any more

We want our rights, and we don’t care how
We want a revolution
Now

That brought to mind another tune sung by Judy Collins, Democracy, written by Leonard Cohen. The penultimate verse:
It’s coming to America first
The cradle of the best and of the worst
It’s here they got the range
And the machinery for change
And it’s here they got the spiritual thirst
It’s here – the family’s broken
And it’s here the lonely say
That the heart has got to open
In a fundamental way
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A

Another song I thought of was (We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove Thing by Heaven 17. As I recall, someone with the band or the label thought it was a bit overboard to say about Ronald Reagan. I’m not litigating that, but in a 2025 performance, the band said the song was more relevant now than then. And it has a great beat.

Have you heard it on the news about this fascist groove thang

Evil men with racist views spreading all across the land

Don’t just sit there on your ass, unlock that funky chain dance

Brothers, sisters, shoot your best. We don’t need this fascist groove thang

NYT

On July 1, Jon Pareles put together a list for the New York Times 

Tracy Chapman, Talkin’ ‘Bout A Revolution
The Isley Brothers, Fight the Power, Pts. 1 and 2
Public Enemy, Fight the Power
Michael Franti & Spearhead, Yell Fire!
Bob Marley & the Wailers, Get Up, Stand Up
Mavis Staples, Eyes On The Prize
Patti Smith, People Have the Power
Björk, Declare Independence
Rage Against the Machine, Know Your Enemy
Antibalas, Uprising

I know I own the ones I linked to. That Isley Brothers couplet has been running through my head even before the list was published:

 When I rolled with the punches

I got knocked on the groundWith all this bullsh#t going down

I can’t forget American Idiot by Green Day, which came out in 2004 in response to the knee-jerk reaction to the stupidity of that time. 

Don’t wanna be an American idiotOne nation controlled by the mediaInformation age of hysteriaIt’s calling out to idiot America
Welcome to a new kind of tensionAll across the alienationWhere everything isn’t meant to be okayIn television dreams of tomorrowWe’re not the ones who’re meant to followFor that’s enough to argue

The chorus of Tubthumping by Chumbawamba runs through my head a LOT, over and over:

I get knocked down

But I get up againYou’re never gonna keep me down
But the winner

I just saw the 2025 video for the Dropkick Murphys’  Who Will Stand For Us? I’m not a “you must watch” guy, but please watch.  Lyrics

Who’ll stand with us?Don’t tell us everything is fineWho’ll stand with us?Because this treatment is a crimeThe working people fuel the engineWhile you yank the chainWe fight the wars and build the buildingsFor someone else’s gain
So, tell me, who will stand with us?
And as time rolls on, not a single thing has changedAnd the wealth gap’s only grown as we all point to blameWe’re at the throats of one another, though we share a single fateAnd the golden few laugh on and on as we all take the bait

Author: Roger

I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto.

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