From Billie Holiday to Patti Smith and Janelle Monáe, protest music spans decades of social justice movements and shows no sign of slowing.

by Grace Birnstengel

illustration by Grace Molteni

In times of political, social and economic turmoil, art is necessary for expression, healing and solidarity. Music specifically is fundamental and universal as a means of communicating unrest and oneness. It can be translated into or built from protest chants. It can be heard far and wide in varied audiences or communities who might not usually tune into national injustices. Protest songs, anthems usually associated with opposition to a particular social movement or time period, go as far back as Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” — an anthem of unity that has been used during protests at Tiananmen Square and at a concert to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. Protest songs by women and femmes often are cast in shadow by the Bob Dylans and Kendrick Lamars of the world, but these groups have been speaking — and singing — out in dismay for just as long.

Treading back to 1931 and The Great Depression, folk singer and union activist Aunt Molly Jackson wrote and performed a series of songs on behalf of the unfair treatment of coal miners in Harlan, Kentucky. Most notably, Jackson’s song “Ragged, Hungry Blues” depicts the unlivable conditions that families of coal miners endured during the Depression. Over sad, barren guitar plucking, Jackson howls about being a poor coal miner’s wife with no food or clothes for her children. “If we can’t get more for our labor, we’ll starve to death and die,” she laments.

As more heads turned to the racial injustices in 1939 America, jazz musician Billie Holiday recorded a version of the poem “Strange Fruit” — a heart wrenching number that is sampled in Kanye West’s 2013 song “Blood On The Leaves” and perhaps better known in that context. The song uses “strange fruit” as a metaphor for black folks hung from trees, “swingin’ in the Southern breeze.” Although the slow, sorrowful tune is a difficult listen, the song is one of the most renowned protest anthems and went on to be inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1978.

Civil rights anthems did not halt as centuries passed. 1956 saw singer and activist Odetta’s “Oh, Freedom,” which Joan Baez would perform at the 1963 March on Washington led by Martin Luther King Jr. The legendary musician Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam” from 1964 will go down as a celebrated protest song for its lyrical response to the murder of civil rights activist Medgar Evers in Mississippi, among other murders of black civilians.

With second wave feminism in full swing and the women’s liberation movement afloat, the “queen of ‘70s pop” Helen Reddy gave the world “I Am Woman” — an anthem for women’s empowerment. “Oh yes, I am wise / But it’s wisdom born of pain / Yes, I’ve paid the price / But look how much I gained” the chorus goes.

The 1980s saw artists like Joni Mitchell and Patti Smith take stands against corrupt politics in the Reagan era. “Money is the road to justice and power walks on crooked legs,” Mitchell sings in 1985’s “Dog Eat Dog,” while Smith encouraged her listeners to stand up to wrongdoings in 1988’s upbeat power jam “People Have the Power.”

In 1990, feminist icon and musical mastermind Ani DiFranco divulged her personal experience with an abortion in “Lost Woman Song.” It also serves as a pro-choice anthem with lyrics like “I am here to exercise / My freedom of choice / I passed their handheld signs / Went through their picket lines” and “They keep pounding their fists on reality / Hoping it will break / But I don’t think one of them / Leads a life free of mistakes.”

The turn of the century and the United States’ shift back into the hands of a republican president gave way to songs like the recently passed soul singer Sharon Jones’ (and her band The Dap Kings) “What If We All Stopped Paying Taxes” from 2002. Jones grapples with the purpose of paying taxes that primarily go to funding wars instead of improving schools and the wellbeing of American citizens.

George W. Bush’s presidency brought criticism, and with it, naturally, protest music. Singer-songwriter Tori Amos wrote “Yo George” in 2007 where she addressed the president himself in her album’s introductory track. “I salute to you, commander / And I sneeze / ‘Cause I have now / An allergy / To your policies it seems.”

In just the last several years, women have produced some of the most powerful and poignant protest music of all time. Folk group Hurray for the Riff Raff’s Alynda Lee Segarra wrote “The Body Electric” in 2014, a sweepingly beautiful song about violence toward people of color in America. “He’s gonna shoot me down, put my body in the river,” she sings.

With the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement and an uptick in police violence against people of color, R&B star Janelle Monáe remixed her older track “Hell You Talmbout” in 2015 and used it to channel the “pain, fear and trauma caused by the ongoing slaughter of our brothers and sisters” she wrote in an Instagram post. The song features chanting of black folks murdered or wronged by police followed by “say his/her name.”

Native artist Raye Zaragoza’s 2016 song “In The River” protests the Dakota Access Pipeline threatening water supplies and welfare of the Standing Rock reservation. “We are stronger when we band together / And we’re standing up for the water / Don’t poison the future away” she coos beautifully over a stripped-down guitar.

In a United States led by Donald Trump and Mike Pence, it is no question that we yearn for anti-establishment art and music. Though we wish that such art wouldn’t have to exist at all, protest music provides grounds for us to mourn, fight and move forward together.

Grace Birnstengel is a writer from Minneapolis living in Brooklyn. She has bylines at Stereogum, Brooklyn Magazine, VICE’s Live Nation TV, City Pages and the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Follow her on Twitter @grace__ (that’s two underscores!).

Grace Molteni is a Midwest born and raised designer, illustrator, and self-proclaimed bibliophile, currently calling Chicago home. She believes strongly in a “beer first, always, and only” rule, and is forever seeking the perfect dumpling. For more musings, work, or just to say hey check her out on Instagram or at her personal website.