From the early '60s to the late '80s, Broadside magazine printed numerous topical songs by contemporary writers, in addition to articles and commentary. By far the most influential years of its life span were the earliest ones, in the early to mid-'60s, when it helped steer the folk movement toward original material that directly addressed modern society and social injustice. This five-CD box set is an important document of Broadside's contribution to 20th century American popular music. The Broadside LPs included material ...
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From the early '60s to the late '80s, Broadside magazine printed numerous topical songs by contemporary writers, in addition to articles and commentary. By far the most influential years of its life span were the earliest ones, in the early to mid-'60s, when it helped steer the folk movement toward original material that directly addressed modern society and social injustice. This five-CD box set is an important document of Broadside's contribution to 20th century American popular music. The Broadside LPs included material by emerging songwriters that didn't show up on those performers' own albums, and undoubtedly this box will get its most attention for featuring some of those items by Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Tom Paxton, Janis Ian, and Eric Andersen. If you're a committed 1960s folk collector, there are a number of such goodies for cherry-picking here. From a wider perspective, however, this anthology is an important record of how social consciousness as a whole grew within American popular music, especially in the 1960s. Don't get the idea this is all great stuff; there are too many obscure strident singer/songwriters, in the mold of Dylan and others, singing dry, didactic, unmelodic tunes with unimaginative plain arrangements. Broadside also missed the boat almost entirely as far as folk-rock and socially conscious rock was concerned, with rare exceptions. When the Fugs' "Kill for Peace" blasts off, it's such a refreshing change to hear an all-out rocker you can move to, though that's definitely not the rule on this anthology. Nevertheless, there's much good music here, and certainly as a whole it's an incredible history lesson, with more than 150 pages of liner notes detailing the magazine, its founders, the performers, and each of the songs. ~ Richie Unterberger, Rovi
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