"The idea concerns the fact that this country [USA] wants nostalgia. They want to go back as far as they can -- even if it's only as far as last week. Not to face now or tomorrow, but to face backwards. And yesterday was the day of our cinema heroes riding to the rescue at the last possible moment. The day of the man in the white hat or the man on the white horse -- or the man who always came to save America at the last moment -- someone always came to save America at the last moment -- especially in 'B' movies. And when America found itself having a hard time facing the future, they looked for people like John Wayne. But since John Wayne was no longer available, they settled for Ronald Reagan -- and it has placed us in a situation that we can only look at -- like a 'B' movie."
-- Gil Scott-Heron, "'B' Movie"
~ ~ ~
The Revolution
Will Not Be Televised
Will Not Be Televised
by Gil Scott-Heron
You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag
and Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In 4 parts without commercial interruptions.
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon
blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John
Mitchell, General Abrams and Spiro Agnew to eat
hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary.
The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by the
Schaefer Award Theatre and will not star Natalie
Woods and Steve McQueen or Bullwinkle and Julia.
The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal.
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs.
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, because the revolution will not be televised, Brother.
There will be no pictures of you and Willie Mays
pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run,
or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance.
NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32
or report from 29 districts.
The revolution will not be televised.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being
run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process.
There will be no slow motion or still life of Roy
Wilkens strolling through Watts in a Red, Black and
Green liberation jumpsuit that he had been saving
For just the proper occasion.
Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville
Junction will no longer be so damned relevant, and
women will not care if Dick finally gets down with
Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people
will be in the street looking for a brighter day.
The revolution will not be televised.
There will be no highlights on the eleven o'clock
news and no pictures of hairy armed women
liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose.
The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb,
Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom
Jones, Johnny Cash, Englebert Humperdink, or the Rare Earth.
The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be right back
after a message about a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, the tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver's seat.
The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.
~ ~ ~
[sound samples on this site:]
POURQUOI UN SITE SUR GIL SCOTT HERON ?
GIL SCOTT HERON est un personnage peu connu du public
français, il est pourtant un artiste majeur de la scène noire
américaine. Poète, musicien, écrivain, cet afro-américain ne manque pas de talent ! Ce site est né, d'une passion, tout d'abord pour sa musique, puis de ses lectures... Il a pour vocation de faire découvrir Gill Scott Heron, à ceux qui ne le connaissent pas encore et de donner de plus amples renseignements à ceux qui l'ont dèjà découvert. PEACE GO WITH YOU'
BAD NEWS FROM THE STARS! :
Le 6 juillet 2006 :
Gil Scott Heron a été jugé et risque entre 2 et 4 ans de prison (Queens Supreme Court - NY) pour possession de drogue et pour avoir quitté son centre de réhabilitation.
GSH est séropositif et a quitté le centre en explicant que ses médicaments ne lui étaient plus distribué.
***********
The New York Post (NYC USA)
(Murdoch tabloid founded by Alexander Hamilton)
Thursday 6 July 2006
RADICAL MUSIC MAN
GETS JAIL
by IKIMULISA LIVINGSTON
The man who stirred the political pot during the 1970s with his song "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" will be singing the blues after a judge ordered him to prison yesterday.
Gil Scott Heron, 56, a pioneer of hip-hop music, was sentenced to two to four years in Queens Supreme Court for violating a plea deal on a drug-possession charge by leaving a treatment center.
Heron said he is HIV-positive and claimed the in-patient rehab center stopped giving him his medication. But the prosecution noted Heron once skipped out for an appearance with singer Alicia Keys.
Justice Pauline Mullings could have given Heron up to six years.
- 30 -
1 comment:
Powerful, Powerful stuff. I remarked previously how it sounded so familiar although, as far as I know, I'd heard it for the first time only a few weeks ago. And now again, reading through the words, I can almost hear the piece being as though it were being played live and not just through my weeks old memory. In particular, the accent on "it 'will' put you in the drivers seat", jumps out from the written word into spoken so clearly that I'd swear think I must know it all from memory, yet I've only heard it 3-4 times through.
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