chorus part, as derived from the 1926 early jazz classic "Muskrat Ramble", co-written by Kid Ory. Collection CountryJoeMcDonald Band/Artist Country Joe McDonald. In keeping with the project's goal we are compiling a list of casualties from various sources. Captured in Michael Wadleighs Oscar-winning 1970 documentary Woodstock, the three rousing minutes of Mr. McDonalds acoustic version of The Fish Cheer/I-Feel-Like-Im-Fixin-to-Die Rag became the premier Vietnam War protest anthem. According to Welcome Home co-founder Joie Talley, some surprise guests are also expected, since many big-name stars are in town for Tuesdays Grammy Awards. Initially, the song didnt attract much attention. (hed eventually pay a $500 fine). Among the four more albums delivered during these years were Love Is A Fire, Goodbye Blues, Rock And Roll Music From The Planet Earth and Leisure Suite. [19], McDonald has four other children, Devin (b. 2. McDonald's work on behalf of veterans has been widely recognized and appreciated, and he remains an advocate for their rights and well-being. In the summer of 1967, they were offered a series of gigs on the East Coast. Mostly as a vehicle for raising money for Vietnam Veterans Against The War, it featured members of local band Grootna and pointed political songs included the anti-draft "Kiss My Ass." Country Joe McDonald - IMDb One of his solo albums, the 1973 Vanguard LP Paris Sessions, was reviewed by Robert Christgau in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), in which he said: "Amazing. But he says hes more or less retired. humor in which people can bitch in a way that will not get them in trouble and that also keeps them from insanity that can be experienced during war., As the war ground on and the casualties mounted, music became even more essential for troops and veterans struggling to express their feelings and understand the politics of the war, and politics in general. I met a soldier who was in the Hanoi Hilton for five years who said the Viet Cong would sometimes let them listen to music, he said. His anti-war "I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die Rag" became a memorable Woodstock moment. 5. The former Navy pilot would later earn the nomination. McDonald's Woodstock performance was a momentous occasion for both him and the festival-goers. A raw direct release, it remains a favorite of many of Joe's fans notably for the feminist (or maybe not feminist) song "Sexist Pig." Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Country Joe McDonald - Best of Country Joe McDonald The Vanguard Yea - J7427A at the best online prices at eBay! I wrote the song Who Am I? for a play I was working on, and after I was done, I literally paused, sat down, and banged out Fixin-to-Die in a half an hour, he said. [10] The modified cheer continued at most of the band's live shows throughout the years, including Woodstock and elsewhere. The first release from this new union was the best selling-highly acclaimed 1975 release Paradise With An Ocean View. When McDonald called out for an "F" and then a "U," instead of an "F" and then an "I," the Woodstock audience went wild. Country Joe McDonald That Barry McGuires hit song Eve of Destruction, which railed against injustice and nuclear war in 1965, was quickly countered by Sgt. Among its many fans was the singer-songwriter Steve Earle, then a teenager in San Antonio. After some abortive attempts at reuniting the original Country Joe and the Fish, he formed the "Country Joe Band" with original members David Bennett Cohen, Bruce Barthol, and Gary "Chicken" Hirsh; the Country Joe Band toured throughout 2004 and 2005. Street Spirit Interview with Country Joe McDonald Pt 1 Space, water and toilets were in short supply. Then something changed, Killer Mike goes off: Right now, in this country, your freedom of speech is at risk, Rihanna has Smurfs on the brain for her next movie: Hope this gives me cool points, Sexual assault began at 13, Runaways songwriter says; her suit names ex-KROQ DJ, band manager, Smokey Robinson on love, Motown and sex at 83: I feel as good as I felt when I was 40, Fugees rapper Pras found guilty of political conspiracy. 195196. It became a cause celebre when the US distributor, Grove Films, attempting to import copies for movie theaters, found all of their prints confiscated by customs as "obscene." The dynamic was complicated by musics peculiar status as both a center of political or cultural resistance and a manifestation of Americas high-tech supremacy. It was to have contained Joe's most topical song "Fixin' to Die Rag" but it was left off at the urging of the Vanguard's president Maynard Solomon who felt that it would become a "thorn in their side and prevent the band from getting any single play on the radio." Fish which with a new keyboard player and rhythm section was produced by Tom Wilson. The first official act on Day 3 was the mad Englishman, Joe Cocker. This series highlights the artists who performed at Woodstock August 15-18, 1969. His road manager gave him the go-ahead, and McDonald's anti-war anthem was met with a frenzy of clapping, singing, and standing ovations. Country Joe McDonald composed one of the most acclaimed peace anthems of the Vietnam era, "I Feel Like I'm Fixin' to Die Rag," a rebellious and uproarious blast against the war machine. Someday, The Fish Cheer/I-Feel-Like-Im-Fixin-to-Die-Rag will be mentioned in the first lines of Country Joe McDonalds obituary. Historians of the 60s have recognized the importance of music as a lens for understanding movements, attitudes and opinions. The song's anti-war message seems more timely than ever, with its savagely satirical attack on the arms merchants, the military and the White House. Sometimes the music was live: soldiers strumming out Bob Dylan and Curtis Mayfield songs at base camps; Filipino bands pounding out Proud Mary and Soul Man at enlisted-mens clubs and Saigon bars; touring acts from Bob Hope and Ann-Margret to Nancy Sinatra and James Brown granting momentary calm. Security was thin. His tour manager said that since nobody was paying attention, why not do the number he was saving for tomorrow night? Both LPs contained novel approaches to music -- the first, "Rock and Soul Music" Joe's paean to James Brown and the second, a dry, cutting, almost minstrel-show-like song about Harlem, "The Harlem Song." He has explained that he was inspired to write a folk song about how soldiers have no choice but to follow orders, but with the irreverence of rock 'n' roll. Country Joe and the Fish: Feel Like I'm Fixin to Die Rag - Vietnam War and one that would become his signature song, "I Feel Like I'm Fixin'-to-Die Rag.". Two years later, the Veterans of Foreign Wars' magazine marked Woodstock's 40th anniversary with a cover story spotlighting some 109 service members who died in Vietnam during the festival and "are never lauded by the illustrious spokesmen for the 'Sixties Generation.'". Superstitious Blues - Wikipedia Concertgoers werent the only ones struck by the fellow-feeling and calm in the crowd despite scores of drug arrests, medical problems ranging from cut-up bare feet to LSD freakouts, and two deaths, one from a heroin overdose and another when a teen was run over, according to The Associated Press reporting from the time. Were all going to die capper. He did say that! I'm a singer and songwriter, I used to be in Country Joe & the Fish, and I live in Berkeley, California, Planet Earth. This lead to the 1988 Rag Baby release, Vietnam Experience which along with the film and video of the same name were to be Joe's "bookends" on the war in Vietnam. Read another biography by Joel Selvin. Dr. Hip02. His "Tribute to Florence Nightingale" website has become a valuable resource for grade-schoolers. Country Joe & the Fish Biography, Songs, & Albums | AllMusic We can make some of it into a sociological thing, and some of it we can make into the fact 15-year-old boys like to curse.. Who would you support in a hypothetical 2024 presidential matchup The singer walked back out, alone, and called to the masses, Give me an F!. Country Joe and the Fish - Wikipedia Vietnam. The word comes camouflaged in music. Much of the band's music was written by founding members Country Joe McDonald and Barry "The Fish" Melton, with lyrics pointedly addressing issues of importance to the counterculture . He is still alive and performing, as I will note in my article on "Country Joe and The Fish." See how this article appeared when it was originally published on NYTimes.com. There are going to be no speakers, no awards, no soap box, she promised. It was about being together. The first Country Joe and the Fish record was released in 1965, in time for the Vietnam Day Teach-In anti-war protest in Berkeley, California. Get our L.A. How Palm Springs ran out Black and Latino families to build a fantasy for rich, white people, 17 SoCal hiking trails that are blooming with wildflowers (but probably not for long! The fall of 1970 found him in Chile scoring the music for the Saul Landau film Que Hacer. Ironically two records released later that year -- The Doors' 45, "Touch Me," and the Rolling Stones' LP Let It Bleed, also made use of horns and strings. It was time for the second act on the second day of a 1969 music festival in upstate New York, but the band, Santana, was having trouble getting it together. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated. Country Joe McDonald. It contained the greatest number of radio and commercial hits since the first two Fish LPs and gave Joe his first clear solo success. PHOTO AND ART CREDITS This last song appeared at a time of growing national awareness of the plight of whales worldwide spurred by the efforts of the Canadian activist group Greenpeace to whom the song was dedicated. Despite being handed a guitar tied to a rope instead of a strap, McDonald put on an impressive 30-minute set in his army shirt and sunglasses. President Joe Biden announces 2024 reelection campaign Country Joe McDonald | The Vietnam War Summit From 1972 till 1973, Joe led a group known as the "All Star Band"; it featured members of Big Brother and the Holding Company (David Getz and Peter Albin), an LA favorite from the 60's United States of America (Dorothy Moskovitz), at times former Fish Barry Melton and players from the Bay Area. I have an addiction to Vietnam, McDonald confessed. Country Joe McDonald is an American singer/songwriter and a Navy veteran. At 17, seeing the world and meeting girls took priority, and he figured the best option was enlisting in the Navy. He didnt realize Fixin-to-Die had reached the grunts in the jungle until he worked with Jane Fonda on a U.S.O.-style antiwar tour called Free the Army (coincidentally, it was also known by the other F-word), and vets started telling him how much they loved his American blasphemy. Day 2 at Woodstock meant the rock acts were up, and the 11th act to appear on Saturday (actually Sunday a.m.) was already a legend. Since his performance at Woodstock, Country Joe McDonald has remained an outspoken activist for social and political causes that he believes in. During the summer of 1968 the band played on the Schaefer Music Festival tour. But Beatty Barnes feels the city-sponsored Harlem festival, which was showcased in two network TV specials, showed people didn't have to go far to come together around music. I was proud to be a veteran, the connection I had with the other soldiers, but I also understood the military dysfunction of capitalism combined with a large bureaucracy.. Country Joe McDonald - NNDB The crowd at Woodstock, half a million strong, rose to their feet and joined in Country Joe McDonalds antiwar war cry, chanting along from the opening expletive all the way to the Whoopee! The war was coming to an end, and those of us still there, and the veterans who were already back home, understood that it would be music that helped us reintegrate into civilian life. He played Fixin-to-Die from the back of a flatbed trailer. A folk rock flavored album, it featured songs from the Chile film and "Memories," a long introspective song about growing up in the 60s. After serving in the Navy, McDonald moved to California and became heavily involved in the protest movement at Berkeley. It was our lifeline, a link to our existence back in the world, connecting us with the things that enabled us, as the Impressions urged us, to keep on pushing. From the peaks of the Central Highlands and the rice paddies of the Mekong Delta to the air-conditioned jungles of Danang and Long Binh (where I served as an information specialist in 1970-71), soldiers used music to build community, stay connected to the home front and hold on to the humanity the war was trying to take away. It inpsired his career as a singer-songwriter and progressive activist. The first Country Joe and the Fish record was released in 1965, in time for the Vietnam Day Teach-In anti-war protest in Berkeley, California. The album had no fewer than five songs that played constantly on FM radio including two major singles "Breakfast For Two" and "Save The Whales." I dont think that being a veteran is acceptable today in any mainstream sense, and I find that a very strange contradiction in the American mind-set, he said. Performers included Country Joe McDonald, a Navy veteran who served mainly in Japan. COUNTRY JOE SINGING A PRO-VETERAN TUNE NOW - Los Angeles Times Its his legacy, one that both provided him with financial stability and quashed his chances at Top 40 stardom. In 1966, Mr. McDonald and his partner Barry Melton, whose nickname was the Fish, decided to move away from their folk music style and form a full-time rock band. This demonstration, the beginning of what was to be a week of protests throughout the Capitol, proved to be one of the pivotal popular manifestations of disenchantment with the Nixon administration's conduct of the war. Woodstock Performers: Country Joe McDonald - Spinditty King as she encouraged G.I.s to lay down their weapons. McDonald makes it clear, though, that the veterans issue is not just one of a long list of causes for him, and that it is vitally linked to his first cause: peace. This series highlights the artists who performed at Woodstock August 15-18, 1969. "Some people alluded to peace and stuff, but I was talking about Vietnam," McDonald said in a phone interview. Just about all the guys I served with in Vietnam in 1970 and 1971 laughed at Edwin Starrs War because we knew better than he did that it was good for absolutely nothin., Many of those tensions and crosscurrents came to a head around Country Joe McDonald, the guiding spirit of Country Joe and the Fish, whose unplanned, slightly reluctant performance of I-Feel-Like-Im-Fixin-to-Die Rag at Woodstock in August 1969 placed a veterans perspective on Vietnam at the center of musical protest. Country Joe McDonald, "Rag" Lawsuit An Unlikely Hero / Anti-war anthem gives Country Joe a - SFGATE Country Joe McDonald live at Woodstock Roger Krook 874 subscribers Subscribe 4.8K Save 794K views 13 years ago Notice Age-restricted video (based on Community Guidelines) It's cable reimagined No. Her mother wouldn't let her go to Woodstock. thats some liberal hippie stuff. The F-I-S-H Cheer was lighthearted, as was the sound behind the pitch-black lyrics of Fixin-to-Die. Country Joe & the Fish played up the songs soldier-as-carnival-barker aspects, putting a hurdy-gurdy organ front and center, dropping kazoo bits throughout and capping it off with sounds of machine guns and a bomb dropping. However, McDonald was determined to get the Woodstock audience pumped up and excited for the rest of the day. That Woodstock generation takes care of its own, McDonald quipped. By 1979 Joe and Bill Belmont had re-started Rag Baby records and released, in Europe through various licensing arrangements, Barry Melton's Level With Me. Joe's parents, Florence and Worden, had moved there after the War, World War II that is, when they began to have difficulties of a political kind. Before Country Joe McDonald galvanized the '60s protest movement with his zany antiwar anthem "I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag" in . rally in front of the Alamo. Born on January 1, 1942 to a leftist-oriented family, McDonald was named in honor of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. Things changed in the summer of 1968 at the Schaefer Music Festival in Central Park, when the bands drummer, Gary Hirsh, suggested altering the cheer, replacing fish with a four-letter expletive. [20], For discography of Country Joe and the Fish, see that entry. The album has some of Mr. McDonalds old progressive spirit, like the anti-firearm song Era of Guns, and he occasionally performs with the (much younger) Electric Music Band. It blames leaders and parents, not soldiers. Joe's last album for Vanguard was recorded in New York and later released as Country Joe. In 1969, a warrant was issued for Mr. McDonalds arrest for inciting an audience to lewd behavior in Worcester, Mass. But having enlisted in the Navy at 17 and been stationed as an air traffic controller at the Atsugi, Japan, air facility until his honorable discharge in 1962, he refers to himself as a Vietnam era veteran.. There was no one baby boomer generation. Ive always believed that the veterans are a basic element to the understanding of war, he said, and the understanding of war is the only path to peace.. News; . This series highlights the artists who performed at Woodstock August 1518, 1969. Day 2 at Woodstock meant the rock bands were up, and the seventh act to appear at Woodstock on Saturday August 16, 1969 was Canned Heat. FlourishAnyway from USA on April 06, 2019: Wow, someone named after Stalin. Organizers had sold 186,000 tickets; ultimately an estimated 400,000 people showed up for the festival on farmland in Bethel, New York, about 80 miles (130 kilometers) northwest of New York City. It's Finally Over Likewise, For What Its Worth by Buffalo Springfield, the song frequently played to accompany film depictions of antiwar protests, had nothing to do with Vietnam per se Stephen Stills wrote it about a riot on the Sunset Strip yet it was as treasured by scores of Vietnam soldiers as it was by protesters in America. The cheer became popular and the crowd would spell out F-I-S-H when the band performed live. He learned to play the guitar and trombone, but his father's loss of employment due to suspected communist ties before the House Un-American Activities Committee changed his world view forever. Tonights show is the first fund-raising event sponsored by Welcome Home Inc., a nonprofit organization supporting various Vietnam veteran outreach and counseling programs and public consciousness-raising projects, including Gov. Country Joe McDonald - Wikipedia 01. With both numbers preserved on film and record--complete with bouncing ball for the sing-along--they remain among Woodstocks most recognized moments. In 2004, McDonald regrouped with three of the original members of Country Joe and the Fish (Bruce Barthol, David Bennett Cohen, and Gary "Chicken" Hirsh) and they toured the United States and the United Kingdom as the "Country Joe Band". It was an early lesson about how powerful music can be.. Country Joe McDonald - Full ConcertRecorded Live: 10/27/1973 - Winterland (San Francisco, CA)More Country Joe McDonald at Music Vault: http://www.musicvault.. Country Joe Band, Country Joe McDonald - AllMusic ", followed immediately by the song. President Joe Biden announced a new permanent American base on Polish soil - pacing the country on the forefront of the push-back against Putin. George Deukmejians drive to build a Vietnam memorial in California. [9] The "Fish Cheer" was the band performing a call-and-response with the audience, spelling the word "fish", followed by Country Joe yelling, "What's that spell?" The group organized by Fonda and actor Donald Sutherland featured theater skits created by Ann and Roger Bowen, alumnae of the famed Chicago improvisation group "Second City". On the same day his band, Country Joe & the Fish, played at Woodstock, another audience of thousands was in a Harlem park for a concert with its own sense of community and yearnings to challenge the status quo. "We went for the music and found something so much more, and so much more important camaraderie," says Karen Breda, who was 17 when she went to Woodstock. But Woodstock became an aspirational vision of what countercultural youth thought they could achieve in the United States., In this Aug. 16, 1969 photo, a young woman naps on top of her car while trying to reach the Woodstock Music and Art Festival in Bethel, N.Y. (AP). Heres My Soundtrack. There are conflicting reports about when McDonald performed at Woodstock. In 2017, McDonald released an album on his own Rag Baby label entitled 50. Joseph Allen "Country Joe" McDonald (born January 1, 1942) [1] is an American musician, singer and political activist. Money Minute, What's next for experimental AI projects in the C4ISR sphere, Military sex assault reports rise, even as Army numbers fall, Zero trust could have limited Pentagon leak, Navy CTO says, Taliban kill mastermind of suicide bombing at Kabul airport, Ship fires cost the Navy dearly, but lessons still need learning, Russian spy intrigue fizzles in Coast Guard vet, wife ID theft case. A $300-million (minimum) gondola to Dodger Stadium? . America needs closure on the Vietnam experience, McDonald said. Born a red-diaper baby he was named after Joseph Stalin he grew up in a Communist. Show, led by then Berkeley neighbor Jane Fonda. He did and the resulting songs, "Mara," "Ny's Song," "Hungry Miller and the Hungry World" and the title song "Quiet Days In Clichy" were released on a Vanguard album as part of the soundtrack. Joe had signed with Vanguard as a solo performer and went to Nashville with Sam Charters to record an album of Woody Guthrie songs. Bruce Lint (L) of Meriden, Connecticut and another Marine (unidentified) provide a little musical entertainment for fellow leathernecks at a fortress in northwestern south Vietnam. While on tour in Scandinavia, he was asked by concert promoter and film producer Knud Thorbjorsen to write some songs for a film production of Henry Miller's classic book Quiet Days In Clichy. By Joe McDonald, AP Thursday, Apr 27 FILE - China's President Xi Jinping arrives to attend the APEC Economic Leaders Meeting during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, APEC summit, Nov. 19 . Making Money In Chile04. Many Americans saw Woodstock as a spectacle of spaced-out, skinny-dipping, promiscuous hippies cavorting in squalor with "little more sanity than the impulses that drive the lemmings to march to their deaths in the sea," as a New York Times editorial put it (while allowing that "the freakish-looking intruders behaved astonishingly well"). Despite the real/honest prison poem and the silly, outdated record fan routines, his best in about five years."[12]. The show was part of the Harlem Cultural Festival, a concert series that would later be dubbed a "Black Woodstock.". This was unusual in an era of short three-minute singles. Day 2 at Woodstock meant the rock acts were up, and the 12th act to appear on Saturday (actually Sunday a.m.) was funk-rock band, Sly and the Family Stone. After being discharged, Mr. McDonald tried college for a few semesters before dropping out and landing in Berkeley. Country Joe entertaining the crowd at Woodstock. Memories06. Some sources state that he performed after Richie Havens on Friday, while others, including photos and recordings, seem to confirm that . The film of the Woodstock Festival was prepared for release in the spring of 1970, and almost coincided with the Fish's last LP for Vanguard C. J. 3. Those who wish to make donations or purchase tickets to be used by veterans can call (213) 281-7817 for information.). Joe at 75. Their best known single, an anti-Vietnam War song called Feel Like I'm Fixin to Die Rag, was recorded and released in late 1967. And here I got to send out this shocking antiwar message to a couple hundred guys singing along. AKA Joseph Allen McDonald. 2023 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. A scheduled, prepaid appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show was canceled, and they were banned for life (although they got to keep the money). But having enlisted in the Navy at 17 and been stationed as an air traffic controller at the Atsugi, Japan, air facility until his honorable discharge in. [8][18], Seven's name was the inspiration behind the character Six on Blossom, cited by Don Reo on PeopleTV special Blossom Cast Reunion aired 2017, timestamp 10:07-10:33. Sam Charters, noted blues writer, producer and poet, was in charge of the record which was entitled Electric Music For The Mind and Body. [14], McDonald lives in Berkeley, California. His mother, Florence Plotnick, was the daughter of Russian Jewish immigrants and served for many years on the Berkeley City Council. Ever wonder who played at Woodstock?