Songs That Declared No To War!
Significant songs that proclaimed Never Again!
Music has long been a vehicle for protest. A platform where wrongs have been called out and channeled across the airwaves to millions. Songs that would become immortalised, experienced with fervour, and long after the objection had receded into history.
Famous orators include John Lennon, John Fogerty, and Edwin Starr, but as we’ll discover below, fame has little to do with the ability to pen a poignant message or to influence swathes of fans and artists alike.
It’s hard to know whether the current Taylor Swift controversy actually exists outside Twittersphere. Conservatives are upset that the voice of a generation is encouraging Americans to vote. Ideally, it’d be the dumbest thing you read on any given day, except tragically, it won’t be.
It is, however, a noteworthy parallel as many of the songs we’ll experience below were delivered by artists who wanted it to be known that something was wrong. It is politicians who send kids off to war. Voting decides who the decision-makers become. Each of these artists were spotlighting scenarios that demanded a little more reflection than they seemed to be getting.
The following references a small subset of artists who focused heavily on the scourge and loss brought about by war, all unified by the idea of never again.
It’s impossible for this to be an exhaustive exploration of songs that denounced war.
By reading, however, you may well learn about an artist you didn’t know prior. Someone with something to say that resonates with you.
New music is always the goal.
I’ve sorted songs by conflict and ascending year of release to give this some linearity.
The First World War — 1914–1918
Before Metallica was a household name, they penned a stirring, seven-minute epic that expressed the hopelessness of a soldier who’d stepped on a mine, losing his limbs, sight, hearing, and, tragically, his will to live. Direct and confronting, One would secure the band a Grammy Award in 1989 for Best Metal Performance and tune a significant audience into the band through the plight of the song’s central character. It is a simple yet stirring account that places the listener at the other end of the conflict, where the hopes and dreams of that man have been replaced with a prayer for death.
Listen to One by Metallica, from 1988’s …And Justice For All
I can’t think of any musician more dialed into military history than Lemmy of Motörhead fame, and the title track of their 1990 album 1916 is unquestionably their most direct comment on any matter related to war and suffering. An ode in the literal sense, the poem-styled delivery weaves a tragic tale of the underage boys who managed to wrangle their way into the army and onto the ships that would inevitably see them senselessly cut down in their thousands at the battle of the Somme, France, between July and September of 1916. Written in the first person, the visualisation of two teenagers clinging to each other as their lives were exhausted eviscerates all notions of glory, adventure and nobility so often attached to service. As a visualisation of a tragic and abhorrent campaign, it is without peer.
Listen to 1916 by Motörhead, from 1990’s 1916
The Second World War — 1939–1945
Pink Floyd’s 1979 concept album The Wall is an ominous collection, amplified by the accompanying film from 1982. The lyrically inexplicit Goodbye Blue Sky is said to be about the German blitzkrieg, which rained over London initially, before expanding across other ports and cities across the UK. Over 40,000 people were killed during the raids of 1940–41. The accompanying video illustrates these events in more straightforward terms, utilising strong visual metaphor that manages to simultaneously maintain the story arc of the album’s principal, Pink. It’s difficult to state whether it was primarily intended as an anti-war song or it was a potent aspect of the main character’s descent, but for a band inclined to attract a type of fan who appreciates the scale and scope of a more cerebral approach to rock music, chances of rumination were indeed high.
Listen to Goodbye Blue Sky by Pink Floyd, from 1979’s The Wall
Never Again is an idea synonymous with the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan in 1945 — that bombings of that nature should never be revisited on this earth. UK D-Beat band Discharge forged an acclaimed style of hardcore punk and remained the marquee act from which that pairing of sound and lyrical philosophy was drawn. Their messages were extremely concise, the sentiment cemented by their graphic black and white sleeves that depicted destruction but touted hope and an appeal to sense.
Listen to Never Again by Discharge, from 1982’s Hear Nothing, See Nothing, Say Nothing
When it comes to artists motivated by an egalitarian spirit, it’s hard to look past Midnight Oil as a catalyst for social change. One of Australia’s most enduring and revered rock bands to have formed in the 1970s, the message of frontman Peter Garrett has perpetually been a call for change.
Species Deceases was a 12” EP released by the band in 1985. Featuring the track Blossom And Blood, which featured two specific WWII references.
The first is found in an inscription at the Kemal Atatürk Memorial on Anzac Parade in Canberra:
You, the mothers who sent their sons from faraway countries, wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well.
The second is a reference to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
There’s a hope in the heart says never again.
This line elegantly frames the atmosphere of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum — a juxtaposition of unfathomable devastation and tragedy adorned with affectations of peace and a commitment to ensuring that such a travesty never again be revisited on earth.
Listen to Blossom And Blood by Midnight Oil, from 1985’s Species Deceases
Vietnam — 1955–1975
Depending on where you were raised, what you might have learned in high school history, or what you elected to study, the war that centered around the country of Vietnam for approximately twenty years has a number of identities and is absolutely worth gaining an insight into.
Described as the first TV war, the media afforded the public a real-time, front-row view of what was occurring within this conflict.
And within that sentiment, some of the most renowned anti-war songs were penned.
Arguably, the most famous anti-war song, Give Peace a Chance by John Lennon, came about while Lennon and Yoko Ono hosted a series of Bed-ins for Peace, a variation on the sit-in protest action of the 1960s. Lennon reportedly expressed their goal for the bed-in was to give peace a chance, and a cut of the song was recorded in a Montreal hotel room — one of the sites in which the bed-in protest was being conducted. Though a member of the Beatles at the time, the single was released as the Plastic Ono Band and is the perfect illustration of a literal protest song captured in real-time.
Listen to Give Peace a Chance by Plastic Ono Band, 1970
Music has been written to express emotion, sentiment, and protest. Artists don’t always have veto power over how their music is used, and anyone who’s dipped their toe in the weaponisation of western music — as in a tool of oppression, even torture — may be surprised to learn that Fortunate Son by Credence Clearwater Revival was alleged to have been played onboard American helicopters as part of the arsenal waged against the Vietcong.
If Give Peace a Chance is the most renowned anti-war song, Fortunate Son runs a close second, adopted as a rallying cry by the anti-Vietnam war movement. Fogerty’s Everyman lyric reminds listeners that since the time before time, people have been sent off to fight senseless wars by folks who love the soldier but not so much the veteran. A masterpiece in 2 minutes and 20 seconds, the Vietnam War setting was ultimately cemented by its placement in the 1994 film Forest Gump, though the overlay was intended to illustrate the less fortunate being dropped into combat.
Listen to Fortunate Son by Credence Clearwater Revival, from 1969's Willy and the Poor Boys
Cited by the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia and the Australian Performing Arts Association (APRA) as one of the top 30 Australian songs of all time, 19 by Redgum threads the needle of the cadet who is soon to endure the horrors of Vietnam, only to find themselves suffering from post-war PTSD — a fog that never lifts. Released almost a decade after Australia withdrew from Vietnam, the song became a number-one hit in Australia, so affected were people — veterans, their families, and those who wished that this sort of history never be repeated. In the storytelling as a song style, this track is a remarkable example.
Listen to I Was Only 19 (A Walk in the Light Green) by Redgum, from the 1983 single I Was Only 19
Generally attributed as an anti-Vietnam war song, there are other theories about the intention of War, performed by Edwin Starr in 1970, each of which considers the song’s motivation as born of conflict. The track, which Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong wrote for the Mowtown label, was originally recorded by The Temptations, but it was Starr’s version of the cut that ultimately captured the imagination of music fans. Unlike the majority of songs collected here, it has a spirited energy that allows it to be experienced with a touch more optimism than may have been intended. It is not the first song of its nature that has been represented in films and other applications that potentially demean its message. But if people are listening, they have a chance to experience its meaning.
Listen to War by Edwin Starr, from 1970’s War And Peace
The Falklands War — 1982
The war in the Falklands was fought between Argentina and Britain over
Crass were an anarcho-punk band from the UK, active between 1977 and 1984. Abrasive in sound and intent, they had nothing of the posturing or affectations of the established punk scene of the day. Highly motivated by social issues and the peril of Thatcherism, the band released a suite of highly revered, socially conscious, and generally scathing screeds that have lost none of their violence or outrage. If music was ever intended to be confrontational and uneasy, this was Crass’ mission accomplished.
Yes, Sir, I Will was the band’s response to the Falklands War. The title is drawn from an interaction between an injured solider named Simon Weston and Prince Charles who ordered him to Get well soon, because that’ll do it.
Around the same time, Crass spliced together a series of speeches by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, which were spread anonymously to perpetuate a hoax that the pair had confessed an array of nefarious actions and plans during a recorded meeting. It became known as Thatchergate, and a great little news piece about it can be heard here.
Listen to Yes Sir, I Will by Crass, 1983
American punk band the Dead Kennedys recorded a conceptually similar track in 1982. Titled Kinky Sex Makes The World Go Round, it has been loosely attributed to the Crass/Thatchergate hoax, though the timing of both recordings makes this a dubious claim. Released on the B Side of the Bleed For Me single and included on the Give Me Convenience Or Give Me Death Comp LP from 1986, this is a parody-styled phone call recording between the Secretary of War at the State Department of the United States and Margaret Thatcher, in which the American thrills and titillates the Iron Lady with a host of scenarios designed to reduce the numbers of unemployed on both sides of the pond. In Jello Biafra’s inimitable style, it’s satirical mayhem taken to the absolute extreme and a triumph of the band’s cleverness, innovation, and astute political observation and commentary.
Listen to Kinky Sex Makes The World Go Round by the Dead Kennedys, from 1982’s Bleed For Me 12”
The Troubles — Ireland, 1968–1998
No assessment of this nature would be complete without the inclusion of U2’s immortal Sunday Bloody Sunday. The seemingly endless conflict inspired the opening track from the band’s 1983 album War in Northern Ireland. Often cited as addressing the 1972 incident when unarmed protesters were shot and killed by British troops, the message does present as bigger than any one single event, encapsulating the hopelessness and tragedy of perpetual strife.
The Plastic Ono Band’s 1972 track of the same name was explicitly about that particular tragedy, Lennon having participated in protests designed to pressure the British government into withdrawing troops from Northern Ireland.
Listen to Sunday Bloody Sunday by U2, from 1983’s War
Protest songs are universal. They affect people of all nationalities and creeds from all periods. While I have focused on a homogenous collective (contemporary rock bands from the 1970s and 80s), there are some engaging historical overviews of mankind’s demand for change.