moment of phasing out of the 1960s,

moving into the 1970s, but of course,

human actions, inactions, chronology,

is not simply as neat as dates on a,

on a calendar as a timeline.  A lot of the

social confusion, violence, and cultural excitement

actually, of this era, of the late sixties,

is right there in the 1970s.  And this lecture's

actually trying to canvass some of the political

turmoil and its, its marriage to popular culture

in the early 1970s.  By way of context though,

let me start in the spring of 1970.  On April 30th--and

actually, let me focus--it's,

frankly, just focus on two weeks in 1970.  On April

30th, President Nixon announces the invasion of

Cambodia, escalation of the war in Southeast Asia in

general, and the need for one hundred and fifty

thousand more troops to find a lasting peace.

In response, the campus at Kent State in Ohio,

the ROTC building is set on fire.  The Ohio governor

dispatches National Guard to make sure that the campus

remains peaceful.  On to May 4th,

this attempt to keep the peace on Kent State

evaporates, when twenty-eight Guardsmen open

fire on Kent State students, killing four and wounding

nine.  Immediately--immediately

being a day--five hundred colleges are shut down

across the country, or they're disrupted from

protests.  Our country, according to college

protestors, our country is now attacking us.  It makes

tremendous headlines.  On May 14th,

ten days--[student sneezes] bless you--ten days after

Kent State, at Jackson State University,

a historically black university,

during a student protest, state and highway patrolmen

open fire with automatic weapons into dormitories. 

Allegations are that someone was sniping at them.  No

evidence was ever found to that,

to that end.  They opened fire without any warning,

killed two students and wounded nine.  The scale of

national attention is not commensurate with what

happens at Kent State.  So for,

in the African American community,

there is a sense that the police state,

in this case, state and highway patrolmen,

could kill our college students without anybody

worrying too much, but at Kent State,

also inexcusable, that if you kill the students,

it becomes a national catastrophe.  Meanwhile,

in New Haven, just about two blocks from here--well,

actually, all throughout New Haven--the Black Panther

Party and the FBI are at a standoff.  Black Panther

Party and fellow travelers had come to New Haven,

essentially to protest the murder trial of Bobby Seale,

who's accused of authorizing the murder of Alex Rackley,

member of the Black Panther Party,

people believed to have been an informant to the FBI. 

Fifteen thousand people descend upon the Green,

Panthers, Panther supporters,

sort of anarchist hippies, called the Yippies,

by--led by Abbie Hoffman, fellow travel--travelers of

all sorts.  And there was a real fear that the city is

going to be collapsed into a race riot.  The university,

under the leadership of Kingman Brewster,

the president at the time, does something that people

never expected, and actually opened its doors to the

Black Panthers.  It created a mechanism,

it felt--Brewster felt, that would relieve some of the

pent-up anxiety and tension over what's happening around

the country and then locally.  Classes are

canceled; there's student strikes.  I think two or

three pipe bombs go off at Ingalls Rink.  It's a level

of chaos that you, that you are not familiar with. 

Kingman Brewster declares that he actually doubts--and

I'm paraphrasing here--whether a black person

can get a fair trial anywhere in America. 

Immediately, the alums start phoning in,

calling for his resignation, for his outlandish

statement.  It's a national event,

student unrest; it's a local story as well.  In this

spirit of what's going on in the country on the college

campuses, and the nation, the call for federal

troops--excuse me, for more military troops,

the invasion of Cambodia, you have an astonishing,

almost sort of a call and response by a lot of

cultural artists.  Most famous in this regard--well,

most famous to me at least, in this regard--is Marvin

Gaye.  Marvin Gaye, who had made a career at Motown by

piecing together and performing love songs,

branches out a year later in May of 1971 with something

really quite different.  So he's known for,

for this: [Marvin Gaye, Tammi Terrell,

"Ain't No Mountain High Enough" excerpt plays.]

Listen, baby Ain't no mountain high Ain't no valley low

Aint no river wide enough,

baby If you need me, call me No matter where you are

No matter how far Don't worry,

baby I mean, really catchy love songs,

really quite--you know, they're actually important

in the history of the evolution of rock music and

the Motown sound.  But by--when we get into 1970,

Gaye is wrestling with, well,

partly exhaustion from churning out these

saccharine-laden songs, but also he's wrestling with

what's going on in the country,

and he wants to aspire to do something quite different. 

And he earns, secures himself a new contract with

Motown and he's given creative license,

which is astonishing.  This is the big sort of rupture

in Motown.  He's given creative license,

and he turns--and he generates a concept album. 

The album's called What's Going On?  It's dealing with

Vietnam, it's dealing with economic despair,

with incredible inflation going on in the country. 

It's dealing with ecological despair,

and this is a few years before Earth Day would

actually take effect, when people are wondering what

we're doing to this particular planet.  In fact,

I've often, when I've given this lecture--and I wanted,

I hadn't given a, a cultural politics lecture for years,

and I finally realized it was time to do so.  And I

listened to What's Going On?

Just to see if I wanted to play a clip,

and I realized, I could actually just put the CD on,

leave the room, have you guys understand the

nineteen, early 1970s by the time the album was over. 

But, well, I have to get up and say something.  So you

have a moment of escalating war in Vietnam,

fear of, of destruction of the planet,

ecologically speaking, environmentally speaking,

hyperinflation in the United States,

poverty, urban decay.  And Marvin Gaye starts writing

these pieces, or produces these songs.  They merge one

into another in What's Going On?

and, in fact, if you do want to learn about the 1970s,

just go out and--I used to say buy the album at the

record store, then you could buy the CD,

and now it's just, you know, go to iTunes,

I suppose.  Although you should patronize Cutler's,

the local record store.  [Students laugh]  One of his

signature songs from the album,

"What's Happening, Brother?"  It's the story of

a returning vet, comes back from Vietnam,

trying to figure out what is happening on the street,

really trying to get back into the mundane routine

of life.

I'll play a clip of it.

Hey baby, what you know good I'm just getting back,

but you knew I would War is hell,

when will it end, When will people start getting

together again, Are things really getting better,

like the newspaper said Whatelse is new my friend,

besides what I read, Can't find no work,

can't find no job my friend, Money is tighter than

it's ever been Say man, I just don't understand

What's going on across this land Ah what's happening brother,

Oh yeah, what's happening, what's happening my man?

If you have the lyrics sheet in front of you,

it's self-evident.  For those of you who don't,

the guy's just come back from war.  He's wondering,

if he's reading the newspaper,

if what he's reading is true,

and he's talking about civil rights here,

of things actually getting better.  Can't find a job

though, money is tight.  "I don't understand what's

going on around here."  And then just wondering,

you know, are they still doing stuff they used to do,

going to the dances?  Do you think anybody has a chance

to succeed, in this case, a ball club?  "I want to know

what's going on, what's happening."  Someone who's

lost and trying to find his way.  Very soon,

you get an answer in the same album,

in the song "Inner City Blues."  Harkening back to

Gil Scott-Heron, "Whitey on the Moon."

Dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah

Rockets, moon shots Spend it on the have nots.

Money, we make it;

'Fore we see it you take it.

Oh, make me wanna holler The way they do my life.

Make me wanna holler, The way they do my life.This ain't

living, This ain't living No,no baby,

this ain't living No,no, no. Inflation,

no chance, To increase finance. Bills pile up sky high.

Send that boy off to die. Make me wanna holler.

The way they do my life Make me wanna holler

The way they do my life.

Sending people to the moon?  Spend it on people who don't

have anything, please, instead.  People taking all

of our money.  This is exactly Gil Scott-Heron's

lament from the same era.  He closes the song,

throwing up both my hands in a lament.  Now if you think

I'm stretching this just a little bit,

I mean, this is just one album,

after all, let me share with you a personal story.  It's

happening in 1971, '72, and '73.  I was too young to

remember it, actually, but in 1990--let me think,

when would this have been--1997 or so,

I was living in Los Angeles.  My father and

mother had come to visit me and my wife,

and we're driving.  We go out to--he'd lived in L.A.

for a while when--during this era--we drive out to

visit some old friends of his in Los Angeles,

have a great night.  Come back,

we're driving back and I happen just to put on this

album.  I listen to it all the time.  He and my mother

riding in the back seat and after a while,

I realize what--something doesn't sound quite right. 

And then I realize, what I'm hearing in the back seat is

weeping, I mean, flat out weeping.  I turn down the

music, ask what's going on, and my father just says,

"I can't--you know, I just can't talk,

can't talk about it."  Get back to the house.  I've

never seen this guy cry in my entire life.  I don't

know what, what has actually happened.  I sit down with

him and my mother says, "Wendell,

just tell him what's going--what happened

there."  And my father essentially had a

flashback.  He was a Vietnam vet himself,

fought--flew in the Air Force.  And he's saying that

album just brought everything back.  I mean,

"You just don't, you just don't understand,

he tells me, "what it was like."  People going off and

trying to--risking their lives for their country,

and being treated the way they were treated upon their

return.  And Marvin Gaye really understood the sense

of confusion that many people,

not just the vets, but certainly in his case,

the vets come back trying to figure out what is going on

in this country, what do they actually fight for? 

Feeling a sense of moral confusion as well.  My

father even talked about the,

you know, the economy and the ecological landscape,

all in that same moment.  He goes,

"That album really captured it all.  Marvin Gaye

understood what was going on."  Now this album,

What's Going On?, fluctuates between the international

critique and also things happening in U.S.