Dear Mr. Karunanayake,
The purpose of my essay is to illustrate how resistance was used in the song, “Revolution,” written by The Beatles. I plan to prove that this song is a piece about resistance through the lyrics. The Beatles have been my favorite band for a very long time, so I already knew a lot of their background, but for this paper I decided to go onto several websites and review some of their background and history. The way that I approached this assignment was by listening to the song several times and rereading the songs lyrics. After listening and reading the lyrics many times, I picked out which parts of the lyrics I felt best depicted the idea of resistance. One of the challenges that I faced was that once I explained why I felt a line of the song represented resistance, there wasn’t much more to say. Because of this, the body of my paper did not have very much context, and was kind of choppy. I feel that I could add more context to the body of my paper, but still need to figure out what to add. Also one of the issues that I faced was the fact that I do already know so much about the band and their songs. This was an issue for me because I did not feel that I needed to do that much research before starting my paper, and I quickly realized that this was not the case. When I did research, I found out a lot more about the band’s background and specifically, the background of this particular song. I feel that I did a good job at writing my introduction with regards to the song’s background, but I feel that I still need to add more to my introduction to make it more interesting and appealing. After meeting with you and talking about the revisions that needed to be made, I felt that I had a much better understanding of the assignment and what I needed to do in order to improve my paper.
Ilise Green
English 112
Dinidu Karunanayake
21 March 2014
The Revolution of Resistance
Resistance is defined by Merriam-Webster as “the refusal to accept something new or different.” To me, resistance means going against a dominant force, or what someone else is doing. Resistance can oftentimes, but not always, involve violence. I believe that the song “Revolution,” written by The Beatles, conveys a message about resistance. It was released to the United States on August 26, 1968. The song was “inspired by political protests” about the Vietnam War “in early 1968” (Revolution[1]). This was the first extremely political song that the Beatles wrote and was considered to be “John Lennon’s response to the Vietnam War” (Revolution by The Beatles). It is said to have been “John’s answer not only to the political unrest in France and America in the spring of 1968, but also an answer to” those that felt The Beatles were not as responsive as the [Rolling] Stones were about the war and political issues that were going on (Revolution[2]). The Beatles’ song, “Revolution,” is a controversial song that accurately depicts the idea of resistance and highlights the need for people to change through its lyrics and music video/sound.
The song consists of several different conflicting lines that go along with the theme of resistance and going against what others might want to do. For example, it says, “But when you talk about destruction, don’t you know that you can count me out.” This is a very obvious example of resistance because The Beatles directly say that they will play no part in destruction, even if that’s what everyone else is doing. They later state, “You say you’ll change the constitution, well, you know, we all want to change your head.” Here they are saying that they do not want to be a part of changing the constitution, and that they would rather change the heads of the people that want to enact the change. By this they mean that they want to change the thoughts within the peoples’ heads that think there need to be changes made to the constitution, because they do not feel that the constitution should be changed. They also state, “You tell me it’s the institution,well, you know,you better free your mind instead.” Here The Beatles are resisting the idea of institution and people being forced to think the same thing. They instead feel that everyone should free their minds and be free to think whatever they would like. These are just a few examples of how The Beatles use resistance in their song, “Revolution.” Although The Beatles allude to the fact that people need to change and not the constitution, they do not acknowledge that the one will cause the other.
The Beatles feel that the constitution need not be changed, but ultimately if the people change their minds, then the constitution will change as well. This is because the people write the constitution, so if they change their line of thinking, then they would also change what they think should be in the constitution, and what they feel everyone needs to abide by. Because of this The Beatles contradict themselves, making their argument less valid. Along with the constitution changing, if the people change their minds, then all things that are manmade will change as well. Therefore The Beatles are advocating change indirectly. In line with changing human thinking, the song also states that people need to free their minds instead of listening to institutions, but sometimes listening to an institution can help to free your mind. The Beatles’ song is filled with inconsistencies therefore making it hard to consider it their lyrics and thoughts liable. Not only did the lyrics themselves contribute to the factor of resistance in the song, but also The Beatles, the music video, and the song itself did.
The Beatles’ song “Revolution” was a divisive song because it was the first particularly political song that The Beatles released, and Brian Epstein did not agree with it. “For years, on The Beatles’ tours, Brian Epstein had stopped [them] from saying anything about Vietnam or the war,” but The Beatles decided that they were going to “answer about the war,” and that the couldn’t ignore it (Revolution[3]). Here The Beatles defied what Brian Epstein wanted and did what they felt was necessary. Oftentimes resistance can cause controversy, so it is not surprise that a song directly representing resistance was controversial in many different ways. Both the music video and song itself can be seen as a form of resistance for many reasons. Resistance can be seen through their music video because The Beatles wear normal clothes in the video, and the whole video is all taken from the same place. In most music videos, people dress up and there are many different scenes and settings. At the same time, the change of camera angle and who is being shown throughout the video can be seen as resistance. Also the sound changes immensely throughout the song. The song starts off with a scream and then throughout it there are extremely high notes, as well as many different guitar solos of different speeds.
“Revolution,” written by The Beatles, was a song that greatly illustrated the idea of resistance through its lyrics, music video, and sound. They tried to make their lyrics portray one ideal, but their arguments were inconsistent and ended up contradicting the message they were trying to get across. Through their video, they tried to resist the norm by making it a simple music video with one setting and regular clothes, but they then went along and changed camera angles, making it more complex.
Works Cited
“Resistance.” Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/resistance>.
“Revolution.” The Beatles Bible. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2014.<http://www.beatlesbible.com/songs/revolution/>.
“Revolution.” The Beatles. Sony Publishing, n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2014. <http://www.thebeatles.com/song/revolution>.
“Revolution by The Beatles.” Songfacts. N.p., n.d. Web. 09 Feb. 2014. <http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=142>.
[1] http://www.thebeatles.com/song/revolution
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