Ignore the sneering young people’s rage is an age old sign of failed politics Fiona Sturges
almost 5 years in The guardian
Like the rockers and ravers before them, this generation treats the choices of their elders with alarm
In the documentary Everybody in the Place, the Turner prize-winning artist Jeremy Deller delivers a talk to a group of sixth-form politics students about late-80s acid house in Britain. As well as documenting the massive cultural changes that took place, he draws a clear line between the decline of industrialisation, the miners’ strike, sound-system culture and the rise of dance music. As Deller shows old footage of whey-faced ravers in bucket hats and sports gear dancing in fields and warehouses, the students look on with a blend of bafflement and fascination. It’s weird, one of them says, that no one has a phone.
Another film, also out now, reports on a youth movement born from political and social disenfranchisement, and a desire for a new way of living. Woodstock – Three Days that Defined a Generation tells the well-documented story of the hippy era and the 1969 music festival that took place in the shadow of Vietnam and civil rights unrest. “We were looking for answers,” says one attendee. “We were looking for other people that felt the same way as we did … If 400,000 people could get together and have absolutely no violence, absolutely no conflict, I felt like we could bring all of that love back into society – and change the world.” Continue reading...
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