Billy Bragg
Billy Bragg
Stephen William "Billy" Braggis an English singer, songwriter and left-wing activist. His music blends elements of folk music, punk rock and protest songs, with lyrics that mostly span political or romantic themes. His music is heavily centered on bringing about change and getting the younger generation involved in activist causes...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionFolk Singer
Date of Birth20 December 1957
music protest
Protest music was prematurely declared to be unfashionable,
amongst british-musician choose nature popular subject
It's not a very popular subject amongst my audience, who are by nature more internationalist, but I don't choose what to write about, I don't choose my subjects, they kind of choose me.
british-musician
My upbringing was very straightforward suburban working class upbringing.
british-musician line people rejected school secondary skilled sort technical work
Most of the people that I went to school with - I went to secondary school - we were educated to go and work in the line at Ford's, and if we were lucky, technical skilled labor. I sort of rejected that, and thought I wanted to do something else.
british-musician case modern people trying worthwhile
I'm trying to make a case for those people who don't have a sense of belonging that they should have, that there is something really worthwhile in having a sense of belonging, and recasting and looking at our modern history.
became british-musician coal involved knew mining people pop star villages
In that sense, I became politicized because the people in the coal mining villages who were involved in the struggle knew why they were there. But they couldn't understand why some pop star from London would want to be there.
audience bands believe british-musician change lesson naive quite taught thinks
That taught me one lesson which is that you're naive to believe that bands can change the world. Bands are very naive to think that just if their audience thinks that they can change the world, that they can. That was quite a lesson for my career, really.
british-musician defeat defining looking next opportunity strike
By the end of the miner's strike I was defining myself as a socialist, clued in and looking for the next opportunity to defeat the Tories.
cop face public talked walked
The thing about Strummer was he walked it like he talked it, ... He didn't cop out. He didn't show one face to the public and have a different face in himself.
believe opportunity player
I never met a politician who didn't want to be a guitar player in a rock band. I've got the opportunity to say what I believe in.
country care patriot
A patriot is someone who cares what happens in their country.
struggle cutting reality
Start your own revolution, cut out the middleman In a perfect world we'd all sing in tune But this is reality so give me some room So join the struggle while you may The Revolution is just a t-shirt away
jobs generations worst
Being spokesman for a generation is the worst job I ever had.
gay sticks common
Just because you're gay, I won't turn you away. If you stick around, I'm sure we can find some common ground.