American Expressions of the 21st Century (2022)

Xander Haselmann

Patricia Petnik

America From Jazz Age to MTV Age

23 October 2022

“American Expressions of the Early 20th Century”

Art is a phenomena in which we as humans need in order to fully process the world around us. Much like a garbage man taking out trash, or dreaming while sleeping after a long and turbulent day, artists can take in all the filth and drudgery of their times on earth and channel them through their mediums. Of these mediums, none is quite as far reaching as music. Music fills the very air we walk through, it can be easily recreated with just your body, and can be accessed by the wealthy and the poor and everybody in between. Music is an immaterial art form, so what better way to express a time in which people had absolutely nothing, and later, a fear that they would lose everything. Between 1913 and 1963 in America was a time in which the status quo switched on a dime. A war to end all wars, a roaring hedonistic raging party, an economic disaster that broke it up, another war to end all wars, two nuclear bombs, a presidential assassination, and all while the very fabric of the culture would constatnly twist and turn out of line. We have many primary sources we can use to peek into a world before our own, but music is by far the most raw. Right from the mouths of the people, to the ears of the people.

The 20’s were a time that metaphorically reflected how many young people live their lives today. A Lot of fashion choices that the culture would later regret (and then unregret and then regret again), partying all the time, drinking illegally, and upholding a general disregard for the future ahead. Like young people transitioning into adulthood, new opportunities and freedoms also came to benefit a great deal of the public. Particularly, women unshackled a number of societal chains in this era. In his book Only Yesterday: an Informal History of the 1920s, Fredrick Lewis Allen details the tight regulations that women were once expected to follow. “Women were the guardians of morality; they were made of finer stuff than men and were expected to act accordingly. Young girls must look forward in innocence (tempered perhaps with a modicum of physiological instruction) to a romantic love match which would lead them to the altar and to living-happily-ever-after; and until the ‘right man’ came along they must allow no male to kiss them.” When the 20’s hit, they could wear what they wanted, often showing more skin than ever before. They were drinking and smoking now, which was a luxury once only enjoyed by men. Perhaps the most significant breakthrough that is still continuing to progress and unfold to this day is that of women’s sexual liberation. Women could now sleep with whomever they wanted, flirt with whomever they wanted, and could even cheat with whomever they wanted. One singer who was clearly inspired by this was Gertrude Pridgett, better known as the Mother of the Blues, Ma Rainey. Ma Rainey not only expressed her sexual desires upfront, she was a homosexual, making her incredibly bold sexual lyrics that much more cutting edge. In her 1928 tune “Prove It on Me Blues” Ma Rainey makes it clear as day, “I went out last night with a crowd of my friends, It must’ve been women, ’cause I don’t like no men. Wear my clothes just like a fan, Talk to the gals just like any old man.” Was Ma Rainey a visionary or just expressing herself honestly? Is there a difference? This song is an extreme version of what was common in the 20’s. The freedom of sexual choice and freedom of sexual expression that is celebrated in these lyrics was also celebrated by many women of the time. This same attitude is also depicted in the film It (1927). The “it” that is spoken of in the film is described as the “quality possessed by some which draws all other with its magnetic force.” You could also describe it as the aesthetic and sexual attraction felt by both men and women that has been now been socially liberated. The film, in short, features a woman who falls for a man, and does anything she can do to “get him”. This is a concept that would offend a society just a decade prior, yet was a popular film of the day that many women saw and aspired to be like. The 20’s seemed to have energy like that of playful fun and youthful prosperity, and from a woman’s voice or performance on a screen, we can see how high they must have felt. When you’re that high as a society, the only way to go is down.

The 30’s were the hangover of the 20’s. The stock market crashed, crops wouldn’t grow, and poverty struck the nation in such a way that whole families would leave their homes and ride trains all over the country because they had nothing better to do. 18 year old boys would be kicked out of their homes without any future prospects because the family could not afford to feed another mouth. So many people were without homes and starving during this time that lines for bread would wrap around the block, full of hardworking honest people who had been left behind by powers greater than themselves. Hard Times: an Oral History of the Great Depression (1970) by Studs Terkel has detailed accounts of people who lived through this nightmare. One talented individual who witnessed this tragedy was Yip Harburg, and in Hard Times, Harburg himself details the writing of his song “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime”. The lyrics are from the point of view of a man who once worked hard to bring America it’s money, yet saw none of it return to him, “Once I built a tower to the sun, Brick and rivet and lime, Once I built a tower now it’s done, Brother can you spare a dime? Once in Khaki Boots, Gee we looked swell, Full of that yankee doodle de dum, half a million boots slogging through hell.” This story was a reality for hundreds of thousands of Americans in the 1930’s. In the book, Harburg reveals the inspiration for the title, “the prevailing greeting at the time, on every block you passed, by some poor guy coming up was: Brother, can you spare a dime? Finally hit on every block, on every street. I thought that could be a beautiful title.” He was right. The title of this song is straight from the mouths of the victims of the depression. A primary source within a primary source. This story can be corroborated in yet another first hand account from Hard Times. Kitty McCulloch was fortunate enough to have a home and food, yet still lived humbly. She describes many different beggars that would come to her door asking for clothes, money, and food. She would take it upon herself to feed the poor travelers, with some pleasant experiences and some not. One man who smelled of liquor asked her for some money. She instead made him a sandwich and then “He gave me a dirty look and he started down the alley. I watched him when he got, oh, two, three doors down, he threw it down the street.” This is a man so hopeless that he does not even care to feed himself anymore. Clearly he needed the money for more liquor, something to numb the intense stress and pain of living during this time. Living not even from paycheck to paycheck or meal to meal, but drink to drink. A vividly miserable tale, juxtaposed to a more subtle and subversively miserable take in a subsequent decade.

After the defeat of the Nazis and Imperial Japan in 1945, America’s next biggest threat for the next 4 decades would be the Soviet Union. The Cold War bubbled underneath all of American culture during that time, and a man named Joseph McCarthy was responsible for making that paranoia ever present in American society. The House Un-American Activities Committee was an effort by the United States Government led by Joseph McCarthy to squash any semblance of Communist sympathy in an attempt to expose Soviet spies. In reality, it was just mass hysteria. More innocent people were hurt by this system than were protected by it. The song “I’m No Communist” by Lulu Belle and Scotty both detailed the disdain for the Soviet Union while simultaneously criticizing the US government for their handling of the situation. “I’m no Communist and I’ll tell you that right now, I believe a man should own his own house and car and cow, I like this private ownership and I want to be left alone, Let the government run its business and let me run my own.” Clearly, this song reflects two attitudes that many Americans held both of. A true rock and a hard place, on one hand, the government could publicly oust you for placing any criticism on the American government, which is blatantly unconstitutional. On the other hand, perhaps there could have been secret soviet agents that walked amongst them seeking to undermine American society and destroy it from the inside out (there wasn’t). Either way, America was rightfully stressed out during this time. This stress is best described in The Sixties by Terry Anderson, “In an age of long distance bombers and rockets, the United States was no longer sequestered from it’s enemies by the Atlantic or the Pacific–for the first time in history, Americans felt vulnerable to annihilation.” A perfect storm of hysteria. It is important to remember that this was a time in which conformity was commonplace. The liberalism of the 20’s was replaced with the 50’s strict conservatism. With all this pressure already on the regular everyday citizen, the cherry on top of all of this was the assured mutual destruction with the Soviet Union. The world now could literally end with the push of a button, and it could be pushed at any second of any day. That attitude was reflected in Al Rex’s aptly titled Hydrogen bomb, “Well judgement day will come one day they say, and when it does we’ll all be rocked away”. This was on the minds of American citizens all day and every day. Russia had the power to reach them now, and when they did, it would mean certain death. A thriving utopia cannot be reached under those conditions. However, that pressure caused a break in the system that acted as the catalyst to the immense progression that the 60’s would bring, where music became such a powerful tool that the songs of the era remain relevant to this day. 

In Conclusion, it can be difficult to look back years in the past and try to relate to the struggles of those people. It seems like such a different land that it may as well be fiction. However, The music that survives the time can paint a mental picture vivid enough to understand. The Depression can be learned about through text, but felt through song. A historian could always explain the aesthetics and ideals of a particular era, but a musician could display them. Music is a tool beyond that of just entertainment. It is emotional resonance, documentation, information, and therefore, it is power.