Search - Harry Chapin :: Last Protest

Song from Harry Chapin's planned movie musical

Lawrance M. Bernabo | The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota | 06/13/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

""The Last Protest Singer" was originally a treatment Harry Chapin began developing in 1978 for a motion picture musical. Chapin was working on the songs at the time of his tragic death in 1981. The main character was named Willie Seine and clearly Chapin intended him to be in the mold of great American Troubadours like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. Seine is on a journey into the off-kilter world of ordinary people searching for fulfillment of their dreams. Such people inspire songs to be written about them, holding to the ideal that "Everybody's special in their ordinary ways." Eventually Willie Seine dies, singing one of his popular songs, having "never found the music to accompany the truth."Harry Chapin was working on eighteen songs in the studio for this project and this album, which was released in 1988, contains the eleven that were well enough along to be completed form the original master tracks by Keith Walsh and Steve Hoffman. Brothers Tom and Steve play on the album, as does Big John Wallace, so the result certainly has the sound of a Harry Chapin album. The problem is in getting the big picture. The contexts of the song are unclear and who knows if the order is right in terms of the narrative structure Chapin was developing (think of any listening to two-thirds of the songs in any other musical played in a random order).Clearly the songs are Harry Chapin in a political state of mind, which makes them different from the story songs that made his reputation and endeared him to his legions of fans. There are love songs about Willie Seine and the young actress who takes him down the back road of truth ("A Quiet Little Love Affair"), but most of the songs reinforce the line in "Basic Protest Song" where our singer warns "But if we can't push for paradise/We'll be setting for hell." In this context it is no wonder that the hero sings "I Don't Want to be President" and attacks the power brokers of the nation in "Sounds Like America to Me." "The Last Protest Singer" is an incomplete work, but is certainly worth a listen, being the one posthumous Harry Chapin album released that has all original songs. Too bad there is not a more comprehensive set of notes or even a libretto, that can give us a better idea of the scope of the what Chapin had in mind.Track List for "The Last Protest Singer":
1. Last of the Protest Singers (4:41)
2. November Rains (3:46)
3. Basic Protest Song (4:28)
4. Last Stand (4:38)
5. Sounds Like America to Me (4:27)
6. Word Wizard (4:14)
7. Anthem (3:48)
8. A Quiet Little Love Affair (2:48)
9. I Don't Want to Be President (4:00)
10. Silly Little Girl (3:26)
11. You Own the Only Light (4:11)"

Great rare Chapin album

Corey Thomas | 07/08/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is one of Chapin's posthumous albums, released in 1988, seven years after his death. While not full of greatest hits or anything of the sort, it is nevertheless an enticing collection of songs for his planned movie musical. It even get some airplay on its first release, with "I Don't Want to Be President", the best and most captivating of the songs, being released as a single. Also, worth listening to are "November Rains" and "Last Stand", which speaks of his impending death. Get it if you can find it."