When Soul Music Marched with Selma
In 1965, America was unraveling. The Vietnam War raged on, young men were drafted into an uncertain fate, and the shadow of nuclear annihilation loomed large. At home, the Civil Rights Movement was reaching a fever pitch, while unrest in the Middle East and the high-stakes space race added to the sense that the world was teetering on the edge.
• “EVE OF DESTRUCTION” •
Songwriter P.F. Sloan took all of this turmoil at age 19 and distilled it into “Eve of Destruction,” a searing protest song that held up a mirror to the chaos of the Sixties. No other song of its time dared to connect the dots between war, racial injustice, and political upheaval so explicitly. Yet, when Sloan pitched it to the Byrds—perhaps hoping a white folk-rock band could push its message further—they turned it down. The Turtles recorded their own version, but it barely made a dent in 1965
In mid-July 1965, white folk rock singer Barry McGuire stepped into the studio, a crumpled lyric sheet in hand, and recorded “Eve of Destruction” in a single, raw take. The song had already been powerful, but its lyrics were updated to reflect the Selma to Montgomery marches and the brutality of Bloody Sunday, events that had shaken the nation just months earlier.
McGuire assumed this was just a rough cut, fully expecting to return for a polished version. But Dunhill Records had other plans. Just days later, without his knowledge, they released the unvarnished recording—gritty, urgent, and imperfect. That rawness, rather than being a flaw, became its defining strength.
LISTEN TO “EVE OF DESTRUCTION” BY BARRY MCGUIRE
Conservatives denounced “Eve of Destruction” as dangerous propaganda, while the media pointed to it as proof that rebellious youth were the root of society’s problems. American radio stations outright banned it, claiming it was “an aid to the enemy in Vietnam.” Across the Atlantic, UK stations like Radio Scotland followed suit, and the BBC placed it on its notorious “restricted list.”
Yet, censorship only fueled the song’s fire. By September 1965, “Eve of Destruction” defied the bans, surging to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and reaching No. 3 on the UK singles chart. White surf-pop duo Jan and Dean took notice, recording their own version for Folk ‘n Roll, swapping in “Watts, California” in reference to the riots that had erupted just weeks earlier. The Grass Roots followed with their own cover on Where Were You When I Needed You in 1966.
The song’s influence echoed beyond the Sixties. In 1970, The Temptations name-dropped it in their politically charged anthem “Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World Is Today).” Decades later, when Barry McGuire revisited “Eve of Destruction” in live performances, he updated the lyrics once more—replacing Selma with Columbine, Colorado, a chilling nod to the 1999 school massacre. The world had changed, but the song’s warning still rang true.
• BLOODY SUNDAY •
Pops Staples kept a close watch on the news, but some stories hit harder than others. On March 7, 1965, a peaceful march set out from Selma, Alabama—more than 600 people determined to walk to Montgomery in protest of the recent killing of civil rights activist Jimmie Lee Jackson in Marion. They didn’t get far. As they stepped onto the Edmund Pettus Bridge, they were met with a brutal wall of resistance—police armed with clubs, attack dogs lunging at their leashes, clouds of tear gas filling the air.
Television cameras captured the horror in real-time. Viewers across the country watched as officers swung batons into unarmed demonstrators, the sickening crack of wood against bone echoing through living rooms. John Lewis, just 25 years old, took a blow to the head so fierce it fractured his skull. Blood stained the pavement. “Bloody Sunday,” they called it. The violence was meant to silence the movement, but instead, it ignited a fire. The nation could no longer look away. Neither could Roebuck “Pops” Staples.
Roebuck “Pops” Staples. Illustration by J.D. Humphreys
“The things we did were mostly inside with Dr. King,” Pervis Staples recalls in I’ll Take You There by Greg Knot. “We didn’t do too many marches because we were touring so much. But we were paying attention to the Movement, and we all saw what happened on that long walk from Selma. When they got to that bridge, and the white folks had taken some big ol’ nuts off the tractors and put them on sticks and they were hitting that bridge. Then the horses came and people were running and screaming. That was something we never forgot. It hit Pops hard.”
The events of March 1965 weighed heavily on Pops Staples, and from that anguish came one of the most powerful songs of the Civil Rights Movement—“Freedom Highway.” Written and recorded live, the song wasn’t just music; it was testimony. Pops wove together history, philosophy, biblical imagery, and unfiltered rage, turning the track into a rallying cry for justice.
Among its most haunting references was the 1955 murder of Emmett Till. The 14-year-old boy, accused of whistling at a white woman, was lynched, beaten beyond recognition, and thrown into the Tallahatchie River. When his body was recovered, his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, made an unthinkable choice—she held an open-casket funeral in Chicago, allowing the world to see what had been done to her son. Photos of Till’s mutilated face spread across the country, igniting a movement. A decade later, as Black marchers were beaten on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, Pops Staples channeled that same fury into “Freedom Highway,” a song that refused to let America forget.
“Freedom Highway” was just the beginning of Pops Staples’ artistic reckoning with racism and white bigotry. The pain and frustration that had simmered for years found their way into his music, one song at a time.
LISTEN TO “FREEDOM HIGHWAY” BY THE STAPLE SINGERS
In 1957, despite the Supreme Court’s ruling that school segregation was unconstitutional, nine Black students—known as the Little Rock Nine—were physically blocked from entering Little Rock Central High School. National news cameras captured the gut-wrenching scene: armed National Guardsmen standing in the school’s doorway, ordering the students to turn around.
Mavis Staples. Illustration by J.D. Humphreys
Mavis Staples remembers her father watching the footage from his recliner, his face tense with disbelief. “Why would they do that? Why are they treated so bad?” he muttered. That night, he picked up his guitar and turned his sorrow into song. The result was “Why? (Am I Treated So Bad)”—a mournful, unflinching reflection on the daily injustices faced by Black Americans. When The Staple Singers recorded it for their 1966 album, the song struck a chord far beyond the world of music.
LISTEN TO “WHY? (AM I TREATED SO BAD)” BY THE STAPLE SINGERS
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was so moved by it that he claimed it as his own anthem. Every time he saw Pops, he had the same request: “You gonna play my song tonight?”
As the Staple Singers evolved, blending gospel with folk, soul, and eventually R&B, whispers of betrayal followed them. Some accused them of "selling out," abandoning the sacred for the secular. Others saw it as something even more blasphemous—a severing of their church roots, the same charge once hurled at Sam Cooke when he dared to step beyond gospel’s walls.
Critic Barney Hoskyns dismissed their transition as “Uncle Tomming for the flower children,” a cruel and reductive take on a group that had spent years using their music as a vehicle for change. But the Staples weren’t bowing to anyone—they were reaching everyone. By 1965, they were sharing stages with the biggest names in soul and R&B: The Temptations, Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles, Gladys Knight and the Pips, The Four Tops. Their audiences grew younger, more diverse, and for many, this was their first real encounter with gospel’s emotional depth.
Crossover wasn’t just inevitable—it was powerful. The Staple Singers were still preaching, just from a different pulpit, and their message of Civil Rights and social justice was ringing louder than ever.
Nancy Wilson. Illustration by J.D. Humphreys
Jazz singer Nancy Wilson, transfixed and horrified of the events unfolding in Selma, was shocked to discover that racial discrimination was alive and well in her home state of Ohio. On the night of her opening performance, Wilson had invited friends to join her, but they never showed. When she called to inquire why, she was stunned to learn that the club had insisted they make reservations—despite knowing that was never a requirement. “It never occurred to me that nobody Black ever went to this club,” she recalled. Realizing her friends had been turned away simply because they were Black, Wilson confronted the club owner, demanding to know about this “reservation policy” and insisted he reserve four seats under her name for the evening’s early show. As for the club’s policy on excluding Black patrons, she declared, "Oh, that's not the case anymore."
In 1965, even the Supremes used their stage at the iconic Copacabana nightclub in New York City to speak out. Their performance of "Somewhere," from West Side Story, became a signature act that resonated far beyond the music. While in Los Angeles, Diana Ross broke from the performance, delivering a powerful pro-civil rights monologue. After singing "Somewhere," she likened the start of a stream trickling down a hillside to a river destined for the sea, saying, "Certainly we can do that too." With optimism in her voice, she declared, “Free at last… free at last.” The crowd erupted in applause. President Lyndon Johnson, having watched the performance, later reassured Ross that the progress she envisioned would come—"little by little," just as she had described. For Ross, the lyrics were a platform to tie the song's hope to the urgency of social change. Just months earlier, the Selma-to-Montgomery marches had unfolded, their brutality on "Bloody Sunday" fresh in the national consciousness. Meanwhile, Berry Gordy, the Supremes' label head, was deeply concerned. He feared that their outspoken stance on civil rights could jeopardize the future of Motown.
• NINA SIMONE’S BOILING POINT •
Nina Simone couldn’t have cared less if her white audience was offended. In 1963, she was done with silence, and her music became a searing blast of fury aimed at a world that refused to listen. No longer willing to tiptoe around the truth, Simone’s rage bled into every note. She wasn’t there to entertain—they were there to hear the hard, unforgiving reality of the struggle. If it made her audience uncomfortable, so be it. This was her fight, and she wasn’t holding back for anyone.
Born Eunice Waymon in Tryon, North Carolina, Simone’s musical gift was undeniable—playing piano by the age of three. But instead of childhood friendships, she was isolated by hours of practice, her every move focused on molding her into a classical pianist. At Juilliard, she excelled, only to be rejected by the Curtis Institute, likely because of her race. Disillusioned, she took her talent to Atlantic City’s nightclubs, hiding her work from her parents, who condemned it as “Devil’s music.” Renaming herself Nina Simone, she fused jazz, blues, and classical to explosive effect. It wasn’t until a club owner pushed her to sing, not just play, that she fully realized her power—ushering in a new era for her career.
Nina Simone. Illustration by J.D. Humphreys
Simone’s career took a bold turn when she signed with the Philips label and released her debut album, Nina Simone in Concert, featuring the fiery anthem “Mississippi Goddam.” The year was 1963, and the brutal murder of Medgar Evers and the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church—killing four young Black girls—pushed Simone to channel her anger and heartbreak into her music full-time. Her neighbor, Lorraine Hansberry, the playwright behind A Raisin in the Sun, had been urging her to join the Civil Rights Movement. But after the atrocities in the South, Simone had no choice but to lend her voice to the fight, her music becoming a battle cry for justice.
"Mississippi Goddam" was Simone’s scorching protest anthem, crafted with the fury of "throwing 10 bullets back at them," as she put it. In her memoir I Put a Spell on You, she revealed her first instinct was far darker: to grab a gun and shoot the first white person she saw. Her husband convinced her to write a song instead.
“I was more than angry when I wrote ‘Goddam’... I was violent,” Simone would say later. “But I’m not violent all the time. Most of the time I’m the same as everyone. But I know my people need me and I won’t let them down.”
“Mississippi Goddam” seethes with urgency, a defiant refusal to wait any longer for change. In the song, a furious Simone chants, “Alabama’s gotten me so upset, Tennessee made me lose my rest, And everybody knows about Mississippi goddam.”
“Alabama’s gotten me so upset, Tennessee made me lose my rest, And everybody knows about Mississippi goddam.”
- Nina Simone in “Mississippi Goddam”
Simone brought “Mississippi Goddam” to life at the Village Gate in Greenwich Village, and in March 1964, a mostly white crowd at Carnegie Hall was in for an earful. With an upbeat, hurried tempo, she started by addressing them head-on: “The name of this tune is ‘Mississippi Goddam!’” Laughter rippled through the audience, some even clapping, unprepared for the force of what was coming. Simone, undeterred by their amusement, shot back, "And I mean every word of it." The crowd, still chuckling, quickly fell into a stunned silence as she launched into the song, delivering an unflinching message they weren’t about to ignore.
When “Mississippi Goddam” was sent to radio stations, many balked at playing it simply because of the word “goddam” in the title. Some refused outright, and one Southern station even returned its box of promotional copies in pieces. The song became one of the most provocative, unapologetic anthems of its time, a direct call to action on the urgent need for civil rights reform. Also featured on the album was “Old Jim Crow,” a scathing critique of the unjust Jim Crow laws, boldly declaring that they were a thing of the past—and demanding that the world recognize it.
LISTEN TO “MISSISSIPPI GODDAM” BY NINA SIMONE
For many, the tumult of the times found expression in the music of Simone and other artists. Mississippi author Anne Moody, for example, found that Ray Charles spoke her mind like no one else. “I put a Ray Charles record on the box, and he was saying, ‘feeling sad all the time, that’s because I got a worried mind. The world is an uproar, the danger zone is everywhere. Read your paper, and you’ll see just exactly what keep worryin’ me.’” For the first time, she felt as though Charles was speaking directly to her. Both Charles and Simone became powerful voices for Black Americans, though their approaches couldn’t have been more different. Charles channeled frustration, refusing to perform at segregated venues, while Simone’s increasingly radical activism was shaped by the personal struggles she faced, including the early signs of mental health challenges.
Simone was active in civil rights events, including the Selma to Montgomery marches in 1965, but her views began to shift away from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s non-violent message. As she embraced militancy and the rising Black Power movement, Simone made it clear she was done with the "We Shall Overcome" philosophy of passive endurance. In her music, she reimagined Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht’s “Pirate Jenny,” turning the song about class struggle in London into a tale of a Black woman’s vengeance against white citizens in a “crummy southern town.” Simone understood the brutal reality of white supremacy and the violence of the Ku Klux Klan, knowing well that white people were complicit when Black people’s suffering went unpunished.
LISTEN TO “PIRATE JENNY” BY NINA SIMONE
Growing up as a young Black girl in segregated North Carolina, Simone lived more comfortably than many Black families, but she couldn't reconcile the harsh, unjust social climate that persisted throughout her life. “I was a Black girl and I knew about it,” Simone said, aware from an early age of the discrimination surrounding her. The rejection from the Curtis Institute of Music stayed with her, fueling a deep bitterness. “I never really got over that jolt of racism,” she admitted. Often explosive and visibly frustrated, Simone didn’t see change as impossible but demanded it happen faster, frequently using her music as a powerful tool to push for that change.
In 1967, Nina Simone left the Philips label for RCA Victor, where she released “Backlash Blues” on the album Nina Sings the Blues. Written by her friend and Harlem visionary Langston Hughes, the song takes aim at “Mr. Backlash,” a representation of white society. In it, Simone condemns a system that raises her taxes, freezes her wages, sends her son to Vietnam, and provides second-class schools and housing. She warns that it is “Mr. Backlash” who "will have the blues." Also released that year on Silk & Soul was Simone’s rendition of Billie Taylor’s “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to be Free,” adding another layer of emotional depth to her already powerful repertoire.
LISTEN TO “BACKLASH BLUES” BY NINA SIMONE
“She is loved or feared, adored or disliked, but few who have met her music or glimpsed her soul react with moderation,” Maya Angelou wrote of Simone in a 1970 magazine article. “She is an extremist, extremely realized.”
• JAMES BROWN — “THIS HERE’S BLACK POWER, BABY” •
James Brown, known for his eccentricity, made his first public stand as a social and political activist during "The March Against Fear" in June 1966. The march had been started by James Meredith, the first Black American accepted into the University of Mississippi, who was walking from Memphis to Jackson to advocate for voting rights. On the second day, Meredith was shot by a white supremacist. While he recovered in the hospital, Martin Luther King Jr., Stokely Carmichael, and James Brown stepped in to continue Meredith’s march, picking up where he had left off.
James Brown. Illustration by J.D. Humphreys
Brown flew his seven-member band to Jackson, where he took the stage at historically Black Tougaloo College for a rally hosted by comedian Dick Gregory. As Brown moved through the crowd, Jet magazine noted that he "looked like Moses parting the Red Sea," embodying a new kind of Black self-confidence. Despite the warm weather, Brown powered through performances of “Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag” and ended “Please Please Please,” bringing it to a close with “just hang on.” His cheeks wet with tears, Brown nodded in agreement when the announcer proclaimed, “This here’s Black power, baby.”
“There was no doubt that he was addressing this plea to the Freedom Marchers who had endured harassment and abuse while marching the 260 miles from Memphis to Jackson,” wrote The Philadelphia Tribune.
“There was no doubt that he was addressing this plea to the Freedom Marchers who had endured harassment and abuse while marching the 260 miles from Memphis to Jackson.”
- The Philadelphia Tribune