In the mood for some rock songs from back in 1970 that are still somehow relevant over half a century later? These three jams touch on the political, cultural, and environmental issues of both 1970 and the present day. They prove that sometimes, a well-written song’s meaning continues to carry through the years. Let’s take a look, shall we?
“Working Class Hero” by John Lennon from ‘John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band’
John Lennon was always a forward-thinking musician, so it comes as no surprise that a song like “Working Class Hero” from 1970 would touch on things that remain relevant in the 2020s. Lennon penned this somewhat bleak folk-rock tune about everything from class to feeling alienated as a young person to the horrors of capitalism.
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“Working Class Hero” was a commentary on social class that a lot of listeners related to back in 1970. The track didn’t chart, but it remains a deep cut favorite among many fans.
“After The Gold Rush” by Neil Young from ‘After The Gold Rush’
Neil Young was singing about environmental anxiety and fear for the future of the planet and humanity long before it was in vogue. Lyrics like “Look at Mother Nature on the run / In the nineteen seventies” feel startlingly contemporary and could easily be changed to “in the twenty twenties.” While Young has said he doesn’t remember what the song is about and once joked that it was about an alien invasion, most media-literate music-enjoyers can pick apart the poetic lines about environmental destruction.
“War Pigs” by Black Sabbath from ‘Paranoid’
Give this Black Sabbath classic from 1970 a thorough listen, and it’ll be pretty clear how this early heavy metal hit is still relevant among other rock songs in our modern age.
Outside of its lyrics, “War Pigs” is relevant in the sense that, musically, it was quite ahead of its time. Heavy metal was in its infancy in 1970, and Black Sabbath propelled the genre forward with songs like “War Pigs” and other distorted, heavy songs on Paranoid. “War Pigs”, specifically, wasn’t released as a single and thus didn’t chart at the time, but it remains one of the band’s most well-known songs.
(Photo by Chris Walter/WireImage)