Bob Schwartz

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
The Who, Won’t Get Fooled Again

You tell me it’s the institution
You better free your mind instead
The Beatles, Revolution

The two iconic songs featured here share a basic message, one that resonated in the dynamic tensions of the 1960s and still does:

Change focused on particular elements—who the leader is, which party is in control, what our institutions look like—misses the point and is bound to fail. Maybe not right away, but eventually.

It is too easy and too obvious to focus on those particulars, especially when they are so clearly maleficent and malignant. But history instructs that all revolutions, including our own, can ultimately devolve unless people evolve.

Pete Townsend’s Won’t Get Fooled Again contains this line:

Parting on the left
Is now parting on the right

I just read that women’s hair styling is undergoing a small change. Apparently, unknown to me, center parts have been stylish for a while. But thanks to celebrities and influencers, side parts are making a comeback. When I read that, I thought about the song.

Style is interesting when it comes to change. Back in the 1960s and 1970s, long hair and beards became a sign of countercultural resistance. Just as hair bobbing in the 1920s was a sign of independent women. So changing style can be something, whether to look current or retro, or to send a message.

But it is not enough, never enough.

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We’ll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgement of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song

A change, it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the fold, that’s all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain’t changed
‘Cause the banners, they all flown in the last war

I’ll move myself and my family aside
If we happen to be left half-alive
I’ll get all my papers and smile at the sky
For I know that the hypnotized never lie
Do you?

There’s nothing in the street
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are effaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Is now parting on the right
And the beards have all grown longer overnight

I’ll tip my hat to the new Constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I’ll get on my knees and pray
We don’t get fooled again

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss

---

You say you want a revolution
Well, you know
We all wanna change the world
You tell me that it’s evolution
Well, you know
We all wanna change the world

But when you talk about destruction
Don’t you know that you can count me out

You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We’d all love to see the plan
You ask me for a contribution
Well, you know
We are doing what we can

But if you want money for people with minds that hate
All I can tell you is brother you have to wait

You say you’ll change the constitution
Well, you know
We all want to change your head
You tell me it’s the institution
Well, you know
You’d better free your mind instead

But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao
You ain’t going to make it with anyone anyhow