Hello!
When we decided to set up this website we thought it would be nice to find a name that somehow symbolised what it was that we wanted the site to represent - a quote from one of Phil's songs perhaps that related to his legacy, about what he wanted to leave behind, about his vision of the future.
And what did we find?
Nothing. Or precious little anyway.
In Phil's songs the past gets a good old going over, and the present too. But the future?
How can someone so wrapped up in the need for change, in the need for change for the better, be so uninterested in the future so as to not even acknowledge what could be after he had ceased to be.
In his early songs it was as if he was so wrapped up in current affairs that he couldn't see beyond them.
His later songs are so riddled with bleakness that in place of a future he saw only apocalypse.
And yet...
This isn't something that I imagine myself writing often but...Phil was wrong.
The future that he couldn't imagine, the future that he couldn't bring himself to sing about is here. It is now. It is us.
And this isn't even a future without Phil Ochs. Phil Ochs is with us still. So long as we remember his ideas, read his words, sing his songs he'll be with us.
This site is our attempt to gather together just a tiny bit of the Phil Ochs that has survived and continues to thrive in a century that he never saw but nevertheless continues to feel his influence.
Phil, this is for you.
When we decided to set up this website we thought it would be nice to find a name that somehow symbolised what it was that we wanted the site to represent - a quote from one of Phil's songs perhaps that related to his legacy, about what he wanted to leave behind, about his vision of the future.
And what did we find?
Nothing. Or precious little anyway.
In Phil's songs the past gets a good old going over, and the present too. But the future?
How can someone so wrapped up in the need for change, in the need for change for the better, be so uninterested in the future so as to not even acknowledge what could be after he had ceased to be.
In his early songs it was as if he was so wrapped up in current affairs that he couldn't see beyond them.
His later songs are so riddled with bleakness that in place of a future he saw only apocalypse.
And yet...
This isn't something that I imagine myself writing often but...Phil was wrong.
The future that he couldn't imagine, the future that he couldn't bring himself to sing about is here. It is now. It is us.
And this isn't even a future without Phil Ochs. Phil Ochs is with us still. So long as we remember his ideas, read his words, sing his songs he'll be with us.
This site is our attempt to gather together just a tiny bit of the Phil Ochs that has survived and continues to thrive in a century that he never saw but nevertheless continues to feel his influence.
Phil, this is for you.