Gordon Lightfoot gets well-deserved acclaim for his strong suits in classic Canadiana (The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald & Canadian Railroad Trilogy), his love songs (If You Could Read My Mind & Pussywillows, Cattails) and his enduring bar-band standards (Sundown & Early Morning Rain), but the power of his scathing, percussive hit, Black Day In July, remains unique
Strongly stung by the intensity and proximity of the 1967 Detroit riots, which lasted five days and caused unprecedented death and destruction, Lightfoot voiced the growing frustration that was igniting songwriters all over the free world as racism, poverty and the Tet offensive dominated the media. The song tracked strongly in Canada and the U.S., until it was pulled from airplay after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King.
Its poetry is steeped in the blood and anger of Detroit, but continues to ask questions of Ferguson, Paris, and whatever tragedies next week's news may have in store.
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