Origin of Song: Gil Scott-Heron’s Revolution of the Mind

In 1970, Gil Scott-Heron was barely 21 when his first novel, The Vulture, was published and his startling, spoken-word record, Small Talk at 125th and Lenox, caught his incisive cool on tape. “I consider myself neither poet, composer, or musician. These are merely tools used by sensitive men to carve out a piece of beauty or truth that they hope may lead to peace and salvation,” he wrote in the album’s liner notes. Accompanied only by conga drums and percussion, Small Talk at 125th and Lenox featured a reading of  “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”, Scott-Heron’s most enduring work and an early masterpiece with words no less potent today than they were when Marshall McLuhan’s “cool medium” was still a relative baby.

“The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In four parts without commercial interruptions.”

Excoriating the media and marketing, the song’s structure burrowed its way into the collective conscious of musicians—both mainstream and underground—and listeners alike; it is referenced throughout music, and rather un-ironically the title phrase has been repurposed to advertise consumer goods, from sneakers to television itself. The piece is also, of course, foundational to hip-hop, its words potent and direct, even if some of the allusions and references may be lost on those uneducated in ‘60s or ‘70s culture. It also sounds great, which explains why musically it’s a standard-bearer for everything from politicized and sexy neo-soul with funk grooves to jazz. Yet pulsing throughout the piece is Scott-Heron’s projection, similar to the theories of McLuhan and scientists like Tesla who foreshadowed the actual facts of global connectivity as well as the pacifying effect on the brain from viewing from a small screen. Heron was channeling his times while bringing a word to the wise:

“The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal…
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, because the revolution will not be televised.”

We’re heard via media channels that the revolution will be “digitized,” the revolution will be “synthesized,” but so far, the revolution has not been “organized.” One ill-fated ad campaign suggested the revolution will be televised. But Scott-Heron was well ahead of the ball when he posited a necessary parsing of media-generated “reality” from truth and set his poem to music on his 1971 album, Pieces of a Man. With that release, Scott-Heron was caught in the chasm between jazz and soul, poetry and rock, and few knew just what to do with the new poet and big bass voice on the scene, though time would reveal his impact, as he would later weigh in on matters environmental and racial, as well as political and social. Though often his was a cry in wilderness, it served as a clarion for future generations of conscious voices...

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Denise Sullivan @'Crawdaddy'