In the days when many people are boiling on the streets, fighting, and even vandalizing and looting... in many American cities, perhaps we should try to hear an explanation about the deep origins of this crisis from ca. Mac Davis's In the Ghetto with the voice of Elvis Presley, "released" in 1969.
The song tells a story from the "closed ghetto" of black people in Chicago.
In the Ghetto - Elvis Presley's never-ending song
During the cold snowy winter - Chicago is notoriously "bone-chilling" cold, a mother cried in despair when she had just given birth to a baby, which, for that mother, was "a hungry mouth" she could not eat. want more.
At this point, the song's author poses the problem: either help or that child "will one day become an angry young man" - call it "hating life" - after - in poverty - grew up, wandering on the streets, learning to "steal" and learning to fight in his isolated slum (ghetto).
The mother cried because she foresaw her son's fate: one cold night with a bought gun, he wanted to escape that poverty, stole a car, ran away, but couldn't run far. Can't get out of the slums.
The crowd gathered around the body of an angry young man, face down on the ground, gun in hand... Another baby was born...
Another snotty-nosed child who runs around today and steals tomorrow, continuing that vicious cycle. The song asks a question for everyone: "Let's look at each other and ourselves, are we too blind to not see anything, and turn our heads to look elsewhere"?
The opening guitar sound "bounces" like the opening of Suspicious Minds - a song from the same era (also by Elvis), but slower.
Elvis Presley's voice is not as "melodic" as in other melodious songs, but simply as if it wanted to narrate the incident. Listening, you will see Elvis and the accompaniment expressing how sad the words "and his mama cried" were after the boy died.
Did Elvis's American society listen and understand, even though this song was also ranked 3rd on the Billboard Hot 100? Maybe it's not very understandable, not as good as in some other societies, like Australia, Belgium, Germany, Norway, New Zealand, Spain... - where this song is always number one.
Probably not many people listen, including big and small politicians. That's why there are riots and destruction of "freedom" like in previous weeks, acts that in the end are just attempts to escape the ghetto of today?
The main rhyme in the song, the rhyme [aiz] in "As the snow flies", "and his mama cries" creates a sense of silver. I don't know if it was due to emotion, but when I heard Elvis sing the phrase "and his mama cries" at the end, it felt like Elvis wanted to gently narrate the story and not shout angrily...
It feels like Elvis, when singing this song, chose to sing gently in accordance with the non-violent spirit of Pastor Martin Luther King.
It is true that he made the comment: "Riot is the language of those who have never been heard", but his policy was: "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do so." "Hate cannot eliminate hate; only love can do that."
