Woody Guthrie was a 20th-century musician and writer whose songs and stories about the American experience have influenced the country's music, identity, and mythology. Guthrie was born in Oklahoma, but eventually moved to Texas, where he experienced firsthand the Dust Bowl, the catastrophic ecological and economic disaster of the 1930s, and began writing music in response.
> Before he was known as a folk singer, Guthrie was a popular radio host in Los Angeles. (Read)
> Guthrie emblazoned "This machine kills fascists" on his guitar, a phrase he borrowed from war machinery. (Read)
Throughout the '30s, Guthrie became a significant political voice for migrants in California through his radio shows and a popular newspaper column, "Woody Sez." In 1940, he wrote the song "This Land Is Your Land" and recorded "Dust Bowl Ballads," a concept album about the migrant experience.
> Guthrie wrote "This Land Is Your Land" as a sarcastic response to "God Bless America." (Read)
> Listen to "Dust Bowl Ballads," considered by some to be the first concept album. (Listen)
Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Joe Strummer, and many other songwriters cite Guthrie as a major influence. He was posthumously inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.
> Dylan considered Guthrie a foundational influence, something he immortalized in his 1962 recording, "Song to Woody." (Listen)
> Watch Springsteen's 1985 performance of "This Land Is Your Land," which he calls "the greatest song ever written about America." (Watch)
Discover more:
> The Bonneville Power Administration commissioned Guthrie to write songs about Washington state's Columbia River. (Listen)
> Guthrie was briefly a member of the Communist Party USA, but he was kicked out for "lack of discipline." (Read)
> The FBI tracked Woody Guthrie's politics for years, amassing an enormous file that was only discovered many years after his death. (Read)
> In 1998, Billy Bragg and Wilco recorded unreleased songs penned by Woody Guthrie. (Read)
