33 Revolutions per Minute is a history of the protest music told via 33 songs. Why 33? Partly because that' s the number of rotations performed by a vinyl album in one minute, and partly because it takes a lot of songs to tell a story which spans seevn decades and five continents - to capture the colour and variety of this shape-shifting genre. These are not necessarily the best 33 protest songs, because this is not fundamentally a list book, but each one offers a way into a subject, an artist, an era or an idea. The book will feel vital, in both senses of the word: necessary and alive. It will capture some of the energy that is generated when musicians take risks, and even when they fail, leave the popular culture a little richer and more challenging. COntrary to the frequently voiced idea that pop and politics are awkward bedfellows, I will argue that protest music IS pop, in all its blazing, cussed glory.