Whether it is Bruce Springsteen’s recent song ‘Streets of Minneapolis’ following the controversial ICE brutality on immigrants and subsequent deaths in Minnesota, or Lana Del Rey’s ‘Looking for America’ about mass shootings in Texas, protest songs have the ability to define a moment in time, like a hand reaching out to people en masse.

Protest songs have traditionally worked by identifying the injustice, naming the villain and giving listeners something to rally against, while in their purest form, they act as a source of comfort and reminder that someone with a platform is right there with you, but in 1968, American singer-songwriter Joe South released a protest song, ‘Games People Play’, that instead of looking outward at politicians or institutions, turned the lens back on the listener, asking the uncomfortable question of what if the problem was us?