A Podcast Conversation With Danny Goldberg

By Bill King

We are nearing the end of 2021, a consequential year with a world in crisis battling competing interests. Issues that most affect the health and sanity of the planet – from climate to income equality to human rights tugging at the soul of humanity. The politics of hate and division.

Author Danny Goldberg's new book, Bloody Crossroads, is a front seat ride with those in the arts and entertainment industry - resisters organizing and protesting against a 'doomsday cult' lurching towards autocracy and fascism. Goldberg confronts an electorate that knowingly embraced a game show host who neither cares nor is concerned about his 30,000 plus lies, or the hundreds of thousands of Covid deaths of which he could have prevented. A rolling clown car of immoral hacks, opportunists and grifters. The shredding of democracy.

It's obvious Donald Trump views his supporters as mere pegs in the ground, potential storm troopers based on the 'big lie.' It's a power game - old white America’s last stand against changing demographics. It's 'Death of a Nation,' encouraged and propagated by the Republican party, FOX News and other fake conspiracy entities.

From the downbeat of Trump's presidency, the 'liberal Hollywood' reaction has been one of activism. Entertainers as social activists in line with social imperatives; transgender rights, gay, voting, women's, equal rights – the rights of each individual - the truths that underline daily life in the workplace and at home.  

Goldberg traces the momentum to unseat Trump and the march to oust the demagogue. The progressives behind tilting the 2020 election to Joe Biden. Goldberg interviews: Bruce Springsteen, John Legend, Rosanne Cash, David Simon, Adam McKay, Chuck D, David Corn, Mandy Patinkin, and others. Beyond the music community, it's the far-reaching impact of known political activists, late-night television hosts, hip hop, rap, comics, Stephen Colbert, Trevor Noah, Taylor Swift, Cardi B, Alyssa Milano, Mark Ruffalo, Jane Fonda, Robert De Niro, Bette Midler, Steven Spielberg, Spike Lee, Ava DuVernay, Dave Chappelle, Chris Rock, and Wanda Sykes.

Danny Goldberg is the author of the acclaimed books How The Left Lost Teen Spirit, Bumping into Geniuses, In Search of the Lost Chord, 1967 and the Hippie Idea, and Serving the Servant: Remembering Kurt Cobain. He began his career in 1969 with Billboard, for whom he reviewed the Woodstock Festival and later wrote for Rolling Stone and Crawdaddy. He worked as a personal manager for Nirvana, Bonnie Raitt, the Allman Brothers Band, and Sonic Youth, and was president of several major record companies. He currently runs Gold Village Entertainment, a management company whose clients include Steve Earle, Martha Wainwright, and The Waterboys. Goldberg is the former chair of the ACLU of Southern California, serves on the board of Public Citizen, and frequently writes about politics and culture for The Nation.

Learn more in this FYI podcast.