Are We Not Men?

Good evening, Mr. Phelps. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is:

1. Read this movie review: 

   https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/devo-movie-review-2025 

2. Watch this film: "Devo" (on Netflix)

3. Share your thoughts -- and memories, if you have any.

Devo was a band formed by a bunch of Ohio college students in the early 1970s. Traumatized by the massacre of fellow students at Kent State (two of whom they knew personally, shot by National Guardsmen at a contentious anti-war protest) and disgusted by the ignoble direction of American culture, the students formed a musical band and sought to revolt. Inspired by the Dada movement in Europe (after World War I's horrors), the students embraced surrealism and visual imagery. Devo was the opposite of what rock bands had become at that time -- corporate tools for money-making. Devo had actual ideas. Subversive ideas. A real, if naive, impulse to reverse the direction humanity was heading toward then.

Devo's journey, captured presciently in their song "The Beginning Is The End," was destined for failure. But, before it collapsed, the band garnered attention and had some cultural impact. Devo was embraced by cognoscenti like Brian Eno, David Bowie, Neil Young and Pee-Wee Herman. Its path weaved through the events and personalities of the 1970s-80s. Devo saw the election of Ronald Reagan and reacted accordingly. Devo existed for a decade before, predictably, fizzling out as a money-maker for Warner Records.

If you have any memory of Devo it's probably of their one big hit, "Whip It." They also did many fascinating music videos before MTV existed which caught that wave as it emerged.

One critic wrote: "Devo’s songs now feel like prophecies set to music. That’s cold comfort to the founders, who called it like they saw it but hoped they were wrong."