Mastodawn

Country Joe McDonald, the iconic lead singer of Country Joe and the Fish and a defining voice of 1960s counterculture, died on March 7, 2026, at age 84 in Berkeley, California. Joe was a Navy veteran who remained a vocal and adamant anti war activist and advocate for veterans.

Inspired by Woody Guthrie and the folk and protest music of the era, McDonald formed Country Joe and the Fish alongside Barry "The Fish" Melton. Known for his anti-Vietnam War anthem "I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag" at Woodstock, he passed away from complications of Parkinson's disease.

He was a good man, he did good things, he will be missed on this plane, and welcomed back into the energy in the next one. So long Joe, and thanks for all the Fish.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRl6-bHlz-4

#CountryJoe #Fish #folkMusic

Edit: Grammar, typo, tmi. :)

Country Joe Mcdonald - Feel Like i'm Fixing to Die Rag - Woodstock '69

YouTube

CynBlogger™️Resists Tyranny!Mar 8

@MissConstrue
😢♥️

@MissConstrue
🙏 🕉️

🕯️Curious Magpie 🕯️Mar 8

@MissConstrue 💔 they're all so young - what happened to all those beautiful children 😢

MissConstrue Mar 8

@CuriousMagpie I know! My parents were younger than my daughter is NOW at that concert. 🌼

And they grew up to be monsters. That generation man, what the hell went wrong?

@MissConstrue @CuriousMagpie I'm part of that generation, and I still wonder wtf went wrong....our innocence was our strength and finally our weakness 😔.

Peace, love and happiness ✌️🕉️

@CuriousMagpie
Yes, it’s a great piece of footage, all so young & beautiful, as you say. Someone else noted that the song was, sadly, still relevant & added a contemporary lyric: “next step Teh’ran” ☹️😢

#USPol #protestSong

MissConstrue Mar 8

@Su_G @CuriousMagpie

It's never stopped being relevant. I'm trying hard to think of a point in my entire life when we didn't have troops deployed in action.

Vietnam shaped my childhood, and probably my whole life. Then Laos, Congo, Dominican Republic, Israel sinking The Liberty, Cambodia, the Yom Kippur War, Iran, the Sinai, El Salvador, Libya, Grenada, Persian Gulf (many times), Honduras, USS Vincennes shoot-down of Iran Air Flight 655, Panama, Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru and the Philippines....and that only gets us to 1990. And doesn't include all the shenanigans that Spooks and Wetwork Inc. get up to.

The United States has been in conflict of one sort or another for the entirety of it's existence. We are clearly a very angry and warlike people. The whole damn country needs anger management and trauma therapy.

@MissConstrue Thank you for posting this and about your experience. I’ve been a fan of his since I first heard the Woodstock album all those years ago. Hope he’s found some peace from his Parkinson’s.

Whitney McNamara Mar 8

@MissConstrue My little social connection there is that my mother- in-law apparently dated one the the early Fish drummers in Berkeley before moving to Indiana in the later '60s, to try to start an organic farm.

MissConstrue Mar 8

@whitneymcn The world is so small sometimes. We forget, when faced with overwhelming deluge of othering, that in some way, we are all connected. 🥰

@MissConstrue I am truly shocked - it was only last week that someone posted the lyrics of Fixing to Die Rag, changing the word 'Vietnam' to 'Iran' on Lemmy.

I posted back the chorus:

...and it's one, two, three
What are we fighting for?
Don't ask me, I don't give a damn,
Next stop is Iran.

RIP Joe 😔.

Carlos Solís Mar 9

One of those cases where history literally, and unfortunately, rhymes and even matches the meter

@csolisr There were so many protest songs back then which are very relevant to the current situation....I have to wonder where are today's musicians, stepping forward and speaking out. Different times, I suppose ☹️.

Carlos Solís Mar 9

@Oyu_Fka The musicians are few and far between, but there are some, for example: youtube.com/watch?v=kWG0K3Y8ZU…

No Kings

YouTube

@csolisr Ah, yes! I've heard a few of his songs....excellent. I agree there are some - the problem is they don't get pushed to the fore for some reason 🤔.

@MissConstrue RIP Country Joe

Steve Felten Mar 9

@MissConstrue Gimme an F!

RIP to a legend

@MissConstrue "Give me an F, Give me a U, give me a C, give me a K."

angst-ridden wanderer Mar 9

@MissConstrue gimme an F!

Still relevant. RIP

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bV7mDnI16h8

An Untitled Protest- Country Joe and The Fish

YouTube

PandaChronicle Resists Mar 9

😢
The soundtrack of my youth...

@MissConstrue Well, that's a whole lot of feels going way back to my single digit days

My camera shoots fascists Mar 9

🫡 godspeed, Joe 💔