‘60s anti-war icon Country Joe McDonald died Saturday evening of Parkinson’s disease. McDonald, born Joseph Allen McDonald, was 84 at the time of his passing. The singer was best known as the front man for psychedelic folk rock band Country Joe and the Fish, a group that affixed the country with their Vietnam War protest hit “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die Rag.” McDonald formed the group with guitarist Barry Melton in 1965 after serving in the Navy. “The important thing about the ‘Fixin’ to Die Rag’ was that it had a new point of view that did not blame soldiers for war. It just blamed the politicians, and it blamed the manufacturers of weapons,” McDonald told the Street Spirit about the song. They performed the hit at the legendary, generation-defining Woodstock festival in 1969, in which the band made the crowd do the call-and-response “Fish Cheer,” during which the audience was called to spell out the ‘F---’. “We had a thing called the F--- Cheer… We weren’t arrested, but we were tried. I was tried… I was found guilty, and the case was appealed and thrown out of court,” McDonald said of the experience. McDonald released six studio albums with the band throughout the ‘60s and early ‘70s. Afterward, he continued his prolific musical run, releasing dozens more albums with a continued social justice focus, writing about civil rights and environmental issues.
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