Pete Seeger (born May 3, 1919) and Lee Hays (born 1914) had worked together for the first time in 1940 as part of the Almanac Singers, who had enjoyed brief but notable success on radio, and as a recording outfit doing topical songs in a folk idiom, until their leftist political views became an issue the group members had been caught in the uncomfortable position, as dedicated Communists, of having pushed pacifism and American neutrality during 1940 and early 1941, and then reversing themselves after Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union. The Weavers bear a striking resemblance to an earlier group called the Almanac Singers. And the songs that they wrote or popularized, including “Kisses Sweeter Than Wine,” “Wimoweh,” “Goodnight Irene,” “Wreck of the John B,” “Follow the Drinking Gourd,” and “On Top of Old Smoky,” continued to get recorded (and occasionally to chart) 50 years after the group’s own time. Yet, despite the controversy that surrounded them, and the fact that their work was interrupted at its peak, the Weavers managed to alter popular culture in about as profound a manner as any artist this side of Bob Dylan - indeed, in setting the stage for the 1950s folk revival, and indirectly fostering the careers of the Kingston Trio, among others, and bridging the gap between folk and popular music, and the topical song, they helped set the stage for Dylan’s eventual emergence. The quartet went from being embraced by the public, and selling four million records, to being reviled and rejected over the political backgrounds of its members, and disbanding after only four years together. How could a song as pleasant and tuneful as “Kisses Sweeter Than Wine” be subversive? More than 50 years after their heyday, however, their origins, the level of their success, the forces that cut the group’s future off in its prime, and the allure that keeps their music selling are all difficult to explain - as, indeed, none of this was all that easy to explain at the time. The Weavers had the most extraordinary musical pedigree and pre-history of any performing group in the history of folk or popular music.
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