Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” from 1964, is one of our all-time great protest songs, and the world needs great protest songs right now. And so Billy Bragg, the great veteran socialist singer-songwriter, has taken “The Times They Are A Changin'” and tweaked its lyrics to make it a song about our new President. Without altering the structure of the song, Bragg has turned it into a sweeping bromide, one that touches on climate change, mob violence, and reproductive rights. He’s called it “The Times, They Are A-Changin’ Back.” Below, watch Bragg singing his version of the song and read his statement about it, via Brooklyn Vegan.

Bragg writes:

At 5pm on Friday, at the moment Donald Trump became President of the United States, Joe Henry and I were beginning our sound check in Salisbury. Joe began mournfully strumming Dylan’s classic “The Times They Are A-Changin'” and, listening to him from the wings, I ruefully thought that it seems more like the times are changing back to how they were in the 1950s.

Checking into my hotel, I saw clips from Trump’s inaugural speech on the evening news and, 30 minutes later when I stepped out the shower, I had these lyrics in my head. I played the song that night in City Hall and it went down a storm. A night off in York has given me an opportunity to film a performance in my room.