When Cyndi Lauper released “Sally’s Pigeon’s” back in 1993, the singer wove a tale of two young girls growing up with aspirations of American life. But as the song’s harsh lyrical themes played out, one of the girls died getting a back-alley abortion and was never able to realize her dreams. It’s a story that happened before the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 made abortion legal in America, but now it’s a tale that might become a sad reality for many women once again, with the announcement that the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade this week.
Now as musicians are continuing to take action, Lauper has released a rebooted version of the song in light of the week’s turmoil and it rings with eerily similar feelings. “50 years later we find ourselves in a time warp where one’s freedom to control their own body has been stripped away.” Lauper said in an Instagram post. The redux version leans on a somber piano and acoustic guitar, instead of the early 90’s soundscapes of the original; almost as if it now bears the wear and madness of how things have regressed to pre-Roe v. Wade 1970s America.
Listen to Lauper’s “Sally’s Pigeon’s (Redux 2022)” above and read her full statement below.
“The Supreme Court’s radical decision today makes the re-recording and re-release of ‘Sally’s Pigeons’ more relevant than ever. In my childhood, women didn’t have reproductive freedom and 50 years later we find ourselves in a time warp where one’s freedom to control their own body has been stripped away. When I wrote this song with Mary Chapin Carpenter in 1991, we wrote about two little girls who dreamt of stretching their wings like the pigeons they watched that flew above them. They dreamt of being free. But freedom then for women and unfortunately now comes at a big price. If we don’t have control over our own bodies then we have no real freedom. We are second class citizens. We need to mobilize. We need to let our voices be heard.”
Source: https://uproxx.com/indie/cyndi-lauper-sallys-pigeons-redux-2022/
