Robb Johnson, Paddy Nash & Diane Greer, Steve White & The Protest Family

So, The Guardian have trotted out their tired "There's no protest singers any more" article again. It's becoming an annual event. Some years they have Billy Bragg telling us that we need to move with the times, others they bemoan the lack of this generation's Joan Baez storming up the charts. The charts? Fuck the charts. The charts are the establishment telling you what music you ought to be listening to*. If you want to like the same bands as the Prime Minister then care about the charts. Since Stock, Aitken and Waterman analysed and codified popular music, the charts, with the occasional notable exception, have been a wasteland for the musician with something to say about a system of society.

Saying there's no protest songs in the charts and saying there's no protest songs any more are two entirely separate things though. Any fan of live music will tell you if that's what you think then you're looking in the wrong place. In these austerity-led times, the protest song is alive, well and angrier than ever. Maybe not in the charts, but the pubs, clubs and community spaces of this land are brimming with acts with something to say and a means to say it. Which is why The Veg Bar and Sound Effect Solutions are proud to present some of the art of protest's finest exponents:

Robb Johnson

Widely feted as this country's greatest living songwriter, and that's saying something given the company that he keeps. As prolific as he is talented, the ink had dried on his song about Mark Duggan and the Tottenham riots before the fire brigade had finished dousing the flames. He's a man with a thousand stories, from the tales of his grandfathers in the First World War to playground politics infant school style. He has the songwriter's knack of using the smaller, quieter story to shout loudly about the bigger picture. He's the regular host of the main stage of the Tolpuddle Martyr's Festival and occasional Billy Bragg stand-in when the Bard of Barking can't make it. A genuinely spellbinding performer.

Paddy Nash & Diane Greer

Ireland's best kept secret; except in Derry of course where absolutely everyone knows them. Paddy and Diane tell tales of the troubles, of the struggle for equality, of laughter and of love with genuine warmth and humour. Bragg favourites since he first heard Billy Bragg Jeans, they've toured Ireland with both himself and Paul Heaton & Jacqui Abbott and have even put in an appearance at the Glastonbury Festival. R2 magazine described their band The Happy Enchiladas as "'Like The Saw Doctors jamming with The Undertones at a street party held by Squeeze". If you didn't love them already, by the end of Barefoot In Verona you definitely will.

Steve White & The Protest Family

They bicker like a family and stick together like one too. Capable of both shocking four-part harmonies and shout-along rabble-rousing choruses, the Protest Family are the band that you'll never see at the fashionable shows but when it's cold and wet on your picket line they'll be there for you. Led by co-founder of Tolpuddle Unplugged, Steve, the band feature some of East London's finest folk musicians, all still trying to behave like a punk band. Of course people compare them to Billy Bragg, but they compare them to The Clash and Ian Dury too. Just don't ask them about Mumford & Sons.

* Cultural hegemony, as a better educated band might put it.