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"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" is a poem and song by Gil Scott-Heron which orginated about the political and social turmoil of 1970s America. It first appeared on the 1970 album Small Talk at 125th and Lenox, on which Scott-Heron was accompanied only by congas and bongo drums. A re-recorded version, this time with a full band, appeared on the 1971 album Pieces Of A Man, and on the double A-side single "Home Is Where The Hatred Is/The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" (all on the Flying Dutchman Productions label). The track name was used as the title to Scott-Heron's "Best of" album, in 1998, issued by RCA.
More recently, the song has been covered, sampled and parodied extensively. The song was covered by The Last Poets and the title track to one of their albums. Soul Rebels, a house music project created by vocalist Roland Clark, has covered the song in dance version, while British acid jazz group Smoove and dub band The Brooklyn Funk Essentials parodied the song with their respective tracks "The Revolution Will Be Televised" and "The Revolution Was Postponed Because Of Rain". The hip-hop artist Common also used this term as an intro to his "6th Sense" track ("The revolution will not be televised, the revolution is here"). The hip-hop artist Aesop Rock also has parodied this in "Coma" on Labor Days, "If the revolution ain't gon' be televised, then, fuck, I'll probably miss it". Prince also made extensive reference to this poem in his 1998 single "The War", a 26 minute noise jam/spoken word piece, in which a chant is heard "Evolution Will Be Colorized".
Also, group Revolutionary Superstars had used it one of their songs, "It's live", saying "The Revolution will not be televised (x2), the Revolution will be Live". It was clearly meant politically as well, and not solely for humour.