Not Enough Protest Singers

"Too many protest singers, not enough protest songs', sang Edwyn Collins in the mid-nineties. I've no idea if that was true then (or even what people were protesting about back then) but it does seem to be the case nowadays. And God knows there's lots of things for people to be pissed off about in 2018. There's you-know-who in the White House, Brexit closer to home, abuses in the church – both historic and recent – and lots more besides. But, for the most part, it seems that musicians have been slow to comment through their art. 

Now I should say, in fairness, that I'm not up to speed with what today's pop, indie or hip-hop acts are up to (hello young people) and I'd only heard two of the songs on this handy list of 2017 protest songs. But of the many artists, young and old, that I listen to regularly there's been very little by way of protest or dissent coming down the tracks lately. Granted Roger Waters' 2017 LP Is This the Life We Really Want? was an entire record of ranting at various issues (and rather successfully too) but few of his contemporaries have been making much noise. Where's Bruce Springsteen, whose American Skin enraged the NYPD so much in 2001 and 2003 that they refused to escort Bruce & the E Streeters through the streets of NYC after their concerts? Ni sign either of Neil Young, who hit the road in 2006, touring red states and calling for the impeachment of George W Bush? There's others, of course, I don't mean to single out those two lads. Just seems that, for the most part, there's been an absence of real anger or protest in new music over the last few years..

Still, all may not be lost because in the last week I've heard three quality new protest songs that prove that all hope may not be lost. The first is Steven Page's 'White Noise', which I'd heard before I went to his show in Whelan's last week. This is a proper protest song written in the wake of the Charlottesville white nationalist rally last year. The only problem is that it might just be too catchy. You could conceivably listen to it several times and have no idea what it's about. Although the swearing might make you think something's up. Here's the clean version - it's a furious racket. Also, White Noise is a FANTASTIC title for a protest song in 2018. 

While White Noise starts as it means to go on, Srinivas by Marc Ribot, Steve Earle & Tift Merritt is a different beast altogether. It starts off sounding much like an old Steve Earle folk song, detailing the February 2017 murder of two Indian men, Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani, in Kansas. While the message behind White Noise could potentially be overlooked, there's no doubting who the target of the singer's anger is here: “Madman pulled the trigger; Donald Trump loaded the gun,” Amen. You might think you have the measure of Srinivas until the last two minutes when the song reaches a frenzied climax with shoutouts to many of the innocent victims who have been murdered by police and racists. All this while chants of “My country tis of thee” plays us out. As the song fades away, you can't help think that while the target of the song's rage is the current dweller of the White House, it's going to take more than his removal to heal the situation. It's devastating. 

And then there's First Aid Kit.  I've been a fan of their sweet harmonies and mellow-ish music for a few years but I've never heard them sound as furious as they do on You Are The Problem Here. Here we have their justifiably confrontational response to the many perpetrators of sexual assault - none of whose justifications for their behaviour cuts any ice with FAK. Nobody gets off lightly in the song - certainly not those who frame their concern for women in the context of their own relationship with their daughters or sisters.  The final blow is the knokout, as one voice sings “And I hope you f---ing suffer,” over the final ringing guitar note. It's not a song that necessarily looks for solutions - other than to say we're not taking any more of your shit. Get the message.

So maybe there's still hope for the protest song - although I couldn't help note that the combined play counts for White Noise and Srinivas is about 20,000 which suggest they're struggling to get the word out. In the meantime you'd hope that some of the big hitters could find their voices again.