stealth songs about politics
Feb. 12th, 2019 03:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rushthatspeaksI've been poking around for like the last year trying to gather material for a mixtape themed around songs which don't seem remotely political, until suddenly someone hands you the context, and then they do. However, after said year, I still only have the three I started with. So I may as well just post those.
Casanova, Rayland Baxter (link is to Youtube official audio).
I heard this one on the radio fairly frequently, and it sounded like the title--
I borrow the money from a woman
Can you believe I never met her?
Can you believe she never met me too?
But she calls me every day, telling me to behave
and you know I never listen
-- except then I randomly heard an interview with him, and the woman's name is Fannie Mae, which puts a bit of a different spin on things, and elevates the whole affair from a pleasant dirty blues into something resembling a generational complaint.
The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness, The National (link is to Youtube official audio).
I am used to the National being a band about disintegrating and dysfunctional relationships with the occasional touch of the world-historical as it refers to individual circumstances (the line in 'Bloodbuzz Ohio' about how 'I still owe money to the money to the money I owe' remains the single best summary of the mood post-2008-crash that I've encountered). This one looks at first glance like a standard National song:
The system only dreams in total darkness
Why are you hiding from me?
We're in a different kind of thing now
All night you're talking to God
and again, I stumbled across an interview, and actually this song is about finding out that someone you care about voted for the current President, and is a desperate attempt to make some sense of the whole thing.
And I cannot explain it
Any other, any other way
Which changes my usual feelings about a National song-- i.e. COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER, DAMMIT-- into genuine terror and tragedy.
High Ticket Attractions, The New Pornographers (link goes to official music video).
I... honestly don't know what I initially thought this song was about, besides being catchy. I mean,
You can imagine all the factions
That form around high ticket attractions
did not to me immediately signal significant intellectual content? But, again, I stumbled across an interview, and this song turns out to be the New Pornographers' attempt, via rock single, to warn the U.S. that we might be getting a tad complacent before the 2016 election.
High on the spirit, hopped up and mystic
After the flame baptism you're fearless, i.e. the Obama years and the success of those political campaigns, but it's really the chorus that gets to me with its mix of hope, resignation, fear, and pragmatism:
This thing could go two ways
Won't be another exit for days
So pack a small suitcase
Anything else can be easily replaced
-- lines which did not give me chills before November 2016. The context also turns the video from an adorable celebration of teenage energy and anarchy into an adorable celebration of teenage energy and anarchy with a complex and shifting underlayer of hope for the next generation and worry about what everyone will have to wrangle for things to be even moderately okay.
Here's an explicitly political one as a bonus: I Want To Be Here, Case Lang Veirs (link to Youtube official audio).
The hungry fools who rule the world can't catch us
Surely they can't ruin everything
In conclusion, the author is dead etcetera, but interviews really can occasionally be surprisingly rewarding.
Casanova, Rayland Baxter (link is to Youtube official audio).
I heard this one on the radio fairly frequently, and it sounded like the title--
I borrow the money from a woman
Can you believe I never met her?
Can you believe she never met me too?
But she calls me every day, telling me to behave
and you know I never listen
-- except then I randomly heard an interview with him, and the woman's name is Fannie Mae, which puts a bit of a different spin on things, and elevates the whole affair from a pleasant dirty blues into something resembling a generational complaint.
The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness, The National (link is to Youtube official audio).
I am used to the National being a band about disintegrating and dysfunctional relationships with the occasional touch of the world-historical as it refers to individual circumstances (the line in 'Bloodbuzz Ohio' about how 'I still owe money to the money to the money I owe' remains the single best summary of the mood post-2008-crash that I've encountered). This one looks at first glance like a standard National song:
The system only dreams in total darkness
Why are you hiding from me?
We're in a different kind of thing now
All night you're talking to God
and again, I stumbled across an interview, and actually this song is about finding out that someone you care about voted for the current President, and is a desperate attempt to make some sense of the whole thing.
And I cannot explain it
Any other, any other way
Which changes my usual feelings about a National song-- i.e. COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER, DAMMIT-- into genuine terror and tragedy.
High Ticket Attractions, The New Pornographers (link goes to official music video).
I... honestly don't know what I initially thought this song was about, besides being catchy. I mean,
You can imagine all the factions
That form around high ticket attractions
did not to me immediately signal significant intellectual content? But, again, I stumbled across an interview, and this song turns out to be the New Pornographers' attempt, via rock single, to warn the U.S. that we might be getting a tad complacent before the 2016 election.
High on the spirit, hopped up and mystic
After the flame baptism you're fearless, i.e. the Obama years and the success of those political campaigns, but it's really the chorus that gets to me with its mix of hope, resignation, fear, and pragmatism:
This thing could go two ways
Won't be another exit for days
So pack a small suitcase
Anything else can be easily replaced
-- lines which did not give me chills before November 2016. The context also turns the video from an adorable celebration of teenage energy and anarchy into an adorable celebration of teenage energy and anarchy with a complex and shifting underlayer of hope for the next generation and worry about what everyone will have to wrangle for things to be even moderately okay.
Here's an explicitly political one as a bonus: I Want To Be Here, Case Lang Veirs (link to Youtube official audio).
The hungry fools who rule the world can't catch us
Surely they can't ruin everything
In conclusion, the author is dead etcetera, but interviews really can occasionally be surprisingly rewarding.
no subject
Date: 2019-02-12 09:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-12 09:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-12 09:52 am (UTC)It's about the Obama campaign! See e.g. https://genius.com/Vienna-teng-stray-italian-greyhound-lyrics :)
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Date: 2019-02-12 10:06 am (UTC)Vienna Teng is such a great songwriter-- for me, that song has long been a pull-myself-out-of-a-bad-mood-by-remembering-how-great-my-relationships-are song, while I have an ex who finds it extremely depressing because she feels as though the narrator's 'not now' sentiment is totally genuine. And both of those I think can be valid readings.
And so can the political one, which had literally never ever crossed my mind but also works perfectly. Damn.
no subject
Date: 2019-02-12 10:08 am (UTC)Yeah, I love it to bits as a personal anthem -- it came into my life at the point at which 1. I had just had a series of dominoing awful breakups (poly is GREAT), and 2. I had just met A -- but I spent... Some Time just sitting stunned when I found out what it's also very much about.
And yes, I thought it very much fitted the general theme of the post (such stealth! very sneak! wow, etc), so even though you hadn't solicited submissions/suggestions... :-)
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Date: 2019-02-12 10:16 am (UTC)I appreciate the addition! I am amazed and delighted to find out that stealth politics were happening in a song I listen to, frankly, a lot.
Also now I get to mention this to Ruth, who will also be stunned.
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Date: 2019-02-12 01:57 pm (UTC)Also I am always up for that Case Lang Viers song, always, always.
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Date: 2019-02-12 08:20 pm (UTC)Anything else can be easily replaced
Yes; that resonates. I hadn't heard any of these songs. Thank you.
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Date: 2019-02-12 09:28 pm (UTC)There also some Barenaked Ladies songs: "Shopping," and "Sell, Sell, Sell." I think they have more, but I don't have titles on hand.
Billy Joel's "No Man's Land" is somewhat overt, but it's also the only song I know of that references master planning, so...
no subject
Date: 2019-02-12 10:09 pm (UTC)