Monday, October 3, 2011
Music Bands Other Than Radiohead That Should Play at Occupy Wall Street
Posted by Sydney Brownstone on Mon, Oct 3, 2011 at 4:10 PM
- Carwil Bjork-James for theatlantic.com
1) Regina Spektor—"The Ghost of Corporate Future"
Children of workaholic, absentee parents—get out your hankies now. This one goes right up there with Harry Chapin's "Cat's in the Cradle" on the list of songs to make you cry about rosy family relationships deferred by the greedy corporate/finance machine. Regina Spektor is also, as we all know, one singularly awesome New York chanteuse, and is no stranger to supporting social justice (I swooned when I saw her at this year's Pride). If these lyrics aren't enough to get someone to look away from the stock ticker, I'm not sure what is:
"Imagine you go away
On a business trip one day
And when you come back home,
Your children have grown
And you never made your wife moan."
2) David Bazan—"Wolves At The Door"
David Bazan has a reputation for being an anti-establishment muckraker in music, and his 2011 album, Strange Negotiations, proved nothing less. His lyrics on the this track imply direction toward a Tea Party-ish type rather than a Wall Streeter, but those "wolves" who "took your money" seem like a clear metaphor for the suits. (This acoustic Sleepover Show version is pretty neat too.)
3) Handsome Furs — "Serve the People"
Alexei Perry and Dan Boeckner, the husband-wife duo that make up the Handsome Furs, wrote "Serve the People" about the organized theft perpetrated by oppressive political regimes in Southeast Asia, but the message applies to the good 'ol US of A. The chorus, "You don't serve the people!" and the line "All the privileged thieves gonna make things run," seem pretty apt right about now.
4) St. Vincent — "Strange Mercy"
Personally, I would love to see Annie Clark chew out a cop (the Pepper Spray one, specifically) on behalf of the protesters. On "Strange Mercy" she sings, "If I ever meet that dirty policeman who roughed you up/No I don't know what/If I ever meet that dirty policeman who roughed you up."
5) Screaming Females — "A New Kid"
The Wall Street establishment may not exactly be the "new" elite on the street, but maybe we can call the die-hard neoliberalism of the past few decades a recent development, history-wise. This image would be terrifying and appropriate to sing to daily commuters trying to ignore what's going on:
"If I invite you over
Can you look me in the eye
Because your head is a cavern
And I wanna crawl inside
I put some speakers in your ears
And I stuff up where you speak
You gotta whole lotta nerve to think
That you can fool me."
The song's also a little reminiscent of Bikini Kill's 1996 "Reject All American," which would make another excellent protest song.
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