What A Time
Been a weird year. On one hand, it feels like the world is collapsing around us and there's no real relief in sight. On the other, there's so many people doing so many incredible things that give me hope. As always, music gives voice to a lot of these feelings I've been having better than my own words.
In honor of May Day, I wanted to make a mix of labor & revolutionary & protest & hopeful for a better future music. I reached out to good buddy and comrade Sean O'Reilly to help me out. Sean and I have bonded over comedy and music many times, politics in the past few years, and most recently almost on a daily basis with our work together on Functionally Dead, a leftist biweekly comedy and culture zine we started along with some of the most talented comedic minds we know (check it out).
That group of likeminded people has been incredibly important for my mental health this past (incredibly trying) year. This music has been as well. Whether you're distressed, angry, confused, hopeful, invigorated... there's something here for you. It's validating, to me, to hear these feelings reflected back. Sean's thoughts on the mix below made me tear up. I hope it does something for you too.
ALSO: I started a Discord server called "song rocks" where we just post songs that rock. Been a really fun way to hear new tunes. Let me know if you want in!
And hey, if you like it, why not share the mix or this newsletter with a friend?
a better world
Created in collaboration with Sean O'Reilly for the possibility.
A few words from Sean:
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I’m a socialist. That does mean something to me. There’s an ideology, a morality, and a history there. I’m proud of the tradition of struggle, hope, fury, despair, and love of humanity that label entails. All of these currents are reflected in this mix in some way. All these songs are, however, about one thing: liberation. The liberation of humanity and the unleashing of the will to create something better, something beautiful. I hate the capitalist system for the same reasons as Barabara Dane, in addition to the fact that humanity can never truly flourish in the conditions of the world as they are today. Everything we buy, consume, watch, wear is all the result of someone else’s suffering and exists only for the profit of someone else.This inhibits us all, it stagnates us as a species, and the labor which we all exploit is the work of people.
These songs, from different times, places, and (in some cases) languages other than my own all express that suffering. Express the experience of it or the solidarity required to end it. And I hope these are things that this mix inspires in you. I hope Ab-Soul makes you mad. I hope Nina Simone touches your heart and mind and helps you realize you too do not know what freedom would actually feel like. I hope Phil Ochs makes you laugh at the exact type of person we’re all in danger of becoming when we stop empathizing and we lose that solidarity. I hope Kendrick Lamar gives you a glimpse of what America actually is. And I hope Todd Snider helps you realize they need you more than you fucking need them. This mix is fun, there are bangers, and I hope you listen to the words. A better world IS possible, and I hope you see that. And that’s all we have: hope in the possibility that we can make this world flourish. I’ll end on a quote from Irish Socialist and rebel James Connolly that I think simply states what I have taken two paragraphs to almost express: “For our demands most moderate are, We only want the earth.”
Good Luck, Comrades.
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Love you all. Hope you enjoy!
Join Me: Rank Dianne Morales #1 for NYC Mayor
I understand not all of you are in NYC, but many of you are! You all probably also know about the mayoral candidates already, but I just think Dianne Morales is cool and good, and we could really use someone in power who cares about the people instead of cowering to police and the wealthy.
Dianne wants to defund the police by 3 billion dollars and reinvest that into communities that desperately need it. It feels insane to see the NYPD parade around robot dogs while our neighbors sleep on the street. Let's change that?
We're doing ranked choice this year, too! All I know is that Andrew Yang would be an absolute disaster for the city. He's a privatized solutions nightmare who panders to disenfranchised communities without doing anything for them, which means he's essentially a slightly more likable Republican. Please do not rank him in your 5 ranked selections. My guy doesn't even want to defund the police a little bit.
Would love if you checked out Dianne's site here.
RIYL: a better world
Some Other Things Sean Loves
(that you might love too!)
Books:
The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin - This novel is science fiction, but it's a very real, very human look at what a different kind of society could look like. It's an "ambiguous utopia" and a beautiful novel.
Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? by Mark Fisher - The notion that liberal capitalism is the end point of civilization is deeply ingrained in us all, I think. Mark Fisher's essays in this book contextualize the ways in which this is an ideological notion and not the plain simple truth of the matter.
Movies:
Sorry to Bother You - It's funny, weird, and about solidarity. Great movie. I will say no more.
The Wind that Shakes the Barley - A movie about the 1918 revolution in Ireland and subsequent civil war. There are great performances, and I think it's illustrative of how the forces of radicalism and liberalism battle within national movements.