The songs ridiculing, denigrating, and satirizing Donald Trump have been coming for a while, and they're surely going to continue bubbling forth, as, once he's inaugurated, he tries to implement his panoply of wrongheaded ideas and nominate the worst candidates imaginable to serve in his cabinet. On the one hand, does Trump even listen to music? It's doubtful. Swindling at a world-class level demands that one not be distracted by beautiful sounds. On the other hand, Trump has the thinnest skin of anyone in the history of epidermis, not to mention the self-control of a 12-year-old boy. If he gets even the slightest whiff about these protest numbers, he'll likely fire off insulting Tweets that will further enhance his reputation as America's pettiest narcissist. After the jump, I survey some of the more recent anti-Trump tunes from CocoRosie, Fiona Apple, Entrance, and Danbert Nobacon (Chumbawamba), and conduct an interview with the latter, who now lives in Twisp, Washington.
CocoRosie's "Smoke 'Em Out," featuring the vibrato-laden testifying of ANOHNI, was written, according to the band, "to inspire the weary-disappointed hearts of so many crest-fallen citizens." "Smoke 'Em Out" posits a near future of matriarchal rage that incinerates the toxicity occupying the White House ("This is the end of the freak show," CocoRosie sings). The song's an elegantly swerving, orchestral synth-pop confection, but it's bolstered by thrusting beats that scan as militant. It's no M.I.A. (the lyrics are too abstruse to easily cohere into protest slogans), but CocoRosie's heart is in the right place.
Fiona Apple's "Tiny Hands" unspools a basic, declamatory chant—"We don't want your tiny hands anywhere near our underpants"—over an ominous piano motif and robust, fuck-off beats, as she splices in Trump's infamous 2005 remark to Billy Bush of Access Hollywood ("grab 'em by the pussy"). It should be at least 10 times as long and piped into the inauguration ceremonies via a platoon of iPod-carrying drones.
Entrance's "Not Gonna Say Your Name"—the proceeds of which will benefit Planned Parenthood—is an earnest, lush, folk-rock middle finger to the obnoxious ubiquity of Trump in the news and on social media. Recommended if you like Father John Misty, Fleet Foxes, and expressions of exasperation toward the president-elect and "the voices of hate."
Danbert Nobacon's "Revolution 9.01"—which appears on his Stardust to Darwinstuff album, due in April—is a surprisingly jaunty, acoustic-guitar-powered folk tune that champions science and disdains the incoming ignoramus-in-chief. He advises listeners to "overthrow this demagoguery" and chides that this "president couldn't even get a job in a public high school."
Here's an e-mail interview with Mr. Nobacon:
You lived in England under Margaret Thatcher. Does the prospect of a Trump presidency strike you as equally bad or even worse than that regime? Do you feel the same sense of terror and rage as you did back then, if I may presume?
I did grow into political consciousness in Northern England under Margaret Thatcher. Chumbawamba formed in 1982 right before she basically rescued her own unpopularity by declaring war on Argentina. But I do think Trump is proportionately far worse because the US wields so much more power in the world. And, it is worse again because of the people whom Trump has surrounded himself with, “of the billionaires, by the billionaires and for the billionaires,” which is basically a coup d’etat and means we have the moral and constitutional duty to overthrow his government. His choice cabinet is one of documented sociopaths, meaning that they are mentally incapable of caring about what effect their predator capital free market orthodoxy [will have], with regard to making the lives of ordinary people miserable, or with fast-tracking the environmental destabilization of our planet.
What tangible effect do you think "Revolution 9.01" will have? Do you think it can go beyond just preaching to the converted?
When people see art or hear music (myself included), that reflects and challenges what is happening in the world, it is inspiring and gives us the strength that we are not alone in this struggle. I would say that by talking about science in "Revolution 9.01," I am hoping to encourage my own audience, to think wider and beyond the simple truism that Trump is bad.
Maybe some of them will pick up some of the science literature, the authors of which are referenced in the song. I did that. I went out and read books about anarchy after hearing the Sex Pistols’ "Anarchy in the UK." Also I think along with Bernie Sanders and the “Our Revolution” movement, it is good to call a shovel a shovel, and say look, if we are to survive as a species, there needs to be an incredible revolution in the terms of how we do things, and let’s not be afraid of the word. Yes. Let’s many of us agree that we can and need to overthrow the neo-liberal/neo-conservative world order (of which Trump, whatever he says, is born and bred) that has proven to be disastrous for people and the planet over the last 40 years, not least in the scientifically measurable terms of global warming and spiraling wealth inequality.
How else do you plan to resist the Trump administration?
My main form of resistance is as a writer and an artist, to generate and stimulate ideas and thinking that might help us survive beyond this century, but I am also a human being. I will be in the streets on Saturday in Seattle protesting the inauguration, like I protested Reagan and George W. Bush outside the US embassy in London when they came to town. I am also a teacher (high school theater) and whilst I do not preach to my students, we do discuss current events and it is quite obvious from my example, where I stand on the political spectrum. As "Revolution 9.01" says, citing H.G. Wells, and as the election of Trump has proven (capitalizing as he so did on peoples’ enforced ignorance and non-truth), it really is a race between education and catastrophe.
Shouldn't you have called your forthcoming album Trumpthumping? (Sorry.)
He he he. Well I didn’t think of it, but then I did specifically not name Trump in the song, so the song maybe perhaps creeps up on the listener a bit more. On the other hand, one of the other songs on the album had a working title "Karma Won’t Save Us" and I just renamed it "Karma Won’t Save Us from Rex Tillerson," because in the lyric it talks about the CEO of Exxon Mobil earning $40 million a year, meaning that he earned minimum wage, literally in the time it takes to say the words minimum wage. My job as a narrative artist is to explore the human condition in all its forms, and sometimes the ideas come as a slap to the head, or sometimes as a thief in the night.
For more sonic resistance against Trump, check out Our First 100 Days, which features tracks by names, and others. It strives to "raise funds and awareness for organizations supporting causes that are under threat by the proposed policies of a Trump administration."
