Anti-Trump pop protesters get busy, roll out '30 Days, 30 Songs'
Plus, "You're So Vain" and "Mr. Tangerine Man."
Should Donald Trump become President, it will be a boon for the productivity of at least one American industry: pop protest music.
This past Sunday, I wrote about Solange Knowles and Drive-By Truckers making music that addresses America's racial divide in ways that strikes fear in the heart of election year politicians.
And I also made mention of a surprisingly small smattering of musicians - like Philadelphia Englishman Wesley Stace, with his pointed Bob Dylan re-write "Mr. Tangerine Man" - whom have actually taken sides in song and slammed Donald Trump in this election year that seemingly will never end.
This week, though, that trickle is fast becoming a flood. For starters, in a seemingly inevitable development, Carly Simon’s 1972 hit “You’re So Vain” has been repurposed as an anti-Trump ad, with a video with spliced in clips of talking heads and Republicans calling Trump a narcissist. Simon replaced the line “your scarf it was apricot” with "your face it was apricot.” (So much creative fun with fruit!) The video is funded by the pro-Clinton Patriotic Artists and Creatives PAC, and was co-produced by Fred Goldring, the Philadelphia-raised Lower Merion High School graduate who also produced Barack Obama's Will.I.Am-starring 2008 "Yes We Can" video.
Then, Monday marked the debut of 30 Songs, 30 Days, a project created by author Dave Eggers in which one anti-Trump song per day will be released every day until the election on November 8 on the web site 30days30songs.com.
The series, which bills itself as being "Created by Artists for a Trump-Free America" kicked off with Ben Gibbard-led Death Cab For Cutie's "Million Dollar Loan," followed by Aimee Mann's "Can't You Tell?" and St. Louis songwriter Bhi Bhiman's "With Love From Russia."
This week, songs will be added by My Morning Jacket's Jim James, singer-songwriter Thao Nguyen and clipping., the rap group featuring Hamilton star Daveed Diggs. Somewhere along the line, a previously unreleased R.E.M. song with be included.
What’s promising is that so far - whatever your political leanings - the quality of the product has been top shelf. “Million Dollar Loan” - “every ascension to the throne begins with a million dollar loan,” Gibbard sings, referencing the “small loan” Trump has said he received from his father to start out in business - comes with a video by Simian Design that plays on Trump’s WWF-like smoke-filled entrance at the Republican National Convention this summer.
Bhiman's "Russia" pokes fun at Trump's relationship with Vladimir Putin and makes Monopoly references: "He'll take the Baltics, and Park Avenue / I'll sell him Boardwalk and there's nothing you can do."
But the real gem is Mann's "Can't You Tell?," which is written as a first person monologue in the voice of the Republican nominee. The former 'Til Tuesday leader's tune explores the idea that Trump decided to run after being mocked by President Obama at the White House Correspondents Dinner.
But, in Mann's words, "Can't You Tell?" is about the idea that "it wasn't really the job itself that he wanted, but the thrill of running and winning, and that maybe it had all gotten out of hand and was a runaway train that he couldn't stop." Mann's next album, Mental Illness, is due in the spring of 2017.
According to 30 Days press release, all proceeds from the songs will be donated to the Center for Popular Democracy and their Universal Voter Registration efforts. A Spotify playlist that will get longer by the day is here. And for your amusement, the Lucky TV fake duet of Trump and Clinton singing the Bill Medley-Jennifer Warnes 1987 hit "The Time Of My Life" at the second Presidential debate in St. Louis is below.
Previously: Sigur Ros at the Academy Follow In the Mix on Twitter
