Saturday, August 26, 2017
Sunday, August 13, 2017
WWII Era Anti-Fascism Film from US - "Don't Be A Sucker"
"The world is a dangerous place...not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it"
-Albert Einstein
In the light of the horrific, fascist, white-supremacist violence against peaceful folks in Charlottesville, Virginia on August 12, 2017, I find this film produced by the US War Department during WWII to be instructive. Clips from the film are appearing on social media sites. The full film is presented here.
From IMDB:
"Financed and produced by the United States War Department in 1943, and shot at the Warners studio, although it was distributed through all of the major studios' film exchanges and also by National Screen Services free to the theatre exhibitors: A young, healthy American Free Mason is taken in by the message of a soap-box orator who asserts that all good jobs in the United States are being taken by the so-called minorities, domestic and foreign. He falls into a conversation with a refugee professor who tells him of the pattern of events that brought Hitler to power in Germany and how Germany's anti-democratic groups split the country into helpless minorities, each hating the other. The professor concludes by pointing out that America is composed of many minorities, but all are united as Americans."
Monday, August 07, 2017
Sunday, August 06, 2017
Dancing at the Apocalypse: Jesse Malin's "Meet Me at the End of the World"
by Gregg Chadwick
"Anybody who says politics and music don't mix is, that's just in your face stupid."– Lucinda Williams
Jesse Malin: Fox News Funk from Meet Me at the End of the World
Jesse Malin's new EP, Meet Me at the End of the World, is out. Produced by Joseph Arthur, this collection of four new songs timely addresses our current Trumpian tribulation and is sparking some major conversations across the music world. Lucinda Williams was so inspired by Malin's Meet Me at the End of the World, that, as Fran C. Anderson reports in Rolling Stone, Williams "hopped on the phone with the D Generation frontman ... for a wide-ranging chat about their approach to songwriting, politics, Canadian electro dynamo Peaches, and a possible future collaboration." In their conversation Williams and Malin earnestly conversed about the mix of politics and music in their art. Williams said,"Anybody who says politics and music don't mix is, that's just in your face stupid."
Malin replied,"You walk out your door and it's political. You're dealing with it. You need gas in your car, you need food, everything is always just class-related, and rock music has always had an awareness of class and separation in the downtrodden." Continuing this thought Malin expressed to Nate Herwick on Grammy.com that, "And [I thought about] how much the media is owned by the government, by the big corporations, so you're not getting the full story. I think [this song is] a call to people to go beyond that, go with their guts and their hearts. You have got to treat the people around you with love, but you also have to question the powers that be, because as much as I love this country and this planet, there are some people that are out to line their own pockets and have an agenda."
Jesse Malin Summing up the album Malin said to Williams,"the music is what brings us together, and we need it right now. We need each other. We need to stand together, and support each other, and give the message, which is really love. I mean, to me, Meet Me at the End of the World as a record is about survival. And you have to live your life like it could be the last day."
Jesse Malin: Revelations/Thirteen from Meet Me at the End of the World
Jesse Malin: London Rain from Meet Me at the End of the World
Jesse Malin: Meet Me at the End of the World from Meet Me at the End of the World
Labels: art politics, Dancing at the Apocalypse. music, gregg chadwick, Jesse Malin, Lucinda Williams, Meet Me at the End of the World, speed of life