Tag Archives: pop

DJ Generals Strike’s top 40 protest songs of spring 2024

July 18, 2024 Halldór H Kristínarson Leave a comment

I’m DJ General Strike, host of the weekly protest music radio show, Protest Tunes on 91.3 KBCS FM in Seattle, WA. I broadcast 2 hours of radical protest music of all genres and eras every Wednesday at 9 PM. Every quarter, I put together a radio show and playlist of my favorite new protest songs released that season, which I call “molotov hot tracks.” This Spring, saw the release of many great protest songs, most notably songs about the recent British parliamentary election and the upcoming US presidential election, songs against Israel’s ongoing war/genocide in Gaza, and songs of LGBTIA Pride. I aired most of these songs on my show this Wednesday (July 10th 2024), which you can listen to the archive of here. I’ve organized these 40 protest songs by genre below (and alphabetically within genre). You can also listen to all 40 songs on this Spotify Playlist. I hope you all are inspired by these molotov hot tracks!

Folk

Adeem the Artist – White Mule, Black Man

Adeem the Artist, AKA Adeem Maria, a nonbinary pansexual poet, singer-songwriter, storyteller, and blue-collar artist. A seventh-generation Carolinian, they now reside in the hills of East Tennessee. They started their music career performing on cruise ships. This track about the history of racism in Knoxville, TN is off Adeem’s new album Anniversary, released May 3rd.

Apes of the State – Forensic Files feat. Local News Legend

Apes of the State is an independent Lancaster, PA based folk punk band. As a band, they are driven by DIY ethics with a goal of helping as many people as possible with their music. The members are also heavily involved in activism for people recovering from substance use disorder and promoting harm reduction. This single released May 3rd, features fellow feminist folk punk duo Local News Legend, also from central Pennsylvania.

Carsie Blanton – The Democrats

Carsie Blanton is a singer-songwriter and guitarist based in New Orleans. Blanton says she “writes anthems for a world worth saving.” About this single released May 31st, she said it’s a “f— the democratic party for sitting on its hands during a genocide” kind of a song.

Troy Cassar-Daley – Windradyne

Troy Cassar-Daley is an Aboriginal Australian country music songwriter and entertainer. His mother is from the Gumbaynggirr and Bundjalung people. Cassar-Daley has released thirteen studio albums, two live albums and five compilation albums over 30 years. Windradyne tells the tale of the Indigenous warrior and resistance leader of the Wiradjuri nation from the 1800s.

Ani DiFranco – New Bible

Grammy winning feminist folk-rock singer-songwriter, author and activist. One of the first artists to create her own label in 1990, she is called ‘the mother of the DIY movement’ and has sold over 5.5 million albums on her own Righteous Babe Records. New Bible is an anti-capitalist song, the 2nd single off her upcoming album Unprecedented Sh!t’, Ani’s 23rd release, just released July 12th.

John Moreland – The Future Is Coming Fast

Moreland is a Singer-songwriter from Tulsa, Oklahoma. This is the opening track off his new album, Visitor, which Moreland recorded at his home in Bixby, Oklahoma, in only ten days, playing nearly every instrument himself, as well as engineering and mixing the album. On “The Future Is Coming Fast”, Moreland laments the “perpetually logged-on life in a time of catastrophe.”

David Rovics – This Is Genocide

Rovics is a Portland, OR based activist singer-songwriter, and anti-Zionist Jew from New York. In order to spread the political messages in his songs Rovics has made all of his recorded music freely available as downloadable mp3 files and all his sheet music and lyrics are available for download too at davidrovics.com. This song against Israel’s war on Gaza is off Rovics new album Bearing Witness, released May 1st.

Aaron Lee Tasjan – I Love America Better Than You

Aaron Lee Tasjan is a Nashville-based singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer, formerly of the bands Semi Precious Weapons and BP Fallon & The Bandits. About this song, Tasjan said “As a queer person living in the southern United States in 2024, I am examining my country’s complexities, contradictions and hard truths in a way that’s conversational.”

Frank Turner – The Leaders

Frank Turner is an English punk and folk singer-songwriter who began his career as the vocalist of post-hardcore band Million Dead, then embarked upon a primarily acoustic-based solo career following the band’s split in 2005. This anti-authoritarian song off Turner’s new album Undefeated, is a rewrite of an old unreleased song of his called Practical Anarchist.

Rock

Joe & The Shit boys – LEGALIZE EVERYTHING

Joe & The Shit boys are a queer vegan indie-rock band “with hardcore vibes”, from the Faroe Islands, (the archipelago between Iceland and Norway). The band formed with the intention of calling out bad behavior in their conservative local music scene, which they describe as “filled with boneless homophobes and meat-eating misogynists.” In this short song they challenge the prohibition of all recreational drugs.

Ferocious Dog – Kleptocracy

Ferocious Dog are an English folk-punk band from Warsop, Nottinghamshire, England. Their fans are affectionately referred to as ‘Hell Hounds’. This song against corrupt politicians in Britain written on the occasion of the British parliamentary elections is the title track off their new album released May 17th.

Melody Angel – Say Her Name

Melody Angel (which is her real name) is a Chicago based blues-rock guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, vocalist, arranger, and producer. She’s also a cousin of Chicago blues icon, Otis Rush. This song off her self titled 3rd album released June 7th, raises awareness for Black women victims of police brutality.

Scarlet Rebels – Divide and Conquer

Scarlet Rebels are a five-piece melodic rock band from Llanelli, South Wales, formed in 2018. They’re known for their efforts to raise money and collect donations for local food banks and charities. This protest song against Britain’s ruling Conservative Party is from their upcoming album, “Where The Colours Meet” due out August 16th.

R&B/Pop

Emma Donovan – Change is Coming

Emma Donovan is an Aboriginal Australian singer and songwriter formerly of bands the Stiff Gins and the Putbacks. She is a member of the renowned Australian musical Donovan family. She started her singing career at age seven with her uncle’s band, Australian Aboriginal country group the Donovans. This hopeful political song is off her new solo album Til My Song Is Done released April 19th.

The Secret Sisters – If the World Was a House

The Secret Sisters are a singing and songwriting duo consisting of vocalists Laura Rogers and Lydia Rogers, who are sisters from Muscle Shoals, Alabama. About this song, they said “it is wrestling with a longing for everyone to take better care of each other, and to recognize that every person you share the planet with matters just as much as you do.”

Reggae/Ska

Buju Banton – Slogan

Buju Banton is a Jamaican dancehall, ragga, and reggae singer, from Kingston, Jamaica. Buju is a nickname given to him by his mother as a child. Banton is a Jamaican word that refers to someone who is a respected storyteller, which he adopted in tribute to deejay Burro Banton, who’s style of rough vocals and forceful delivery Buju emulates. Buju released this single about the media’s political spin on May 3rd.

YG Marley – Survival

YG Marley is the son of American rapper and singer Lauryn Hill and Jamaican football player Rohan Marley, and the grandson of reggae pioneer Bob Marley. This song about black resilience, which samples and references a handful of Bob Marley tracks, made its premiere on “The Tonight Show”, May 14th, in which Lauryn Hill performed alongside YG Marley.

Black Roots – Exploited

Black Roots are a roots reggae band from Bristol, England, formed in 1979. This track about the legacy of slavery and European colonialism is off their new album Roots, released in April.

Jazz/Spoken Word

The Brkn Record – Why do they fear us (featuring Yolanda Lear)

The Brkn Record is a project led and produced by Jake Ferguson, the co-founder and bass player for the UK’s deep jazz outfit the Heliocentrics, with fellow Heliocentrics co-founder and drummer Malcolm Catto. This song about blackphobia is off The Brkn Record’s new album, The Architecture of Oppression Part 2 released May 31st.

Hip Hop

Audio Assault – STRIKE!

Audio Assault is a political techno-industrial rap band originally from Dallas, Texas, one of the first acts to combine hip hop, industrial rhythms and rock guitars. This single released May 21st, features hip-hop legend Kool Keith, disco-industrial artist Xiu Xiu , punk-hiphop artist Ceschi (of Codafendents), Denver rapper and author Time (of Calm), and Bay Area artist Yunoka Berry (of Angelo Moore & The Brand New Step).

Dakota Bear x NugLife – Stolen Land

Dakota Bear is a Saskatoon-born, Vancouver-based Indigenous hip-hop artist and activist. NugLife is an LA based producer, beat-maker, and DJ. This song is off Nuglife’s album Nuglife 2024 released in April, and is about the colonization and genocide of the first nations peoples of Canada.

Dobby – Language is in the Land

Dobby is a Filipino-Aboriginal Australian musician. He describes himself as a “drapper”, a contraction of rapper and drummer, although he plays other instruments too, and is also a composer. This track is off Dobby’s new album WARRANGU: River Story, about the Barwon, the Bogan and the Culgoa Rivers in New South Wales, which he says is “about fighting for these rivers, and it’s about knowing how to be proud and how to take care of our land and waterways.”

Gabriel Teodros – Fire Season Part 2

Gabriel Teodros is a musician, DJ and writer from Seattle formerly of the groups Abyssinian Creole and Copperwire. Teodros’ music often features socially conscious themes, and he was a catalyst in the surge of dynamic underground rap acts from the Pacific Northwest during the first decade of the 2000s. This followup to his 2023 anti-war song Fire Season was released May 31st.

K!MMORTAL – Stop Business As Usual PART 2 feat. Phoenix Pagliacci & Bobby Sanchez

Kimmortal is a Queer Filipina emcee and singer-songwriter based in Vancouver, BC. Their debut album Sincerity = was entirely crowd funded by her community. In this follow up to Kimmortal’s November single against Israel’s war on Gaza, Stop Business As Usual, they feature Toronto R&B/Hip-Hop artist Phoenix Pagliacci of TRPP and transgender American-Peruvian rapper Bobby Sanchez.

Mach-Hommy – POLITickle

Mach-Hommy is a rapper and record producer from Newark, New Jersey of Haitian descent. He is well-known for his reclusive nature, concealing his real name and face in all public appearances. This behavior has led him to be described as “one of hip-hop’s most elusive artists” and gained him a cult following. POLITickle is about the International Monetary Fund in Haiti and is off his new album #Richaxxhaitian released May 17th.

Rapsody – He Shot Me

Rapsody began her career at North Carolina State University, where she joined hip hop collective H2O and its spinoff group Kooley High, despite not having rapped before. She launched her solo career in 2008. This song off her new album Please Don’t Cry is about the police murder of Breona Taylor, and samples Bob Marley’s “I Shot the Sheriff”.

Rebelwise – Be Like Water (feat. Aya Iworiosa, Stic.Man, Ashel Seasunz & Quincy Davis)

Rebelwise are a conscious hip hop band from Portland, OR. They describe themselves as “Rebelwise delivers dope-medicine to uplift our people and our communities.” “REBEL speaks to the spiritual warriors standing with conviction. WISE speaks to engaging with a deeper awareness, in relationship with Creation.” This song off their new album Fully Loaded Altar, features Stic.Man, one half of the political hip-hop duo Dead Prez.

Talib Kweli & Madlib – Nat Turner (feat. Cassper Nyovest and Seun Kuti)

Talib Kweli earned recognition through his collaboration with fellow Brooklyn rapper Mos Def, when they formed the group Black Star in 1997. Madlib, is a DJ, music producer, and rapper, who has described himself as a “DJ first, producer second, and MC last.” Their new album Liberation 2 released in April is a sequel to their 2007 release Liberation. This track was inspired by abolitionist Nat Turner, an enslaved man who led a rebellion of enslaved people in 1831 in Virginia.

Macklemore – Hind’s Hall

The Seattle star rapper released this viral protest single on May 6th. The title references Columbia University Gaza encampment activists’ renaming of Hamilton Hall to “Hind’s Hall” in honor of Hind Rajab, a Palestinian child killed by Israeli forces. Tom Morello said “Hind’s Hall” is the most Rage Against The Machine song since Rage Against The Machine.” Macklemore is donating all proceeds from the track to UNRWA.

Metal/Hardcore

Bear McCreary and Serj Tankian- Incinerator

Bear McCreary is an Emmy winning composer of film, television, and video game scores. This single featuring System Of A Down’s Serj Tankian on vocals is from Bear’s new double album The Singularity. About the song, Bear said “Once I heard Serj’s searing vocals, I knew immediately that Incinerator would be the first song on the album, acting like a warning that a massive, aggressive, and emotional journey lay ahead.”

CROSS DOG – Jane Roe

Cross Dog is a female fronted experimental, bass-driven hardcore punk band from Peterborough, Ontario. In this pro-choice single from their new album All Hard Feelings, the name ‘Jane Roe’ is used to “represent every single person who is forced to fight for their reproductive rights and access to abortions.”

Death Lens – Disturb The Peace

Death Lens originally formed in LA as an instrumental project, then evolved as they began using their platform to protest injustices facing their communities. This song, off their new album Cold World, is “a song written for the people, inspired by the people, and for my people – like my immigrant parents who came to the chaos of America to give us a better life and opportunity,” says vocalist Bryan Torres.

Tom Morello – Soldier In The Army Of Love

Tom Morello, is a guitarist, singer-songwriter, and political activist, best known for his tenure with Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave. This new solo single, off his upcoming solo rock album, Morello calls the song “a salute to the transformative power of music”. It features a guest guitar solo by his 13-year-old son, Roman Morello.

Punk

The Anti-Queens – Crusade

The Anti-Queens are a “punked up rock n’ roll quartet of super high-powered women who give the male-dominated music industry a run for their money” from Toronto. This single off their new album, Disenchanted, explores the systemic oppression faced by marginalized groups, particularly Indigenous Peoples in Canada.

The Irrepressibles – Yo Homo

The Irrepressibles is the creative guise of British musician Jamie McDermott. The project’s name is “about breaking boundaries in music and being honest about being gay in music”. Based in London, for many years, Jamie Irrepressible currently works from Manchester. Yo Homo! is a single about gay & queer rebellion released May 24th.

Lambrini Girls – Body of Mine

Lambrini Girls are a queer feminist three-piece punk band from Brighton, UK. About this single released April 23rd, The band says, “this song is about trying to connect to your gender identity, feeling like you’re not fully yourself, and struggling to figure out how to truly become it.”

Pink Suits – Dystopian Hellscape

Pink Suits are a queer, feminist punk duo out of Margate, U.K, formed in 2017. This is the title track off their sophomore album Dystopian Hellscape, which they describe as “an astute and comprehensive reaction to existing in the mess that is Tory Britain in 2024.” The track uses contemporary news stories to “create a tapestry of struggle that builds up in a horrifying picture of contemporary life.”

Ryan Cassata & The Top Surgeons – The Truth The Life The Way

Ryan Cassata is a transgender singer-songwriter, actor, speaker, and activist based in New York. This is the opening track off Ryan’s first punk album, with new band The Top Surgeons, called “This Machine Kills Transphobia”. They describe the album as “a collection of punk songs meant to challenge systems of oppression, especially sexism and transphobia.”

The Tony Slug Experience – Puppet Smut

This track, featuring Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys is off the self-titled album, The Tony Slug Experience, an homage to Amsterdam punk pioneer Tony Slug, of bands BGK, Loveslug, The Nitwitz, and The Hydromatics. An international group of over 30 musicians contributed to what became Tony’s final record; right after all recordings were on tape, Tony died at the age of 60 after a brief battle with throat cancer.

Lady Parts – Glass Ceiling Feeling

Lady Parts is a band created for the British sitcom, We Are Lady Parts, created, written, and directed by Nida Manzoor, who alongside her siblings, also writes and supervises the music for the show. The series follows a British punk rock band named Lady Parts, which consists entirely of Muslim women. This track is off the show’s soundtrack, We Are Lady Parts (Music From The Original Series – Seasons 1 & 2) released May 31st.

Interview

When his body made other plans, he made music: Interview with Ban Summers.

October 7, 2023 Halldór H Kristínarson Leave a comment

The reasons for why someone starts making music are as many and varied as the stars at night. I reckon every human being can relate to having longings, wishes, plans and then having something in this existence, in some way, pull those plans apart and automatically create a new path.

For independent musician Ban Summers, from Portsmouth, UK, those forces were physical and inside of his body. But although being pulled in different directions Ban decided at one point to not let it control his final path. At a young age he picked up a guitar and he contributes his physical disability for that. Otherwise he’d likely be at the football field nowadays.

So in Ban’s case, music came out of that forceful pushing and pulling back and forth. Chill, lo-fi pop music which I recommend to everyone to check out. Ban has a new album coming out and an active radio show where he only plays music by disabled artists. You can follow his work via his Bandcamp page and other social networks.

Ban Summers (photo courtesy of the artist)

Halldór Kristínarson: Thank you for taking the time to answer a few questions for the Shouts audience! For those who don’t know you, who is Ban Summers?

Ban Summers: Ban Summers is the helpful disguise of me, Edward Perry. I write, produce, mix, master and release all the music, so I’m a one man cottage industry. I live in Portsmouth and make all the songs at home.

HK: How did you get into making music? Have you always had creative tendencies?

BS: Before I was first ill, I played football all the time. With that all taken out of the equation as a young teenager, music became more and more important. I heard Lightspeed Champion’s (Dev Hynes/Blood Orange) Album In A Day and it blew me away. If he could make that in a day, I wondered what I could do in a year. Lidl had advertised a classical guitar, so I convinced mum to take me up there and I started to learn on it by myself. I then got an electric guitar for Christmas, I may have been 13/14 at this point. I didn’t really enjoy learning other people’s songs so I started to write a few songs and eventually uploading them to MySpace, which shows how long ago that was. I played my first gig at 15 on weekend leave from hospital, where I was for 8 months. I’m now 30 and released 2 albums and countless EPs and singles under several different projects.

I think I always did have creative tendencies but it was only because of my circumstances did I take the route into making music. It was one of those chance things in life and I’m grateful to have the outlet. I’m lucky I have a laptop, a microphone, a guitar, an amp and an audio interface and I can make music and release it on my terms.

HK: In your song, “Day In, Day Out” you sing the words “I made plans but my body made other plans”. I can imagine a lot of people can relate to those words, disabled or not. In the end, an “able” person is perhaps not able to make beautiful music although they are able to, say, jump. Lack of creativity, lack of empathy, lack of compassion – these things, to me, seem like a disablement. I for one salute you for the strength to put your creative voice out there, for the world to hear, and to be healed by. So, thank you for that.

BS: Thank you for saying so. I think for music to have become such an outlet, I needed to put some of myself into it. It’s daunting on the most part but when I wrote that line in Day In/Day Out, I was pleased to distill the chronically ill experience into it and the rest of the song. I don’t think I could ever get as close again to such a concise message that says so much.

I can’t really think of what happens after release and people hear it, it would make me too anxious. I want the music to connect of course but that isn’t the main reason for making it. I’m still making the music for myself and to give myself something to do.

HK: Has your music always had a conscious message?

BS: It’s often been personal or trying to say something. There are some songs that are maybe more subtle in their message but I’ve learned that there is power in being as direct as Day In/Day Out is. But I also want to learn to not have pain being a necessity to the music. Would I want to still make music if I was always happy, content and pain free? Of course, it would still be important to me. The world is still messed up, so there will always be something to say.

HK: What do you hope to achieve with your music?

BS: I want to create a catalogue of music that I’m proud of. I want to look back over albums and EPs of work and feel that I made something that was worthwhile. I don’t want to look back on numbers that can vanish if a platform closes down or become obsolete. Maybe recognition would be good for my ego, but that’s again not something I can control. My back catalogue and adding to it is something I can control.

HK: Why do you think music is an effective form of protest or activism?

BS: I think music, along with other forms of creative expression, has a way of getting into your head and soul. It doesn’t have to even be immediate or explicitly said, but once the music has pulled you in, then the message is given free reign on influencing you. Because of the melodies or the excitement, you start to remember what could be large pieces of text if it was written as say an article. You’re more likely to repeatedly listen to music than say an article or even a movie. So, music gets given a different space in our lives. And that bond between artist and fan/listener builds a trust that means you give more weight to what they are saying or the broader message. Of course, for some people they don’t care for politics or the message or they just want escapism, so maybe you wouldn’t be changing their minds anyway. But then if you speak or practice what you preach beyond your music, it can gradually change minds or attitudes. The artist and the listener both need to eventually put in that work for that to happen though.

HK: Can you tell me about your radio show Dis? What do you like about having that outlet?

BS: Dis is a four-weekly two-hour radio show on Portsmouth’s Unmade Radio, a community station that has so many amazing DJs covering so many different styles and you can listen live on their website, app or listen again on their Soundcloud. Dis features only disabled artists, with as wide range of disabilities or conditions as possible. Some artists may not identify as disabled, but they have experience of disabilities. Unmade Radio have been amazing in supporting the show and allowing me to record it remotely from home the whole time.

It’s great to have something that is bigger than myself. I think Dis has the possibility of having a greater impact than I do personally. One of the things that gives me joy is seeing artists played on Dis who then go and follow each other. A lot may well have been aware of each other but some won’t have been and it’s nice if I had some small part to play in that happening. I don’t think anyone has ever released music with the sole intention of it making it onto the show but I hope it gives a knowing nod saying “I see you”.

I love having the radio show, but it is exhausting for me to make and because of my energy or pain levels, the show can sometimes suffer. But that is real life as I’m chronically ill and disabled. I do what I can and Dis means a lot to me.

HK: What do you have on the horizon, music wise or in life in general? Rumor has it that there is an album on the way?

BS: There is indeed a new album. I only released Bean Summers last November but there was a lot of songs that flowed quickly afterwards and it was pretty much done 6 months after. But I wanted to allow people to get to know the songs a bit better, so I’m releasing it bit by bit at the moment before sharing the whole thing next year. I started with Drifting in May and now released Couldn’t Give A, which features shouting and sweary crowdsourced voice clips. The strange thing about waiting to release it is there’s even newer songs trying to fight their way onto it and maybe they will win out. The album could end up being quite a bit different to how it was intended a few months ago. There is even a song that is loosely based on a football commentator, part of me trying to write a song that hasn’t needed pain to exist.

In my wider life, we’ve just got Dottie, our 6-month-old rescue puppy and I have started writing about football finally, with an article on disabled football fans in When Saturday Comes magazine and helping out the England Amputee Football Association media team. It’s been great to find an outlet outside of music, which relieves some pressure on it, I think.

HK: Anything else you’d like to shout from the rooftops?

BS: I want to give a big shout to say thank you for taking the time to chat and shout like in Couldn’t Give A, with a big “f**k”.

News

Musician And Animal Activist, Inanna, Releases A Single Protesting Factory Farming

November 17, 2021 Shouts - Music from the Rooftops! Leave a comment

Music, environmental protection, animal rights and, belly dancing. These are some of the things Inanna brings to the world on a daily basis. Now the singer and activist has released a music video to ‘The Machine’, off of her recently released album, ‘Acrotopia‘.

The mostly black and white video shows Inanna weaving through factory machines, and dubious-looking workers, in a blood-red colored dress, all the while conveying a message about the rights of animals.

We can all have different opinions about eating other animals but there are sensible, ethical ways of doing things and then there is factory farming. The latter is nothing but torture and horror that even causes trauma to the workers/murderers not to mention the environmental effects such as deforestation, pollution, and the decline of smaller farms and rural communities.

“I firmly believe that all forms of art have an incredible capacity to drive change and create awareness, even about difficult issues such as animal exploitation. This video, inspired by some of my favorite movies of the silent era, wants to be an allegorical representation of the treatment of animals in factory farms and forests burnt by human activity. It is a dark video for a dark and emotional song, but it also includes a message of hope and a colorful fragment where we can catch a glimpse of a possible future where humans and animals live and thrive together. Both song and video want to witness what happens, but they also want to celebrate life and individuality of all Earthlings”
– Inanna

Inanna is one of many voices that stand up for those without a voice. Check out her video below and more of her music and work via her webpage, inannamusic.com.