Every week, we’ll be posting a new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Normal guitarist is visually documenting people, places and events from his band’s 41-year run, with text by vocalist Jean Smith.
Firstly: Do not vote for Trump. Every song I’ve ever written is opposed to this man in one way or another.
In this song, an abstract soundscape, too-poetic a slant is put on the cycle of socio-political successes and defeats. The first clearly enunciated line asserts that “the voice pushed it through,” soon after which the tables turn and the “giver took to taking” and, then, even worse, the “giver took to singing, too” in an unfurling timeline that could refer to gains and losses on many different fronts, but implies a sort of corporatization of methods and tools that radicals, artists and musicians rely on to promote progressive social change. Malicious appropriation! When such underground and DIY methods—invented out of necessity— reach the mainstream, they often lose their clout in a swirl of misconstrued assumptions and half-baked cachet, leaving the activists who originated them in a state of resource depletion.
Lastly: Do not vote for Trump.
“On The Row Of Dials” from Flood Plain (K, 1993) (download):
