Do you think there's no good protest music these days? So did I, until I started looking for it. Every month, I listen to it all, then select the best that relates to that month鈥檚 political news. Here鈥檚 the round-up for July 2024.
1. DAVID ROVICS & KAMALA EMANUEL - MINISTRY OF CULTURE: LIVE AT ECOSOCIALISM 2024听
Radical Melbourne punks Diploid released their new album, Mantra, on July 5. In an interview about it a month earlier, European media asked them what they thought of Australia's government banning Palestinian freedom fighter Leila Khaled from appearing in person at the Ecosocialism conference in Western Australia at the end of June. Bassist Reece Prain replied: "I feel a lot of people would be all for her speaking at the Ecosocialism conference. Not only is she very relevant right now in this day and age, she is just an interesting historical figure for Palestinian freedom and revolution... Our news media has got people who probably never even thought about Israel and Palestine before being pro-genocide and pro-colonisation.... Ultimately, ." Three weeks after the conference, veteran US protest musician David Rovics released an album of his live performance there. 听听
2. ANDREW GURRUWIWI BAND - SING YOUR OWN SONG听
In his , Rovics said international delegates at the Ecosocialism conference noted an uncomfortable fact: that as they discussed problems in far-away Palestine, just outside, Aboriginal people were suffering homelessness on the streets. Days after the conference, oil and gas firm Woodside - notorious for its desecration of Aboriginal sites in Western Australia - announced it was paying $1.35 billion to become a . The move angered its investors, who want it to transition away from the fossil fuel. Even more livid at such colonial destruction is north-east Arnhem Land's Andrew Gurruwiwi Band, who released their unique on July 5 to critical acclaim. "Once upon a time, there was a war in Arnhem Land," they sing on "Once Upon A Time". "Killing our people, destroying our land, destroying our culture." 听
3. KOBIE DEE - CHAPTER 26听
Such anger spilled onto the streets on July 12, when thousands marched for National Aboriginal and Islander Day Observance Committee (NAIDOC) week. The marches came after Megan Krakouer, director of the National Suicide Prevention and Trauma Recovery Project, told the Ecosocialism conference the jailing of Aboriginal people was 鈥渙ut of control鈥 and linked to suicide rates. Making the same connections was Indigenous emcee Kobie Dee, who put on for Australia's largest Aboriginal community, Blacktown in Western Sydney, as part of NAIDOC. "I'm a Black man living in this country, where it's normal to be sent, to a place where my people make almost 50%," he raps on his new EP, released days later. "That's half of the population in our prison today. We only make up 3% of the country ain't that a shame... And suicide is oh too common, about 10 that I've known myself." 听
4. VARIOUS ARTISTS - SONGBIRDS 4 - BALLADS BEHIND BARS听
Also as part of NAIDOC week, Sydney's Art Gallery Of New South Wales hosted Blak Country, a night of live Aboriginal country music, on July 10. Between the performances, a deejay played tunes from Songbirds, a series of compilation albums featuring songs by Indigenous prisoners locked up in New South Wales jails, the latest volume of which was released just days earlier. "You can hear the enjoyment in the songs," said the gallery's assistant First Nations curator, Liam Keenan. "The . I think that the country songs that come out of the Songbirds program are some of the most original and unique examples of Indigenous songwriting anywhere in the country right now." Blak Country came nine days after Victorian coroner David Ryan said "a series of missed opportunities culminated in the preventable death" of Joshua Kerr. 听
5. RADICAL SON - BILAMBIYAL (THE LEARNING)听
The Songbirds program is run out of Sydney's Long Bay Jail, where Tongan and Kamileroi man in solitary confinement for bashing prison guards. Leha, now better known as rapper and soul singer Radical Son, released his new album on July 12. "Jail made me a worse person," said Leha, who released his previous album with a special show for offenders at Parkville Youth Justice Precinct. Discussing his new album, he said: "Even though I wish I'd had a stronger connection to Culture and Country, even though there was a real disconnect and Culture and Country was not something I had a deep understanding of, still so much of my music is about my mob, my culture, my heritage." On the album's centrepiece, "Elder", he sings: "I wish to be an elder, an old man of this land. I want to grow old with her, and I've held her in my hands." 听 听
6. MELISSA ETHERIDGE - I'M NOT BROKEN (LIVE FROM TOPEKA CORRECTIONAL FACILITY)听
Leha was lucky to leave jail at a relatively young age. But on July 3, Native American activist after being given two controversial life sentences in 1975 for his role in a shootout between activists and FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Six days later, US country musician Melissa Etheridge released a powerful new album of her wild concert at a women's prison. On its opener, "All American Girl", she sings: "Her eyes are black as leather, and her hair is killer red. How could she keep the baby, when she can barely keep her head? She's an all American girl, and she will live and die in this man's world." On July 13, a product of that man's world, attempt by a gunman. The narrow escape by the self-described "" seemed as remarkable as the fact that he had so far eluded jail. 听听
7. MOLLY NILSSON - UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES
Two days later, the 78-year-old Trump announced that his running mate for president would be 39-year-old JD Vance. Ailing President Joe Biden then stepped aside and backed his vice president, Kamala Harris, to run against Trump. Vance was then revealed to have called Harris a , showing his views may be more backward than a man twice his age. Hitting back, former attorney Harris said: "I took on perpetrators of all kinds. Predators who abused women. Fraudsters who ripped off consumers... So hear me when I say: I know Donald Trump鈥檚 type." Trump responded by calling Harris a "radical left lunatic". Such red-baiting is mocked on Un-American Activities, the new album by Swedish-born singer Molly Nilsson. Its draws parallels between 鈥渢he persecution of leftists and socialists鈥 in the 鈥40s and 鈥50s and the rise of the far-right today.
8. JESSE WELLES - HELLS WELLES
Trump's son-in-law, property developer Jared Kushner, is mocked on the new album by . On "War Isn't Murder", Welles takes aim at Kushner's plans to turn the Gaza Strip into prime real estate after Israel's genocidal bombing of the Palestinians. "War isn't murder, there's money at stake," he sings in his cool, cracked drawl. "Hell, even Kushner agrees it's good real estate... War isn't murder. It's the vengeance of God. If you can't see the bodies, they don't bloat when they rot. And the flies don't swarm. And the children don't cry. If war isn't murder, good men don't die. So in a short 20 years, when you vacation the Strip, don't think about the dead, and have a nice trip." The song's online success, hailed as proving "there鈥檚 to coexist", is no fluke. It's one of 20 gems on what could be the protest album of the year. 听 听
9. ZESHAN B - O SAY, CAN YOU SEE?
Also standing up for the oppressed is former Casteless Collective rapper Arivu with his new album, released on July 18. Discussing it, the Tamil emcee explained how, as a child, he was told he . Now, as he put it: 鈥淚 am the wildest dreams of my ancestors.鈥 The record came days after Narendra Modi's Indian government enforced new anti-protest criminal laws that threatened low-caste Dalits and indigenous Adivasis. Over in the US, first-generation Indian-American Zeshan B served up his latest classy protest album on July 26, sounding like a modern-day Marvin Gaye. It's executive produced by a former US Attorney for New York鈥檚 Southern District, Preet Bharara, who shares Zeshan's . As Zeshan put it: "All Preet's life, he has fought for justice in the courtroom. All my life, I鈥檝e fought for justice with a microphone." 听
10. BERWYN - WHO AM I听
Also no stranger to the law is Trinidad-born musician Berwyn, whose new album, released on July 18, describes his struggles in Britain. "I was the first boy in my family to not go to jail before 16," he said. "So I wanted to change the narrative a bit.鈥 But it was hard amid the racism whipped up by then-Prime Minister Theresa May. 鈥淚鈥檓 sitting down watching the news and accepting the idea that I am enemy to the state. I鈥檝e accepted that narrative from being a young child.鈥 Three days earlier, , which is no less scathing of the Tories, despite him being a white British passport holder. Discussing its song "Aerodomes", while listing his 10 favourite protest songs, he said: ". My grandparents were immigrants who came from the old Yugoslavia and the Ukraine." The EP is a fundraiser for Palestinians. 听 听
[Mat Ward has been writing for听91自拍论坛听since 2009. He also wrote听听and听makes听political music. This month, .]
Want to get this column every month? Just email matwardmusic@gmail.com and I鈥檒l add you to my monthly email that includes a link to this column here at听91自拍论坛.听Yes, I want to read this column every month.
Read about听more political albums.
Stream our new听.听This replaces听听at more than 700 albums.
听