Heads High

‘Told you we aint dead yet, we been livin’ through your internet. You don’t have to believe everything you think, we’ve been programmed, wake up, we miss you.’

As part of an underground creative network, we take pride in supporting, creating and exporting ‘progressive/forward-thinking/different-from-the-norm’ music. Noble principles. There is a deep value in this….. but when did we decide to dissociate these lofty principles from the rest of our lives?

I’ve been observing the musical blogoshpere for a minute now and it has been a bipolar experience of delight and disappointment. Delight in the amazing creations we are continually blessed with and disappointment that there are virtually zero heads out there (Heads High included) that are willing to talk about much else but the music itself, or its associated media. Breaking bread with industry friends,it seems that any kind of vaguely political or spiritual topics have slim place in certain musical spheres – that people don’t want to be preached to. They’re right. But who are we if as tastemakers and opinion shapers, we’re too afraid to say anything apart from big up or take down the endless stream of product coming through our hands?

Our culture has been structured in a way that allows us to blot out realities in favour of consuming more of the same – in a different package. This particular thought stream was triggered by ‘The Story Of Stuff‘, a 20 minute treatise on the harsh realities of the production process which you’ll have heard of somewhere over the past year or so. Don’t worry, I’m not going to launch into a tirade against the evils of consumerism….I think we all get the picture on that….what does interest me though is the idea that cultures are created, maintained and perpetuated with the goal of neutralizing peoples opinions on things that matter.

I figure 90% of you reading this are music lovers….the word culture is almost holy ground to us.  We all take pride in the (sub)cultures we are part of. More than that, we actively direct and extend these cultures. So in truth, we’re in a curious space where we simultaneously control and are controlled by our cultural ‘norms’.

Back to the Story of Stuff. If you’ve seen it, you’ll agree that one of the most unsettling moments is the quote below:

The Real Meaning of Consumer Demand

‘Our enormously productive economy demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals, that we seek our spiritual satisfactions,our ego satisfactions, in consumption. The measure of social status, of social acceptance, of prestige, is now to be found in our consumptive patterns. The very meaning and significance of our lives today expressed in consumptive terms…. We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced, and discarded at an ever increasing pace. We need to have people eat, drink, dress, ride, live, with ever more complicated and, therefore, constantly more expensive consumption.’

Sound like a familiar situation to you? A market analyst named Victor Lebow dropped this in his ‘Journal of Retaling’ which was published way back in 1955. An era which saw the rise of youth culture on both sides of the Atlantic. A generation which prided itself on its autonomous rule and individual identity while in actuality feeding the very same model described by Mr Lebow above. Sadly, in this respect at least, I feel we have progressed little in the past half century.

My basic point is, as Erykah says, we need to wake up. Technology has afforded our generation(s) a ridiculously high level of creative output but we seem to be wielding this potentially world altering weapon like children with toy swords.  Art is exceptionally important, and we celebrate it accordingly, but we are lost in a maze of the next big thing. The exact maze that Mr Lebow describes in his quote. The longer we remain lost, the longer our voices are ineffectual in the reshaping of a world which, in number at least, we should be in control of. When I flick through the new posts on my RSS feed reader, I can’t help but feel a little bit of shame. Shame at the fact that after an evolution on this planet of circa 300,000 years (the official figure), the majority of us appear to have limited our infinite capacities (including our creative vision) to boundaries set by those whose aim is for us to continue to walk in self-perpetuating circles.

I don’t believe it’s an accident that some of the most enduring icons are those which used their art to speak beyond the surface. Cats like Fela Anikulapo Kuti and Peter Tosh. who composed for human rights, John Lennon, who made noise for peace, and Sun-Ra, who stood out on a limb and opened minds to new realities – if they were ready. We’ve got our share of truth speakers now. Sa Ra, Georgia Ann Muldrow and Dudley Perkins are flying the flag for peaceful spiritual frontiers amongst others.  Heads like Mos Def and Immortal Technique are dropping truth on the lies of the men in suits and even Stones Throw’s James Pants has turned his attention to the esoteric with his latest ‘Seven Seals‘ offering. It would have been easier for any one of these artists not to have broached uncomfortable subjects, just as it is easier, and infinitely more socially acceptable, for us to talk air rather than truth.  I’m not saying that every song or blog post needs to be chanting down Babylon and discussing the nature of multi-dimensional reality, but I really do believe its time for our media educated generation to consider their purpose and objectives in a world which needs direction now more than ever.  We all have truth to tell. I for one would like to look back on what we produced in word, sound and image and know that it actually meant something….

‘We’ve been programmed, wake up, we miss you…..’