Late-grunge era San Francisco-based rockers Stephan Jenkins and Brad Hargreaves, the vocals and drums that have pretty much been the basis for the group Third Eye Blind, have assembled a new band, and have released one of the first true ‘pop’ protest songs about the Occupy Movement: the band posted “If There Ever Was A Time” to their Facebook page on November 16, 2011, available for free download. The accompanying Youtube montage of Zucotti Park clips dramatizes these lyrics:
[…] where are the youth, we need you now
if there ever was a time, it would be now
to make the masters hear this
if there ever was a time to get downtown
and get non-violent and fearless
things only get brighter when you light a spark
everywhere you go right now is Zucotti Park […]
While the words of the song don’t ring with as much liberty as “Stand!” by Sly and the Family Stone, Third Eye Blind’s effort in writing a 21st century pop-protest song is notable, if diluted by its place in history: are the “masters” the same as who Dylan described in “Masters of War,” or in the revived Black Sabbath epic, “War Pigs?” When we get downtown, the bridge reveals what’ll happen: And news corps says you don’t have a plan/well sit down, man, I’ll tell you again/the plan’s to stand together up to greed. Advocating non-violent demonstration to the youth (“we need you now,” the song repeats) in a centralized location through song, on Facebook and YouTube—a distribution effort that costs virtually nothing—is an new embrace of an established form. Neil Young and friends wrote, recorded and released “Ohio” in May of 1970, in response to the tragedy at Kent State, where four protesters were shot; within about a month of the event, radio stations and record stores had the 45rpm single in-hand, backed by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young harmonizing on Stephen Stills’ “Find the Cost of Freedom.” Dylan, Young, Sly, Marvin Gaye: legends, from a time when songs could espouse to being direct social commentary on what What’s Going On.
A few months hence, and already a strange democratic melancholy threads through Jenkins’ lead vocal call, if there ever was a time, it would be now. While this sentiment may be inscribed on cave walls and in caverns deep within the pyramids, and found rendered more interestingly across the canon of recorded American pop music, “If There Ever Was A Time” is a call to action, however implicit and vague, implanted within a rock song. The production employs the glossiest kind of modern pop: the acoustic guitar shines, drums swing in up-tempo, the chorus is melodically rousing. The whole affair reminds me of Soul Asylum’s “Runaway Train,” except Third Eye Blind’s number didn’t come out of nowhere in the way that the Dave Pirner missing-children anthem did, and that the video-music distribution landscape looked very different in 1994—back when MTV ran the Tony Kaye-directed video incessantly, featuring images of children missing in America. In the original video, Pirner himself appeared at its close, asking viewers to call a hotline if they could identify any of the children shown. Regardless of the fact that MTV in the United States chose to run the video without Pirner’s closing statement (not wanting their program to become a public service announcement), the video was successful in locating missing children across the country, as well as in Australia and the UK. The song won a Grammy that year; Third Eye Blind would win a Billboard Music Award for “Semi-Charmed Life” three years later. This modern socially-minded song with an ethical but cumbersome title, “If There Ever Was A Time,” might reflect the tribulations of the rock outfit: dropped unexpectedly by Warner in 2004, a few albums in the last decade with no hits whatsoever, and, early in 2011, an eight-million dollar lawsuit by former guitarist Tony Fedianelli over songwriting credits. Third Eye Blind, which may be at work on their fifth album, currently includes Kryz Reid on electric guitar and Abraham Millett on bass.
The official video of “If There Ever Was A Time” isn’t likely to be seen on MTV, and the song isn’t likely to go multi-platinum, like Soul Asylum’s “Runaway Train” or Neil Young’s “Ohio.” The audio was used as a bumper on VH1’s Big Morning Buzz, but the video-- fast images of the police, the marches, dancing in the streets, cardboard signs flashing by in radiant hippie glory, a woman’s exposed belly painted “End the Fed”--while Jenkins appears in sunglasses, strumming his acoustic, is a made-for-YouTube production, helping define a new category in the realm of film. Video remixes abound, including ones of Jenkins’ acoustic performance in Zucotti Park; suggestions appear in the sidebar, offering Occupy performances by NOFX in Los Angeles, a haggard Joan Baez teaching the crowd “Joe Hill” on a cold November afternoon in New York, and a stunning live performance by Jackson Browne and Dawes, backed by a gospel choir on an original Browne tells the crowd he finished “last night,” posted by karinmoveon on Dec. 2, 2011. It’s both democratic and capitalist to sing a song of protest in a public (privately-owned) park like Zucotti or, virtually, through YouTube or Facebook; the factories where vinyl 45rpm singles were produced, and the studios and offices of MTV are no longer necessary to musical expressions that are calls to action, and that likely goes for a Jackson Browne live performance, an embattled Third Eye Blind making new, good use of their time, and the work of John L. Samuels Jr.-Esco, whose foresight in late September 2011 may give him claim to writing one of the earliest songs about the protest movement. It is a hip-hop number he created at Slag Studios in the Bronx, that he titled on YouTube “Occupy the Street Song (The Official Anthem)”; it is nearly five minutes of melodic vocal harmonizing around the words “stand up,” along with a quiet synthy string part, and one very loud kick drum. He posted his song, and accompanying video (featuring reverse footage of arrests in the street, and of the Twin Towers exploding) weeks before the Brooklyn Bridge blockade in mid-October.
Two months later, on the closing night of Philip Glass’ opera “Satyagraha” at Lincoln Center, Lou Reed told the crowd gathered outside—large enough to necessitate two repetitions by the crowd of the aged rocker’s words, so that all could hear-- “I’ve never been more ashamed than to see the barricades tonight. The police are our army. I want to be friends with them. And I want to Occupy Wall Street. I support it, in each and every way. I’m proud to be part of this.” Following the opera’s final performance, the esteemed composer himself emerged from the massive theater and into the cold street to address the gathered crowd. He wore a black knit cap and spectacles; I was not there, but wept as though I was, when I watched him repeat his prepared statement three times, realizing its relevance, and the challenge inherent to the artists, to find ways to share some truth in of our time:
“When righteousness withers away and evil rules the land, we come into being, age after age, and take physical shape, and move, a man among men, for the protection of good, thrusting back evil, and setting virtue on her seat again.” (Philip Glass at Occupy Lincoln Center, 12/1/11).
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Sept. 2011—John L. Samuels Jr.-Esco, “Occupy the Street Song (The Official Anthem)”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bF0zQwcMT14&feature=related
Nov. 11, 2011—Joan Baez at Zucotti Park: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mh1z-E5RDhM&feature=related
Dec. 1, 2011--Philip Glass at Occupy Lincoln Center: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2p1HWwh-rM8
Dec. 1, 2011—Lou Reed at Occupy Lincoln Center: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDR4YCAGk7M
Dec. 2, 2011—Stephen Jenkins at Zucotti Park: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8h9d-mQbtyk
Dec. 4, 2011—Jackson Browne and Dawes at Zucotti Park: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RalPB3ux4M&feature=relmfu
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