A huge part of me is a political creature. It came to me at my father’s knee, as it were, and has remained prominent throughout my life. I have come to enough of an understanding of government to know that I need no part of it, beyond as subject for socio-political observation. Politics, while abysmal at human harmonic existence, is spectacular as art. My art is the cumulative result of all that I have learned up to the point of creation. To avoid repetition, I keep learning. This has other benefits as well….
I have chosen some fascinating sources from which to gather my understanding of the world. Alas, most are not about for me to offer my tributes to directly, which saddens me. But some still are, which gives me hope. Professor Noam Chomsky is and none is more deserving. He has influenced and inspired me for many years and his work of explicating reality has most assuredly colored my own.
I offered him the lyric to “Dissent” by email. He, to my great pleasure and surprise, responded with thanks and compliment. This means the world to me. As I don’t wish to occupy time better spent, my correspondence with him has been brief. But in asking as to his style of music preference he characterized himself as fairly conservative, though he likes Stravinsky.
As I like Stravinsky I felt another kinship. So I plunged in to “Dissent”, the music. It was a challenging birthing to say the least. Join me, if you will, in the delivery room:
As the song has a central theme of anarchy regarding the successful anarchism of the Spanish Revolution (ultimately crushed by the even more successful fascism of pretty much everywhere), I decided to take an Iberian flavor. I started with a flamenco guitar and developed several prominent themes which would represent the republican forces. To counter the republican guitar came the extreme violins of the nationalists, backed by their external sources of support and influence, the percussion of the German and Italian fascists, with the droning support of the Big Brass from those places seldom mentioned in this regard. To offer balance to the overwhelmed guitar of the republicans, the anarchist piano joins the musical fray. I also threw in a French horn to aid the resistance as well as some additional brass for the Soviets to horn in with.
The piece begins with an overture to reason where the players state their points with lots of interference from the percussion, banging away there, as they try to drive the action. The nationalists initially ape the republican statement as a question but then alter it while ignoring the anarchists input, eventually drowning out all voices but their own. Just like in real life. Then as they all leap up to defend their respective positions, they slam right into each other and come crashing down.
Just like in real life.
Behind the main verses, the guitar lays down the republican line with minor variation, though it does slip some quick ones in when the violins aren’t looking. The violins counter, appealing to tradition and sentiment, really tugging at the heart strings as they try to lead us from the progression of the republican perspective. All the while, the anarchist piano slips in little hints of its own beauty without all that sentiment.
Everybody joins in the chorus, more than slightly Germanic in temper, each voice demanding to be heard over the competing voices. It is here the Brass become increasingly horny, trying desperately to convince us to give it up, that they’ll still respect us afterwards. The simple repeatable chorus which appeals so well to Groupthink is of course confounded lyrically by its lack of repetition, but the music doesn’t know that; not into long winded moralist dissertations, more content with passing notes in bars.
After the first chorus, the fascists make their move and this nightmarish section is hearkened by the German bombing of Guernica and brutal nationalist attacks upon republican and civilian positions. The percussion increases until the crash, leading into the middle lyrics where all hell breaks loose. The music tells the story of the war as all the conflicting elements come together in a driving musical assault, inspirational while overwhelming.
In the end, the guitar and piano are vanquished (only to reappear in the second verse as they again support the lyrics in the manner to which they’ve become accustomed), and the beating and violins dominate Orwellian throughout. The second chorus dissolves to the verse in a very strange transition almost dreamlike, offering a taste of the surrealism so prominent in the age. By the third chorus the guitar and piano are completely buried under the strings, horns and percussion dominating the ominous end they so strive for.
As it began with an Overture it then must end with an Underture. As revolution assures us we’ll come around again, the theme of the Overture is restated, this time by the victors in the battle that so demands our dissent: the nationalist violins, fascist percussion and the Big Brass – the capitalist masters. Of course, while they state their original positions exactly as before, even incorporating the opposing voices to allow a sense of equilibrium, they get it all backwards and horribly out of time. This then is the message of the piece encapsulated: with our leadership sinking in wild yet diminishing spirals, we are all out of time.
We should spend it well.
Peace.
10/15/14
Dissent
Assuming the position
Blindly forth we charge
Reason on occasion one must purge
Presuming imposition
Target to disparage
Their interests and our interest converge
Establish coalition
Asset base enlarge
As soon as consensus does emerge
Political ambition
Judicial miscarriage
Once again a conflict on the verge
Man, you’re fracturing dissent
By continuing compliance
Manufacturing consent
Demands human defiance
For a brief shining moment
In human social lore
The anarchists prevailed
In the Spanish Civil War
Professor Chomsky noted
Likewise Orwell before
Where anarchism flourished
Fine social fruit it bore
Anarchy’s aristocrat
Is equal to the whore
Control through monied power
A notion to deplore
Fascists fought it fiercely
Unevened up the score
Propaganda’s prominence
Over the battle roar
Sunken in dictatorship
Modern conquistador
The taste of freedom soured
Lest people demand more
Man, you’re factoring assent
As a perceived alliance
Manufacturing consent
As much an art as science
Decidedly reliant
Development arrest
Excess with so very much at stake
Successfully defiant
The giant you can’t best
See how far you bend before you break
Media serves client
Issues unaddressed
Impossible to avoid mistake
Pummeled public pliant
So easily impressed
What we gain dwarfed by what we forsake
Man, you’re fracturing dissent
By continuing compliance
Manufacturing consent
Demands reasoned defiance
Man, you’re factoring assent
Upon systems reliance
Manufacturing consent
Dissent our shared alliance
© 2012 ArtAHammer
12/16/12
With infinite respects to Professor Noam Chomsky