The day after the election, against all odds, life continued on. The straw did not, in fact, break the camels back. I found myself behind the counter of Wax Trax. Many of us were in shock and grief, but we all went about our jobs.
We carefully decided the only true discourse we would have about the election was through music. We all took turns queuing up songs that day – through my bleary eyes and ringing ears – these are the tracks I remember:
- The Roof Is on Fire by Rock Master Scott & the Dynamic Three (Not a protest song, but let the motherfucker burn)
- Nuclear War by Sun Ra
- [We Don’t Need This] Fascist Groove Thang by Heaven 17
- Dead Men Don’t Rape by 7 Year Bitch
- A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall by Bob Dylan
- Drink Before the War by Sinéad O’Connor
- The Revolution Will Not Be Televised by Gil Scott-Heron
- Fight the Power by Public Enemy
Cathartic and dramatic, these songs to me demonstrate a horrific truth. In a situation that feels unprecedented, we choose to comfort ourselves with songs about the travesties of the 20th century; a sickening reminder that we have been here before. The tears in our eyes have been cried for generations, and we find ourselves solaced by them.
German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel defined history as “the slaughter-bench at which the happiness of peoples, the wisdom of States, and the virtue of individuals have been victimized.” We move from one atrocity to the next, and suffer incessantly as we always have. Yet, we are not meant to resign ourselves to agony. Hegel also wrote, “world history is not the place for happiness… periods of happiness are empty pages in history.”
Through the horrors of the world, we move ourselves closer to the largest and longest grail in human history: freedom. This freedom, both political and entirely individual, is our raison d’être, the “absolute substance” of our being.
Now, when so many of us feel the weight of the slaughter-bench upon our chests, it’s imperative that we remember ourselves in the annals of history. Generations to come will remember our reaction, the same way we now remember Bob Dylan’s reaction to the Cuban Missile Crisis. History is immortalized through art and music, and we often worship those who metamorphized their agony into great pieces of work.
This all is to say take time to grieve – life is not easy on the slaughter-bench. And once you’ve gathered yourself enough, commence with the project of freedom. Use your place in history to create something amazing and pay careful attention to what artists have to say. The future is watching –and more importantly in this industry, listening.
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