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Know your roots

The role of Punk Rock in the Black Lives Matter movement by Zac Vanlandingham

 How has Punk culture and music addressed movements for Black social justice? As a Punk musician and songwriter, myself, this question holds a lot of interest for me. I intend to look at how Punk music and culture has tied into past movements for social justice and how it now ties into the Black Lives Matter movement. The history of Punk culture and music is tied into different kinds of Black music and culture. Punk rock is a sub-genre of Rock and Roll music. Rock and Roll music in the late fifties and early sixties created some of the first integrated audiences for music performances. White and Black audiences would attend performances by Black artists such as Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Fats Domino, and James Brown. To name just a few. Another aspect of the beginnings of Punk music was that Jamaican immigrants in London were playing and performing Reggae music and this music started to become popular with the young white working class in London. Punk Rock was the result of these young white working class musicians feeling inspired by the unique beats, time signatures, and guitar strumming of Reggae music and putting their own spin on it. This relationship between Punk Rock and Reggae music would later be illustrated by the Bad Brains, who were a Black Punk Rock band who would transition into a Reggae group, and then would later return to playing Punk Rock. As I stated earlier my interest in the history of this music comes from the fact that I am myself a singer, musician, and songwriter in a Punk Rock band. My own background is that I am a straight, white, male who grew up with a middle-class childhood. The music that I enjoy listening to and playing however has caused me to interact, emphasize with, and become familiar with cultures and backgrounds that are different from my own. One of the aspects of Punk culture that is important to me is that individuals from many different backgrounds, cultures, and sexual orientations are made to feel welcome and to be a part of the Punk community. I intend to explore a few of the ways in which the Punk Rock community is currently engaging with the Black Lives Matter Movement. My own band has written a song highlighting the problems of police brutality and corruption and we routinely try to raise awareness on this issue, as well as many others. My own experience being the victim of a wrongful arrest made it easier for me to believe others when they said that they had had similar experiences. As a fan of both Punk Rock and Hip Hop, I’m interested in exploring the similarities between these two different forms of music. Both musical genres are politically aware and engaged and they both praise the DIY (do it yourself) values of the musical artists active in their respective communities. Punk Rock and Hip Hop are both viewed as rebellious subcultures acting in defiance of the dominant culture. Dick Hebdige describes the experience of being involved in a subculture in the following way. “It signals a refusal. I would like to think that this refusal is worth making, that these gestures have a meaning, that the smiles and the sneers have some subversive value, even if, in the final analysis, they are. Just so much graffiti on a prison wall.” (Hebdige145). I took this passage as meaning that for musicians and songwriters in these genres, it is a moral duty to use the music as a platform to criticize aspects of society that need to change even though it may not seem to make a difference sometimes. You may not be able to see the effects immediately, but if you keep singing, someone, somewhere, will hear you. “What today’s activists, organizers, and artists are giving us are new ways to see our past and our present. Even more, they are giving us the directive to address inequality and inequity now-to make it clear that if we do not do so, we will continue to be drawn back into the bad cycle...” (Chang8). It is important to continue using music to criticize injustice because, “the social structures that create premature death do not harm only those individuals who have the misfortune to come into contact with bigots or quick-trigger authorities who have not yet learned how to see. They also prevent people from getting adequate food, shelter, and housing. They limit physical, economic, and social mobility. They refuse to let us all be free.” (Chang3). Both Punk Rock and Hip Hop have used music to criticize corrupt and violent police actions. While the songs ‘Police Truck’ by the Dead Kennedys and ‘Fuck the Police’ by N.W.A may sound different from each other, they both carry the same message. Both songs convey the reality of police harassment. The fact that police have routinely harassed the musicians creating both music forms gives these musicians incentive to be involved in the Black Lives Matter movement. Salim Faraji says that “The #Black Lives Matter movement emerged in response to a series of violent police assaults that have killed countless unarmed African Americans around the country, including Eric Garner, Sandra Bland, Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, Oscar Grant, Tamir Rice, Tanisha Anderson and more recently Laquan McDonald. These criminal acts by police against their own citizenry have been exacerbated by the failure of the justice system to convict or in many cases even investigate the perpetrators which for many equates to a system of state-sanctioned police violence.” (Faraji4). After continually being exposed to harassment and being bombarded with these kinds of wrongful deaths happening in their communities the musicians from these scenes feel compelled to voice their discontent with what they know best, music. In the song ‘Police Truck’, the Dead Kennedys speak about the culture of corruption and cooperation in many police departments that keeps police officers from being punished for their crimes. “The left newspapers might whine a bit. But the guys at the station, they don't give a shit. Dispatch calls, "Are ya doin' something' wicked?" "No siree, Jack, we're just giving' tickets!” (Dead Kennedys “Police Truck” Give me convenience or give me death Alternative Tentacles. 1987). In the song ‘Fuck Tha Police’, N.W.A speaks about the police practice of profiling that results in minorities being harassed because of their appearance. “Fuck the police coming straight from the underground. A young nigga got it bad because I'm brown. And not the other color so police think. They have the authority to kill a minority. Fuck that shit, because I ain't the one. For a punk motherfucker with a badge and a gun. To be beating on, and thrown in jail. We can go toe to toe in the middle of a cell.” (N.W.A “Fuck Tha Police” Straight Outta Compton Ruthless.1988). Black Musicians were being discriminated against and attacked even before Hip Hop existed. Brian Ward provides us with an account of the Jazz singer Nat King Cole being attacked during a concert in 1956. “Let’s get that coon!" someone shouted. Four white men ran down the center aisle of the Birmingham Municipal Auditorium toward the stage. Nat King Cole was midway through his third song of the evening, the romantic ballad "Little Girl." Three of the men vaulted the footlights and one, Kenneth Adams, grabbed the startled singer, who was hit in the face by a falling microphone, and wrestled Cole over his piano stool onto the floor. Plainclothes policemen, alerted to the possibility of trouble at the concert, rushed to rescue the singer, only to clash with uniformed cops who thought they were a second wave of attack. As the curtain fell and Cole was rescued, the Ted Heath Orchestra, a British band touring with Cole, stayed at its post and launched into "God Save the Queen." Shortly later, the shaken singer returned to the stage. "I just came here to entertain you," Cole explained. "I thought that was what you wanted. I was born here. Those folks have hurt my back. I cannot continue because I have to go to a doctor.” (Ward21). Nat King Cole’s music was not even very political. If he could become an object of hatred for racists and become the victim of a brutal attack, it should illustrate how much more hatred musical artists would later receive for speaking about issues involving race relations in their music. Since both Punk Rock and Hip Hop are politically outspoken, they both receive a lot of criticism. The crossover hardcore band, Body Count mixes together elements of Hip Hop, Hardcore Punk, and Heavy Metal in their music. The band is led by lead vocalist and Rapper Ice-T who is mostly known for his solo Hip Hop career. Body count’s first album Cop Killer along with the single of the same name was released in 1992. The song and album Cop Killer were a response to the Rodney King trial in which the four police officers who were caught on video assaulting Rodney King were acquitted of all charges. The spoken word into to Cop Killer which is entitled ‘Out in the Parking Lot’ addresses the issue of police officers profiling and harassing people because of their appearance. "This next record is dedicated to some personal friends of mine, the LAPD. For every cop that has ever taken advantage of somebody, beat 'em down or hurt 'em, because they got long hair, listen to the wrong kinda music, wrong color, whatever they thought was the reason to do it.” (Body Count “Out in the Parking Lot” Cop Killer Sire/Warner Bros. 1992). Because the issues that they were addressing in their first album have still not been resolved and are now being discussed again openly due to the Black Lives Matter movement, Body Count have released a new album called Bloodlust. The song ‘No Lives Matter’ is meant to bring awareness to the Black Lives Matter movement. The song begins with a spoken word intro in the same style as the intro to ‘Cop Killer’. In this intro, Ice-T directly speaks about the Black Lives Matter movement. “It’s unfortunate that we even have to say, 'Black Lives Matter', I mean, if you go through history nobody ever gave a fuck. I mean, you can kill Black people in the street, nobody goes to jail, and nobody goes to prison. But when I say, 'Black Lives Matter' and you say, 'All Lives Matter', that's like if I was to say, 'Gay Lives Matter' and you say, 'All Lives Matter'. If I said, 'Women's Lives Matter' and you say, 'All Lives Matter', you're diluting what I'm saying. You're diluting the issue. The issue isn't about everybody. It's about Black lives, at the moment but the truth of the matter is, they don't really give a fuck about anybody, if you break this shit all the way down to the low fucking dirty-ass truth.” (Body Count “No Lives Matter” Blood Lust Century Media. 2017). In the chorus of the song ‘No Lives Matter’, Ice-T points out that the police also target poor people of all races because the poor are the most vulnerable and the least likely to have the resources to defend themselves from a corrupt law enforcement and legal system. “Don’t fall for the bait and switch. Racism is real, but not it. They fuck whoever can't fight back. But now we gotta change all that. The people have had enough. Right now, it's them against us. This shit is ugly to the core. When it comes to the poor. No lives matter.” (Body Count “No Lives Matter” Blood Lust Century Media. 2017). The song ‘Black Hoodie’ on the same album deals with the issues of excessive force, profiling, and the lack of accountability in our law enforcement systems. Like ‘Cop Killer’ and ‘No Lives Matter’, this song also begins with a spoken word intro by Ice-T in which he discusses profiling and police brutality. “All these people out here tripping off police brutality like this shit is something new. Give me a fucking break. I've been talking about this shit for over 20 years. And now you can kill a motherfucker just because of how he's dressed. Are you fucking serious?” (Body Count “Black Hoodie” Blood Lust Century Media. 2017). In the chorus of this song Ice-T provides us with an account of an unarmed man that has been shot by the police solely because of his appearance. “Got on a black hoodie, its hood up on my head. I didn't have a gun so why am I dead. You didn't have to shoot me and that's a known fact. And now I'm lying face down with bullets in my back. Got on a black hoodie, its hood up on my head. I didn't have a gun so why am I dead. You didn't have to shoot me and that's a known fact. And now I'm lying face down with bullets in my back.” (Body Count “Black Hoodie” Blood Lust Century Media. 2017). Throughout his career, in both his solo work and with Body Count, Ice-T has dealt with themes of racial injustice in his music. The Hardcore Band Prophets of Rage like Body Count also mixes together elements of Punk Rock, Heavy Metal, and Hip Hop. The band is made up of former members of Rage against the Machine, Public Enemy, and Cypress Hill. The members of the band provide an example of multiple races working together. DJ Lord and Chuck D from Public Enemy, who are in the band are Black men. B-Real from Cypress Hill is Latino. Bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk are white men. Guitarist Tom Morello is of mixed descent. He has a white American mother and a Black father from Kenya. The members of the band are engaged in political activism and are supporters of the Black Lives matter movement. Their first public performance together was a protest show in which they played opposite to the Republican National Convention to protest the open racism of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. They have also played free shows for demonstrators at some of Black Lives Matter’s rallies. In the song ‘Prophets of Rage’ they stress the importance of being politically involved and aware of events happening in the world around us. “When choice became the people's voice. Shout loud. Put your hands up in the crowd. Raise your fist up (fist up). While I lift up (lift up). Fucking everything wrong with the system (system). People hungry and dying'. They ain't got a home. This is the nature created. From the terror dome (terror dome). Let's turn the page. Shaman burn the sage. Clear the way for the prophets of rage. Can you kick it like…?” (Prophets of Rage “Prophets of Rage” The Party’s Over Caroline. 2016).  A newer Punk Rock band that addresses the Black Lives Matter movement is the band Big Joanie. They are a black feminist punk band from London. The band consists of three Black women. The women in the band Big Joanie are outspoken political activists and are also part of the current Afro-Punk movement. The basis of the Afro-Punk movement is that while there has always been a black presence in Punk Rock as demonstrated by bands such as Pure Hell, Death, Bad Brains, and Body Count, they did not feel as if they were visibly represented enough. The Afro-Punk movement seeks to increase the visibility of these diverse and talented bands by giving them their own spaces. There is a touring Afro-Punk festival, which tours worldwide, and there is a documentary about Afro-Punk that features a lot of these newer bands and gives credit to the older artists that inspired and influenced this musical movement. Right here in San Antonio, we have the bands Angry Red and Lonely Horse that are connected to the Afro-Punk movement. Many of their songs deal with the frustrations of living in the Black experience. Big Joanie wrote the song ‘Crooked Room’ to describe the experience of living as black women in a society where most of the rules of proper behavior are dictated by white males. Taylor Burton of Grinnell College says of the song ‘Crooked Room’ that, “they expressed the difficulty black women have to overcome when finding confidence in a world where they are portrayed negatively in all forms of popular media.” (Taylor Burton, Afro-Punk History, http://haenfler.sites.grinnell.edu/subcultures-and-scenes/afro-punk/). This is how Big Joanie describes living with this experience. “Can’t think straight. Chorus of noise. Can’t think straight. Locked in your room…The crooked room gets you. In the end.” (Big Joanie “Crooked Room” Sistah Punk EP Sistah Punk Records 2016). Another Punk Rock band that acknowledges the Black Lives Matter movement is the band Pussy Riot. Pussy Riot is a feminist punk band from Russia that is comprised of three white Russian women. They wrote a song called ‘I Can’t breathe’ to protest the police killing of Eric Garner by the NYPD. I think it’s interesting that a band from as far away as Russia can recognize problems with how our police officers interact with the public but many people here still refuse to acknowledge that a problem exists. In the song ‘I can’t Breathe’, Pussy Riot describes the frustrations people feel when hearing about one unarmed police killing after another all the time, without any officers being punished for their actions. “It’s getting dark. New York City. It’s getting dark. New York City. I need to catch my breath.” (Pussy Riot “I can’t Breathe” No Label/Pussy Riot self-released 2015). A significant fact about this song is that it is Pussy Riot’s first English language song. They felt that the issue was so important that they needed to let activists in America and anyone here that must deal with these issues know that we have their support. I think that what this band from so far away, from a completely different country, from a completely different culture, represents in acknowledging the Black Lives Matter movement, is that there is a very powerful truth behind the movement that cannot be ignored for much longer. Another band that is part of the Afro-Punk movement is the band Rough Francis. Three of the five members of the band are Black men, the lead singer, one of the two guitarists, and the drummer. The three Black men in the band are brothers. Their names are Bobby (Jr.), Julian and Urian Hackney. An interesting fact about the three brothers in this band is that they are the children of Bobby Hackney, who is the singer/bassist of the black proto-punk band Death. The song ‘Blind Pigs’ by Rough Francis criticizes the treatment that young Black men often receive from police officers. “On their knees and on the ground. They beat them down. They beat them down. On the roofs and on the ground. They beat them down. They beat them down.” (Rough Francis “Blind Pigs” MSP 2 Riot House Records. 2015). Their fathers band Death also uses their music to criticize unjust systems. “Always tryin' to be slick when they tell us their lies. They're responsible for sending young men to die. We have waited so long for. Someone to come along and correct our country's law, but the wait's been too long.” (Death “Politicians in My Eyes” For the whole world to see Drag City Records. 2009). Now as we get into some of the history we will see why the Afro-Punk movement and its connection to Black Lives Matter are important. Originally Rock and Roll was primarily a Black musical invention. Maureen Mahon says that, “Rock 'n' roll, a great American innovation, is also a great American hybrid. Music critics and historians usually recognize rock 'n' roll as a fundamentally American music form developed through the creativity of young black and white working-class, southern musicians in the late 1940’s and 1950’s.” (Mahon283). She goes on to say that, “As rock 'n' roll expanded beyond its core black constituency and began to appeal to white teenagers, the form itself became associated with whites in the American popular imagination. Indeed, by the mid-1980s, black Americans who engaged in rock as musicians or listeners stood out from the black mainstream for their allegiance to a music that no longer seemed to be "really black.”” (Mahon283). The importance of the Afro-Punk movement is that black musicians are reclaiming the music that their culture and community helped to create. Not only was Rock and Roll created by a culture of predominantly Black musicians, but the music that it evolved from, the Blues was as well. Blues Music topics included living with the frustrations of the black experience. It also cried out against injustice and engaged in activism. Phillip Kolin says of the song ‘Blues for Emmet Till’ that “Blues" reflects the spirit of the times - the fear and outrage over Till's murder and the urgency to seek justice. Written before there was a carefully orchestrated civil rights movement, the ethos behind "Blues" anticipates the subsequent protests that Till's murder occasioned, e.g., Freedom Riders for Emmett Till, Rosa Parks’ historic refusal to sit in the back of the bus just three months after Till's murder, and later the marches on Montgomery and Birmingham.” (Kolin456). The creators of the song ‘Blues for Emmet Till’ would go on to become involved in the Civil Rights movement and would continue to use music as a tool of protest. “The creators of "Blues for Emmett Till" were passionately involved in civil rights battles. Aaron Kramer (1921-1997) was regarded as "the leading resistance poet of the McCarthy era" (Kramer). A prolific poet, editor, critic, translator, he had recorded for Folkways Recording as well as for the Library of Congress and throughout his long career collaborated with many musicians who turned his rhyming poems into songs. Clyde Robert Appleton (1928- ), an African American composer, singer, and educator, was a lifelong activist in the civil rights movement, first in North Carolina and then in Arizona. Graduating from Park College in 1954, Appleton taught at Shaw College, Purdue University, and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. In 1965, he led the historic Black Belt Conference (on "Civil Rights and Anti-poverty") in a round of civil rights songs, and wrote articles for Jazz, Educator, The Churchman, and his "Singing in the Streets of Raleigh, 1963: Some Recollections" appeared in The Black Perspective in Music (Autumn 1975), providing a first-hand account of the music that bound together a generation of young African Americans. "Blues" thus underscores a powerful collaboration between a white resistance poet and an African American composer, both determined to denounce the villainy behind Till's murder.” (Kolin456). The event of Emmet Till’s murder continues to affect musicians in our modern era of music. “For the hip-hop generations, Emmett Till's narratives inspire powerful connections to the civil rights era, African American migratory patterns, the violence of white supremacy and racism, and the troubled sexual politics between black men and white women.” (Peterson617). Black musicians have always used music as a tool of protest and as a way of declaring their humanity. A trait that Punk Rock and Hip Hop share with each other is that they are both political and outspoken. Derrick Alridge says of Hip Hop that, “While Hip Hop has not dramatically changed oppressive institutional structures or organized itself at anywhere near the level of civil rights organizations, such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), or the NAACP, it shares with the CRM a critique of the problems that plague U.S. African Americans and other oppressed people throughout the world.” (Alridge228). As Rock and Roll continued to evolve it split off into different subcategories. Some of these subcategories like Soul, Funk, and Hip Hop were ways for black musicians to hold onto their musical creation and present songs from a uniquely black experience. It is important for the black community to be able to maintain control of the music that they create, so that they can maintain a sense of identity. “While the end of formal colonialism has not eradicated racism, postcoloniality has unsettled Black identity, producing new struggles around gender, sexuality, class and location.” (Noble111). Many Black musicians are now feeling as if it is their duty to reclaim the music forms that their communities and cultures helped create. Kesha Morant says that, “From work songs and spirituals during slavery to the gospel, soul, and funk of the civil rights movement, Black music offers a new historicist interpretation of the African American experience. Through Black popular music, the struggles, faith, and joys of a people are expressed. More than mere entertainers, Black musicians are the village griots, the revisionist historians, and the voice of a people. African American music solidifies messages of societal concerns, offering snapshots of social conditions and defining moments within a society.” (Morant71). The Afro-Punk movement reclaiming Punk Rock is important to the Black activist musicians in the scene because they are aware of every music form created by their culture and community being coopted by the White culture and then losing their effectiveness as a protest tool. This same series of events happened with Jazz music as well. Jazz was an important part of the Harlem Renaissance. Along with authors, and other kinds of artists, Jazz musicians in the Harlem Renaissance were creating art from a uniquely black perspective. As the decades came on though, Jazz like Rock and Roll, and the blues, drew the attention of white musicians and listeners. Andy Fry says of Jazz that, “African-American musicians in the 1950s and 1960s were typically happy to share the bandstand, and even to celebrate the music’s power to break down barriers between “races.” But they rightly protested when the discourse of “universalism” was used to promote the careers of nonblack musicians who already had huge structural advantages (and had not, historically, been so willing to share the stage).” (Fry718).    

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