audio - Red Wedge

Editors' note: Richard Wallace, also known as EPIC of the Chicago hip-hop group BBU, released his first solo album last month. Entitled #OPRAH, the title is actually an acronym: "Ordinary People Recording American History." It is, as the Chicago Reader's Leor Galil puts it, "a continuation of Chuck D's comment, but it's also an allusion to rap's current position, wherein recording equipment has become increasingly cheaper and more people have access to tools that allow them to document and share their experiences on some of the most popular websites out there." This track, "Letter to My Father," ties the political with the personal. Wallace's father died in prison, and the racist toll of the prison industrial complex and the injustice system are hardly news to anyone paying attention. LyricsTake me away Take me away To brighter days Take me away Take me away To where my father is living Far from the prion system that pimped him Daley’s hit men hit men until they bent men Something gotta change Call me different distance distorted Son and daughter’s aborted And water boarded To save fortunes The porridge is running thing again And the wolfs is at the door The boy cried wolfstill the the village called him a whore They took his voice and gave him sores took his hands and gave him sword Stole his soul and gave him lord I feel like war is eminent When you murder the innocentThere no repentance The life Trayvon Hearts dropped like a bombs while the world yelled stay calm The church said pray for him What happened to prophets speak the passion of the people Speak!!Cause we need youNot the money that leads you This is an open call to any militant That gives a shitI’ll load a clip and die for this I seen my mother cry for this Look into her eye and whisperChange gone come, because it has toYou dream might out last you But they are in line with what your past drew. And you drew Picasso’s momma I’m from where the red fern grows Stood on hot coals for the souls of Black folk I wrote this for cottage groveGD’s BD’s and solid 4’s Vice Lords Black Stones and many moreThey will unite till when this war You by pass them as some thugs but i see them as our core Intellectuals be the arm but the goons will be our sword War on bastards that want to out last us Word from the spook who sat by the door and learned master Wasn’t faster more intelligent Or or better fit then he was We don’t need them but they need us So drugs and dreams is what the feed us Keep us sick and waiting for Jesus To resurrect and kick his feet upWell Jesus what are you waiting for? Waiting on you so long we knocking on Satan’s door. Like he ain’t picking up or he ain’t picking us. Richard Wallace a.k.a. EPIC is a community activist, writer and lyricist in Chicago. He is a member of acclaimed hip-hop group BBU and is a co-founder of the Future of Benin Project.

“Suicide Nets,” from New Tongues' newly released Suite EP, is based on the use of such nets by the Foxconn factory in China to prevent workers from killing themselves by jumping out of their dorms. The suicides became common in 2010 at the Shenzhen manufacturing hub; workers began to see suicide as their only form of protest against inhumane and abusive working conditions.Loud music often times has mundane or personal lyrics void of historical or political context. What we’ve tried to do is convey ideas about a subject that indirectly force the listener draw conclusions that are outside of their comfort zone. Abrasive soundscapes and the ebb and flow of tempo, volumes, and feel are important to what we write musically. The actual lyrical content of the songs may not be of the direct variety that politicos who listen to music seek out. LyricsThe ledge is not your friend todayThose nets are meant for safetyThe line shall not be crossed todayLook out below!!!Not today, not today, not todayWhen does it end? Where to begin?Where does it end? When to begin?

Editors’ note: This workshop was presented at the Socialism 2014 conference in Chicago on June 26th. It was part of a track of radical art talks done every year at the Socialism conference. It now appears at the website WeAreMany.org. Broken up into two parts, the talks take on the broad question of creative expression’s relationship to activism, first from the outside in, then from the inside out.The first speaker, Alexander Billet of Red Wedge, attempts to provide a framework for understanding art both under capitalism and how it is impacted by radical social change. The second speaker, Palestinian-American poet Remi Kanazi, then picks up by performing two of his own poems and shares his experiences as an “artist-activist.” Alexander Billet is a music and arts critic and writer based in Chicago, and is on the editorial board of Red Wedge.Remi Kanazi is a poet, writer, and activist based in New York City. He is the author of Poetic Injustice: Writings on Resistance and Palestine, and is the editor of Poets For Palestine.