When it comes to my taste in music, I tend to be stuck in the 40’s. On any given day, in any given mood, my ipod is circling through hundreds of jazz tracks and very seldom do change it. That’s not to say that I don’t listen to other genres of music, I’m a huge Black Keys, Elliott Smith, and Janis Joplin fan, but when it comes to most contemporary music, I’m at a loss.
This weekend, I went to my very first ‘electronica’ show at the Paradise Rock Club right down the street. The tickets weren’t too expensive, and Chloe and I were treating some lovely sophomores to a night on the town. I wasn’t really looking forward to the show, as it was not something I predicted to enjoy given my antique taste palate. However, what I found was that there is an underground movement of politically infused electronica that is changing the youth who listen to it.
With the Occupy: Wall Street movement in full swing this week across the nation, one has to consider the origins of the protests. Millions of young middle class Americans are standing up together against our flawed capitalistic system, big banks, and our government’s laissez-faire attitude. This movement has been spawned by social media, videos and blogs, and (what I learned on Saturday) music. The opener for the band we were seeing was called DJ Philistine. And on top of being a crazy amazing DJ, he was inspiring. Behind his set up there were projections of modern commercial consumerism that played and changed with every downbeat. He told the crowd he was from Barcelona and that earlier this year they had a movement similar to the one we’re having now. Thousands of Barcelonians crowded the streets in peaceful protests against the failing government, and through his show, he was attempting to spread the word. The fact that Philistine was so successful in communicating this message to a group of young American electronica lovers (at one point he shouted “We had our time, now this is your time! Occupy Boston!” to which the crowd responded with resounding cheers) is amazing to me. The power of music, the power of art, can be used for igniting a flame within people and fueling a politically active fire.
Not only did I walk away with the inspiration to create change through art, but also with a greater appreciation for the contemporary music movement. Perhaps there will be a few new tracks to add to my usually constant jazz playlist.
