Music is a Weapon | The Sound Strike

The famous Cuban singer Silvio Rodriguez once sang, ?la guitara del joven soldado es recluta tambien,? the guitar of the young soldier is also a recruit. Silvio speaks to the power of pop culture to not only create a dialogue about what is happening in the world, but also to create meaningful discussion, and yes to recruit people to get involved. With so much masochism, bling, bling and ignorant commercialism in music today it is no wonder why the popping movements against wall street, government corruption, the criminalization of migrants, and other causes are looking years back for their playlists at rallies.

Don?t get me wrong, I love me some Dead Prez, Manu Chao, Rage Against the Machine, and Public Enemy. But where are the songs coming out today about today? There are a lot of up and coming acts that have been speaking on issues for years and been ignored by the music industry and shown straight disrespect by radio stations. Artist like Pharoahe Monch, Conor Oberst, Invincible, Aloe Blacc, Jasiri X, Rise Against, Immortal Technique, and Calle 13 have been dropping heat in their music recently. Some of these artists have gotten fabulous play by some radio, DJs, podcasts, iphones and laptops, but the music industry is too busy trying to figure out how to bring back the days when they freely ripped off fans with overpriced shows and music to pay attention.

The industry has always struggled with who saw their music as part entertainment and part political weapon. The music industry tends to only embrace those artists with remarkable talent or uniqueness that is ?marketable.? Perhaps they fear that social music could boomerang around to question why talent makes so little of the overall money made by Hollywood? But we must recognize that music is a powerful weapon in both disseminating information, building critical thought of the status quo and mobilizing people into a set of ideas, and hopefully action.

For our part, the Sound Strike embraces music as a weapon. Over the next several weeks we will launch several projects to help engage in current affairs happening across the nation. We hope to do this with our? podcast, soon to be released music, as well as some upcoming efforts we will announce soon. But no one should wait. In the modern day of social media, instant internet availability and the hyper-connection of people via the web we can create our own online and word of mouth distribution of content that combines entertainment with information and, hopefully, thoughtful insight.

In the meantime, here is our 3rd episode of Sound Strike radio with a special mix by DJ Sloe Poke. There are two other podcasts you can check out by clicking here.

Any artist with a song, video or event they would like to get out should email us at info@thesoundstrike.net so we can post it, tweet it, spread it, etc. Please also stay tuned for an upcoming effort we hope you can participate in as artists, fans, or interested peoples. Also tweet @thesoundstrike songs that say something important so we can help spread it around.

Source: http://thesoundstrike.info/2011/10/08/musicisaweapon/

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