The Bachfire Manifesto

Sitting back and watching your government frolic into doing whatever they want causes problems for many people because they may be oppressive, violent, out-dated, unjust and don’t tend to the real needs of the people. Protests occur all around the world to create social change and are a tool for progress within social movements. They address issues like violence, oppression, slavery, civil rights, woman's rights, race, labor laws, anti-war and environmentalism. It doesn’t always start with a mob or a riot. Artists such as musicians are the ones with the creativity to describe these problems and to call upon the people to act on the issues affecting them. They can be activists to create change in society for the better. Culture in general is highly affected by popular views and opinions. Popular culture is the mainstream, the accepted and loved arts and ideas by the people. Popular Culture’s appeal and major consumption to the general population can also be its downfall as a tool for activists. Listeners expect a certain message, if the musician strays too far from the accepted pop styles they will lose their listeners. Music becomes the same, monotonous just to make a buck by musicians and distributors alike. Musicians need to use their creativity and bravery to perform and spread new ideas instead of falling in the trap of the mainstream déjà-heard tunes. It is a target that can be influenced by the words and sounds of musicians, artists, record labels, and the audience. Being weary of how you approach social movements within music has been a controversial subject. A problem that can occur is being poisoned, absorbed and neutralized by the market into doing something unethical to you as an artist. The markets psychological power can be detrimental to an artist and their career by causing you to do things you would not agree with or have no interest in standing up for, though if you find the right ways to do it, it could be very effective for you instead of causing problems in the long run. Before we can look ahead into protesting within music, we must look into the past to see success and failures of activist music. Bob Dylan, a Folk singer started the Broadside movement with other musicians to support civil rights and other causes, while the years went by Bob Dylan lost touch with what he believed in and felt the pressure of his fans engaged in his protest music. Once Bob Dylan started playing more mainstream events, and lost his edge, people thought that he was just becoming another mainstream artist, someone who was being controlled by the markets and labels. Phil Ochs, A Folk singer involved in the civil rights movement in the 60’s witnessed the violence in the Chicago convention and thought it was far worse than Ochs could imagine and claimed that he was there as the witness of the death of America and as an American, he presented it as his own death. He demanded so much change using his aggressive lyrics and raw sound that it might have been too aggressive which caused too much chaos even for his label A&E which dropped him from the label by 1969. In the 1970’s, A UK band called “The Clash” protested against monarchy and aristocracy. However, unlike many of their peers, The Clash rejected nihilism (Morality does not exist). They stood up to the mainstream politics of the public as well as standing up to their musical peers. They found solidarity with a number of contemporary liberation movements and were involved with such groups as the Anti-Nazi League which raised issues about race and class. The band's political sentiments were reflected in their resistance to the music industry's usual profit motivations; even at their peak, tickets to shows and souvenirs were reasonably priced. The group insisted that CBS sell their double and triple album sets London Calling and Sandinista! For the price of a single album. This Heat were a British experimental group formed in early 1976, with one of the most noted songs “Ace of spades”. They named one of their albums Health and Efficiency which is. the name of a British nudist magazine, notorious as one of the only places that British men could sneak a peak at woman’s naked body parts in the repressive atmosphere of the fifties and early sixties. They took this name to try to be unconventional but it backfired and made them look like brutes and ultimately caused there downfall by trying to be unconventional and trying to hard. This Heat were over-confident that they were going to be huge, but they embodied the social and political landscape of their Britain too well and weren’t successful. Bands like Rage Against the Machine, Rise Against, Public Enemy, Green Day and Arcade Fire address recent situations that are happening in the world today, authoritative figures, religion, race superpowers, environmental issues, anti-war, animal issues and political situations. These bands use videos and lyrics to support their causes and do this in such a direct and sometimes extreme way that they create demographics of different kinds and sometimes even grasp new audiences. These musicians had to conquer some obstacles, the messages that they wanted to get across though was a success in some way shape or form. This is what I want from my musicians,

1. We want to make sure we’re genuine.
2. We want to sell our albums at a low cost to appeal to audiences and reach out further.
3. We want to give musicians a voice.
4. We want to give the people something worthwhile and meaningful to listen to.
5. We want to stand up for what is right and stick to what we believe in, be direct and follow through what we were fighting for from the beginning.
6. We want to try and give support to our causes by acting in protests, creating lyrics and songs and being involved with the right groups.
7. We want to have to guts to step out of boundaries and face the music.
8. We want to enlighten popular culture.
9. We want to support fellow musicians, artists and activists who share their causes.
10. We want to spread our causes to as many countries as humanly possible to make a difference.

11. We want to be unique, have an appealing sound, sound fresh and confident.

Live long and prosper young musician

By Julian Bachlow