Category: Towards the Within

  • And… Billy Bragg is with us, too

    Now, Billy Bragg is a folk musician I do listen to. He wrote a classic tune for Minneapolis in the past few days as well. If you haven’t listened to Billy Bragg before, I recommend you remedy with that below.

    When they came for the immigrants
    I got in their face
    When they came for the refugees
    I got in their face
    When they came for the five-year-olds
    I got in their face
    When they came to my neighborhood
    I just got in their face.

    I will bear witness to terror
    I will bear witness to tyranny
    I will bear witness to murder
    I will bear witness to fascism.

    For reference, a five-year-old was used for bait by ICE to arrest his father. They wouldn’t let the young boy go into the house, and then they took him to Texas with his father against judge’s orders.

  • Towards the Within — Citizen I.C.E., Dropkick Murphys

    Too scared to join the military
    Too dumb to be a cop
    Citizen I.C.E.

    This is an old song of theirs, formerly called “Citizen C.I.A”, and lyrically reworked to reflect current events. The rest of the lyrics are in-video.

    I have to admit, I should probably listen to more Dropkick Murphys than I do, and that will probably change in the coming weeks. Every time I encounter news about the band, I see them in an increasingly positive light. I don’t have to like every song a band writes to know them to be stand-up folks that deserve my support.

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  • Towards the Within — Sólstöður, Kælan Mikla

    A little Icelandic darkwave in honor of the upcoming solstice, perhaps?

    Á sólstöðum í svartnætti tunglið geislum grætur
    Vetrarnótt; við erum þínar sönnu svörtu dætur

    Winter solstice in the black night
    the moon cries its beams
    Winter night; we are your true dark daughters

    Of course you may have some, my darkling dearies. Enjoy.

  • Towards the Within — Succulence by Foetus

    J.G. Thirlwell, also known as Clint Ruin, Frank Want, and Foetus (multiple variants of the name), among other pseudonyms is an Aussie musician that has been putting out albums of an experimental nature since the early 80s.

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  • Towards the Within — Vicious Thorn, Rose Chronicles

    It’s been a spell since I added a song to the series of posts that was originally intended to look backwards to look forwards for music discovery.

    I was disappointed with the discovery process, which either sent me to bands I already knew full well or directed me to bands that sounded nothing at all like my “seed” music.

    Rose Chronicles, copyright status unknown

    After yesterday’s post quoting an opinion piece writer who has essentially declared that we have settled for the enshittification of our culture via the monetization of everything artistic thanks to the internet, I was left thinking about the last time I really enjoyed most of the music I was discovering. I can safely say that started to wane at some point near the end of the 90s.

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