By Brooklyn Fears
The lights turn off in a flash triggering young 20-somethings to scream and chuck their hands into the air. The ocean breeze brushes the smells of marijuana and liquor over the crowd. An acapella cover of The Beatles' “With a Little Help From My Friends” blares out the speakers. Declan McKenna graces the stage to perform a sold-out show at Humphrey’s By the Bay in San Diego, California at the tail end of a warm September night.
The bright and airy guitar melody of “Beautiful Faces” croons as McKenna slides up and down his fretboard. The song cries about the social pressures of perfection in the modern era of social media addiction and trashy reality television. This track among others in the English singer’s catalog is filled with social and political commentary proving that Generation Z is as politically savvy and attuned to social issues as any other generation before.
McKenna continues to share his opinions on war, climate change, and social justice issues through his discography. His charisma and musicianship entice young women such as Amber Macias, 23, who traveled two hours to see McKenna live. The 22-year-old musician is one of
her favorite artists, “He’s a very energetic performer, you can tell he loves doing what he's doing,” Macias said via Facetime. “He's passionate about what he is singing about,” she said.
She admires uniqueness, “He doesn’t care what people think, isn’t trying to be anybody else.”
Politics cemented itself into music nearly a century ago. Media Communications professor Evan Wirig, 59, believes that records are explicitly intertwined with the events or cultural revolutions of the time such as the protest rock songs of the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s and 1970s.
“Recordings are cultural forces, characterizing social groups, defining movements, setting social trends, and shaping our modern culture,” Dr. Wirig responds via email.
McKenna concludes his set with his 2019 single “British Bombs” where he criticizes his nation’s foreign policy and war crimes. The song is dressed in early 20th-century English phrases and passive jabs at Great Britain. A line that resonated with many of McKenna’s North American fans is “Get real, kid, your country’s been at war since birth, now,” as many of McKenna’s fans were born around the time that the United States invaded the Middle East.
Communications professor Waleed Rashidi, 44, believes that social and political issues in music can have an impact on the listener, however, the impact may have varying degrees. Rashidi explains that receiving a message and pondering the lyrical content is different from engaging in the political landscape and becoming involved. Rashidi is of the notion that music is either reactionary as a result of partisan events or proactive in trying to get ahead of political movements.
McKenna’s debut record What Do You Think About the Car? and sophomore effort Zeros both explore coming-of-age tropes while interweaving themes of pain, heartbreak, confusion, and frustration plagued upon him by political leaders and subsequent exclusion of political discussions due to his adolescence. To many of McKenna’s fans, listening to these tracks can be very cathartic. Whether these tunes have an impact on the listener or not, is debatable.
While Dr. Wirig lists a lengthy catalog of his favorite political tunes including Billy Joel, Marvin Gaye, and John Lennon, professor Rashidi, is stumped, “My utility for music is not really to listen to it as a source of messaging that would be coinciding with current events and current issues in the political sphere” said Rashidi scratching his chin. He is adamant that he often listens to music to take his mind off of politics.
To further explain his perception, Rashidi considers that musicians are not always qualified to speak on state affairs. He observes that there are extremely intelligent artists who are insightful on partisan matters, while others create surface-level reactive commentary.
This begs the question if musicians feel pressured in this day and age to be more politically aware in their discographies. Rashidi places partial blame on social media, and the narrowing of the communication gap between fans and their favorite musicians. Rashidi cites K-pop fandoms urging their idols to share their notions on the Black Lives Matter movement that erupted in 2020, despite the Korean musicians having little knowledge of American social issues.
Generation Z not only cares about what their favorite musician is writing about but also who they are as people. Audiences want to know who they are supporting and giving their hard-earned money to. However, if a musician is uneducated on a topic or removed from a situation, should they feel obligated to speak on it?
For artists such as Declan McKenna, there is no pressure. In fact, it may be an act of purgatory to alleviate the strain of anxiety that the state of the world thrusts upon humans. For decades, political and social discourse served as an inspiration in musical composition to generate impact both minuscule and significant. Generation Z is just as proud to creatively enact change and manufacture a greater future for themselves and generations to come.
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