It’s been some time since I last posted about the activities of my band The Four Fathers, so here’s an update following our most recent appearances — at a protest against the proposed redevelopment of Walthamstow’s main square, on February 24, and as part of the Telegraph Hill Festival, with our friends the Commie Faggots, on March 16, a wonderful and very well attended protest music double bill.
Since I last wrote about the band, people have, we’re glad to note, continued to listen to us on Bandcamp (and we’ve even sold a few CDs!), and our video of ‘Grenfell’, the song I wrote after last June’s entirely preventable fire in west London, in which over 70 people died, has now had nearly 1,650 views on YouTube and Facebook.
We’re planning to record it soon, along with our anti-Brexit anthem, ‘I Want My Country Back (From the People Who Wanted Their Country Back)’, and we’ve also been working on new material — new songs about the history of the counter-culture, and about so-called “affordable” housing, and a positive anthem about solidarity and resistance — and some covers, with Aswad’s ‘Not Satisfied’ inching closer to a public outing. I was also recently interviewed for an article about protest music in Artefact Magazine, produced by students at London College of Communications, following up on another protest music interview, for the Icelandic website, Shouts! Read the rest of this entry »
Last month, I was delighted to be approached by Halldór Bjarnason, an Icelandic journalist and musician, asking if he could interview me for his website, Shouts: Music from the Rooftops!, which features interviews with musicians who make political music, including Andy White, from Belfast, Yuca Brava, “a political rapcore band from Puerto Rico”, War On Women, a feminist punk band from Baltimore, and Keyz, a 20-year old rapper from Sudan. The interview is here, and is cross-posted below.
As I noted when I posted the link to the interview on Facebook last night, the “questions, about my band The Four Fathers, and my songwriting, were very interesting — about how we got together, why we perform protest music, and whether I think there’s an audience for protest music these days.”
Introducing the interview, Halldór, noting that I am both a journalist and am musician, wrote that journalists have a responsibility to be voices for the voiceless, to hold power to account, and to be “courageous in seeking the truth.” He also noted that “[m]usicians do not bear the same responsibility exactly, although it can be argued they have a powerful voice” that often has an international reach. He also noted that, although some musicians do not manifest a “socially conscious message,” because they believe in creating music based on their emotions, “Others are more explicit in their lyrics or performance and send a strong message of protest out into the ethos in every single song,” adding, “The Four Fathers are of the latter type.”
My thanks to Halldór for taking the time to interview me, and I hope you have time to read the interview, and will check out our music if you haven’t already heard it. Read the rest of this entry »
I’m delighted to announce that today my band The Four Fathers are releasing our second album, How Much Is A Life Worth? via Bandcamp, where you can buy it on CD (which can be sent anywhere in the world), or as a download (either the whole album, or individual tracks). The CD costs £8 (about $10.67), plus postage and packing, while the download of the album costs £5 (about $6.67), with individual tracks available for $1 (about $1.33). These are the minimum prices, but you can always pay more if you want to provide us with extra financial support, to help us recoup the costs of recording and production.
The album features ten original rock and roots reggae songs — eight written by me, as lead singer and rhythm guitarist, and two written by lead guitarist Richard Clare. It follows the release in 2015 of the band’s first album, ‘Love and War,’ and continues to demonstrate a commitment to political issues, with six of the album’s ten songs being protest songs. The band also features Brendan Horstead on drums and percussion, Andrew Fifield on flute and harmonica, and Louis Sills-Clare on bass (replaced after the album was recorded by current bassist Mark Quiney).
Followers of the band on Bandcamp — or those who have seen us live — will already know some of these songs, as six of them have previously been released online, although all of them have now been slightly remastered. Those songs are, in order of release, ‘Close Guantánamo’ (used for the ‘Close Guantánamo’ campaign that I run), ‘Dreamers’ (a song about friendship, written for a friend’s 50th birthday), live favourites ’Riot’ (about austerity and the need for social and economic justice) and ‘London’ (a lament for how the capital’s vibrancy in the 80s and 90s has been destroyed by housing greed), ‘She’s Back’ (Richard’s song about Pussy Riot) and ‘Equal Rights And Justice For All’ (my celebration of habeas corpus, which always gets a laugh when I say live that no set is really complete without a song about habeas corpus). Read the rest of this entry »
Yesterday, I was very excited to put the final touches to my band The Four Fathers‘ second album, ‘How Much Is A Life Worth?’ The album will be available soon on CD and to download on our Bandcamp account, where our existing recordings are still available — our first album ‘Love and War’, the ‘Fighting Injustice’ EP, featuring remixes of three songs from ‘Love and War’ (US and UK versions), and a single, ‘Close Guantánamo.’ Please feel free to like us on Facebook and to follow us on Twitter.
The album features ten original songs — eight by me, as lead singer and rhythm guitarist, and two by Richard Clare (lead guitar, backing vocals), and we recorded it with Pat Collier at Perry Vale Studios in Forest Hill in three sessions from July to November with Brendan Horstead on drums and percussion, Andrew Fifield on flute and harmonica, and Louis Sills-Clare on bass.
My songs include the title track — our most recent song — comparing how white westerners value their own lives compared to the victims of the west’s post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the refugees fleeing the death and destruction in Syria and elsewhere, and the black men — and children — killed with impunity by the police in the US, where the Black Lives Matter movement has been such a powerful force. Read the rest of this entry »
Investigative journalist, author, campaigner, commentator and public speaker. Recognized as an authority on Guantánamo and the “war on terror.” Co-founder, Close Guantánamo and We Stand With Shaker, singer/songwriter (The Four Fathers).
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