Political manifest by The Creekdippers
by Ian Simmons
[ cdreviews ]
Following hard on the heels of The Creekdippers' last CD, Mystic Theatre, this is clearly a CD born of its times. The title tells you exactly what to expect in the box: political music. The late unpleasantness in Iraq has produced remarkably little protest music, but The Creekdippers intend to change all that. Overtly anti-war and anti-Bush, it is the sound of an angry, sad America. Part of the reason that there has been so little political music, I suspect, is that post 9/11 people have felt awkward speaking out against a government that claims to be fighting back against the purveyors of atrocity, lest they appear anti-American; but not everyone buys that line.
The Creekdippers are among those who have noticed that George W has cynically co-opted the international outrage and sympathy that followed 9/11 and wazzed it down the sink by using it as a pretence to invade a country for a self-serving agenda. He's then topped it off by allowing his "liberators" to act as paranoid oppressors once there, all the while screwing up the pursuit of the real culprits by starving the pursuit of resources, possibly as a deliberate agenda. Ugly times and a disgrace to America which deeply appals many, many who would see themselves as true Americans. Indeed, it could be said that to be a real American these days is to be anti-Bush, given that he is dragging the nation's reputation comprehensively through the sewer, less than three years after it reached its world-wide zenith: some achievement.
This is a relatively short album, and not as immediately tuneful and attractive as Mystic Theatre, but there is no mistaking the resolute slow-burning anger, particularly on the Rumsfeld-skewering 'The End of the Highway' and 'George Bush Industriale', with its refrain "George Bush, la putain industriale", reference to the Bush family's petrochemical fortunes and their link to Mark Olsen's father's death from PVC-related industrial illness, and Olsen's vow to call Bush "every name in the book, but women and children are here." True, it does get mildly juvenile on occasions (Bush is told to "Get back to Texas, you piece of snot", while in 'Portrait of a sick America', Olsen expresses an urge to "punch George Bush in the mouth"), but overall the tone is elegiac and full of sadness for the depressing pass America has been brought to by a pack of cynical, dishonest right-wingers. Still, there is hope here too; two traditional spiritual songs, 'My father knows foes' and 'Coming, coming', look forward to better times, falling back on the language and beliefs that have traditionally carried Americans through dark times, whistling in the dark with the best of them. This is a brave and timely album that does credit to The Creekdippers and highlights the lack of backbone of most of today's musicians.
