Streets Brought Alive By Chants

It has been a remarkable month. Two big national demos in London and three local ones in Manchester. They've been full of energy, and full of young people. It has been truly exciting to look around a crowd and not recognise people - this is a new generation rising up against Tory ideology. Here are some of my favourite chants that have come from the mouths of kids previously written-off as apathetic;

A simple chant capturing so much feeling: 'TORY SCUM! TORY SCUM! TORY SCUM!' The Guardian had a line on it's front page after the first demo (Millbank);

"The ancient British roar of 'TORY SCUM' echoed once again across Westminster." A necessary chant and one that gained a lot of instant support from passers-by and builders etc.

Next, I'm in Parliament Square, kettled in by vicious riot cops. A group of teenage girls clap and chant in a tight and catchy rhythm. Raising their hands high in the air they point to each other and chant, 'This is what democracy looks like,' then jabbing their arms and fingers in rhythm towards the lines of riot police protecting parliament they chant, 'That is NOT what democracy looks like!'

Again a group of very young girls chant, 'The only cuts we want to see, are Tories on the guillotine.' It betrays the deep hurt that this failure of democracy has caused so many young people.

A small group of protesters trapped outside the kettle stumble on a vintage limousine carrying a Prince and Princess through the center of the City in which generations had just been robbed. They impulsively throw stuff at the car, hit it and chant, 'Off with their heads! Off with their heads!' Remarkable, and the mask behind which monarchy hides briefly slipped.

Protesters broke down the door to the Treasury chanting, 'we want our money back!'

I may add more to this list in the future, you will be aware of my interest in such folk traditions. But I'll leave you with my favourite little song that protesters have been singing;

Build a bonfire, build a bonfire,

and throw the Tories on the top,

put the Lid Dems in the middle,

and we'll burn the fucking lot!

Beyond Here Lies Nothin'

I just stumbled on a video for Bob Dylan's Beyond Here Lies Nothin' which I'd only watched once when the Together Through Life album came out in 2009.

It is a remarkable video. I'm not sure what the remark is, but it is remarkable.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDMCaGNtsu0

On the one hand the video seems oddly jarring with the border-town rhythm of the song; yet it somehow builds into a ballad of ultra-violence, each punch of the music providing a new assault. It provoked a visceral reaction, shock, horror, despair and then a truly weirdly conflicting tonic. For me, it's a good example of when something is so ugly that it's pretty much beautiful.

It's also interesting to see it as a response to the posturing violence celebrated in so many gangsta and even pop videos. This is real and desperate. (And genuinely violent!).

It is a desperate song; trapped within a cycle of no-hope, trying to break away but having no capacity or imagination to hope for any better a life. It's like breaking away from an abusive relationship and sitting staring at the horizon only to remember you can't escape demons of your past, so you return to the only love you've ever known. Indeed, it reminds me of the end of many a relationship, looking to future and seeing nothing, unable to remove the obstacles of the past. Naturally, it also reminds me of how we live under an abusive system like capitalism where we are expected to strike blow after blow on each other in order to be the one who survives, suffering because we do not yet have the collective imagination to see anything lying beyond capitalism.

I await the sequel, Beyond Here Lies Socialism. But for now this is a fitting display of ultra-violence to remind us of the desperation we so badly need to break away from.