Future Soundtrack for America
There's a new CD coming out, and the lineup looks pretty good:
The album features a pretty amazing line up of artists: Blink-182, Bright Eyes, David Byrne, Laura Cantrell, Clem Snide, Death Cab for Cutie, Mike Doughty, The Flaming Lips, Fountains of Wayne, Jimmy Eat World, Ben Kweller, The Long Winters, Nada Surf, OK Go, Old 97's, R.E.M., Sleater-Kinney, They Might Be Giants, Tom Waits, will.i.am of The Black Eyed Peas, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are all featured. In addition, the family of Elliott Smith contributed a mix of "A Distorted Reality Is Now A Necessity To Be Free," a song from Smith's as-yet-unreleased last record, and the first release of new material since his death in late 2003.
Together, the songs present a passionate rallying cry for all of us to take our country back. Mike Doughty's song "Move On" hones in on the passion that drives all of our activism, singing "I love my country so much, like an exasperating friend." Tom Waits' contribution is a heartbreaking song about a letter home from a soldier in Iraq. R.E.M. takes on Bush and the war in Iraq, and They Might Be Giants (whose John Flansburgh pulled the project together) revisit a campaign song from the Presidential campaign of 1840.
You can get this here with a $25 donation to the MoveOn.org PAC (a progressive political action group), but I guess it's coming out in stores soon, too.
And speaking of politics tinged music, Green Day has a new album coming out this month called American Idiot, supposedly a "Rock Opera" concept album about Jesus of Suburbia. I can't wait for that one.