Unbest

Jeremy D. Larson on Third Eye Blind’s “If There Ever Was A Time” (2011)
(YouTube, SoundCloud) 

Every time I read a “hard” news article, I feel useless—like I’m somehow in tacit agreement with the things I’m opposed to just because I wrote up another tour announcement for Vetiver. I’m not saying that music conversations should cease and we should all focus on socio-political issues (though, maybe like one day of the week we could?) but I wouldn’t miss it as much if there were some more agit-prop songs out there, speaking to and for the moment. Where’s the insurrectionary salvos in this the year of the protest and of the revolution? I see, like, three total fists in the air, you guys.

And then, out of 1997, comes Third Eye Blind with a song for Occupy Wall Street titled “If There Ever Was A Time.” Because nothing says action quite like conditional verb phrases! Look, the tune is a milquetoast, clunky suggestion of non-violent resolution that resonates worlds away from, say,  “Ohio” or “Anarchy in the UK” or, hell, I’d even take “American Idiot” at this point. Stephan Jenkins turns in something no doubt from his heart, but that heart still seems to be playing “Jumper” on repeat. This is the gnarliest part:

If there ever was a time to get downtown
And get non-violent and fearless
Things only get brighter when you light a spark
Everywhere you go right now is Zuccotti park

You couldn’t get a young Karen Carpenter to sing “Zuccotti” and make it sound good, and its repeated about ten times in this song. But against my better judgment, I love this song. I love this song if only for the fact that Third Eye Blind offered transparent and tangible reason to their music, instead of so many mp3s being offered to the nether. I feel guilty for ragging on it because they did something and took action for what they believed in and I believe that it takes courage to write something like this, release it to the public knowing that many people only know you as the band that goes “doo doo doo, do doo do doo do.”

I whittle my day away on Twitter, reading articles and writing and working, while seemingly in another dimension entirely 3EB writes the only notable and ostensible protest song that gets no press major music sites and blogs? The hell? Meanwhile, the same blogs and websites (mine included) give more credence and ink to Lana Del Ray, who’s perhaps the most dubious and opaque figure in music today and has absolutely nothing to say about a single damn thing.

It’s a curious feeling, knowing that the ripple effect of turmoil has probably yet to reach the core of a lot artists. Maybe I’m impatient, or just too furious to wait. There have been a handful of songs this year that spoke to topical issues, like John Darnielle covering Billy Bragg for the Wisconsin Union protests or Cass McCombs recent ode to Wikileaks leaker Bradley Manning.

But information disseminates quickly, and movements wax and wane with viral velocity that it messes with the natural order of time for an artistic response. Is it already too late? If someone came out with an OWS Protest Comp album next year with genuinely solid songs, would that be over-shadowed in the end by the unfortunate pepper spray meme? What if the moment passed us by, and all we ever have is “If There Ever Was A Time”? I want something else to get me through this…

Jeremy D. Larson is Content Director at Consequence Of Sound, has appeared in Paste, and also tweets.