Post-Punk Protest Music

"Gonna Wash That Man Right Out of My Hair," PJ Harvey (1991): 

"Gonna Wash That Man Right Out of My Hair." 

Actually, Harvey calls her song "Sheela-Na-Gig," after carved figurines of a naked woman with an exaggerated vulva, architectural grotesques found on cathedrals, castles, and other buildings throughout Europe in the middle ages. Love the esoteric feminist history but had to look it up, of course. I was originally slow on the uptake with Harvey when she first came out in the early 1990s. Both Dry ('92) and Rid of Me ('93) first struck me as too much like Patti Smith. That same melodramatic shamanistic banshee vocalizing thing. Which was such a rock snobby take, no doubt, but for the life of me now I can't hear what a fuss I was making. I mean, sure, there's a vocal styling resemblance but Harvey is way more Sturm und Drang, and way more intensely sexual. Being her own person, like Smith, the power in that, is what Harvey shares most with Smith. Don't try to pigeonhole them too much. They will arrive in their own time and on their own terms. Maybe Harvey was a little bit to the '90s what Smith was to the '70s, rockers, sui generis strong women art rockers. Salute. 

"Leave the Capitol," The Fall (1981): The Fall at an early peak; from The Slates EP. In a fitful nightmare I imagine Mark E. Smith taking down Grump in a battle rap royale, jabbing him with his rat a tat tat militant nonsense, dancing around the Fat Bastard spastically. Never being touched. The TKO'd G crumpling with Smith leering over him, pointing a finger at him, taunting him with the hook here, "Then you know in your brain/LEAVE THE CAPITOL!/EXIT THE ROMAN SHELL!" Over and over. The dream look is Clockwork Orange. No doubt the obtuse ranting lends itself to such fantasy because Smith is a little Trumpy; like one of Elvis Costello's "Two Little Hitlers." Apparently, the song is about Smith wanting to get out of London, to get away from the pop press hype. Post-punk revenge pop. 

(1988): 

"And the mercy seat is waiting

And I think my head is burning

And in a way I'm yearning

To be done with all this measuring of proof.

An eye for an eye

And a tooth for a tooth

And anyway I told the truth

And I'm not afraid to die."