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‘What Would Pussy Riot Do?’
10.30.2013
12:40 pm
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wwprd
 
Anti-Folk mainstay Jeffrey Lewis is having a busy year. Not only has he released a collaborative album with bizarro-folk founding father Peter Stampfel (who just celebrated his 74th birthday yesterday, incidentally), he’s also released the “WWPRD” E.P. and toured extensively with his band The Rain. The centerpiece of the E.P. is an idealistic, poetic tribute to Pussy Riot, the female punk band famously being held captive in Russia for the “crime” of staging a protest. Here’s a partial transcription.

Pussy Riot went to prison
Just to make some people listen
They say church & state’s corrupt
It must be true ‘cuz they’re locked up
Before we lose democracy
You ask yourself, and I’ll ask me -
WWPRD?

Put in jail for two years each
Just for punk rock public speech
What is this, the middle ages?
Let those women out of those cages
Before you choose complacency
You ask yourself, and I’ll ask me -
WWPRD?

Minds can open in a flash
when hit by art or hit by cash
Money wins as like as not
Imagination’s all we’ve got
So let’s just have the decency
For you to ask yourself, and I’ll ask me -
WWPRD?

‘Cause progress is not guaranteed
I say Pussy Riot is what we need
This ain’t the old Red Army Faction
This is bold, non-violent action
To change the world, the biggest hint is
art is really what convinces
That’s why they always try to buy it
But they couldn’t buy off Pussy Riot
So when you see bands on TV
You ask yourself, and I’ll ask me -
WWPRD?

Permit me a mild irony in posting commerce links after that last bit, but in case you might want to support Lewis’ work, the E.P. is available digitally from Amazon and in multiple formats from Rough Trade.

Here’s the poem, performed in Cologne by Jeffery Lewis and the Rain, posted by YouTube user haengendegaerten.

Posted by Ron Kretsch
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10.30.2013
12:40 pm
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