No Kings Day II: A Theme Song

Today is another No Kings Day of anti-fascist protest in the US. Here on this Crummy Little Blog That Nobody Reads, we have a theme song proposal.

Jack Hardy: “Ask Questions”

Jack Hardy was (alas, past tense) a force with which to reckon on the New York City folk scene.

His voice was gravelly, nothing special (as you can hear below). But if you listened to him… oh, good heavens! You’d find he was deeply literate in Irish poets, Celtic mythology, and the bardic tradition. The songs were magical, sometimes in the literal sense that folks who practice “magick” would recognize the invocation of a spirit of understanding, peace, and knowledge.

He was a mentor to other artists, raising many of his fellows up to fame. If you follow American folk music, you probably know some their names: Suzanne Vega, John Gorka, Shawn Colvin, Lucy Kaplansky, Christine Lavin, Richard Shindell, and David Massengill. He was famous for having weekly spaghetti dinners in his Greenwich Village apartment where they’d all present a song and listen to the critique of the others. So he gave a lot to the community, making stars of some of them, even though his own popularity never quite reached that level.

He performed reasonably frequently in Cambridge, and I almost always managed to be there. He usually performed in a dramatic black velvet jacket. Sometimes he couldn’t decide if he was a singer or a comedian, given the elaborately funny and deep introductions.

He usually looked like this album cover of The Hunter, giving you the side-eye with a little grin that made you think he knew something you didn’t know. And… he almost always did know something you didn’t know, and was about to spring it on you as a joke.

The song “The Hunter” on this album was practically my personal theme song through the 1980s. If you asked Jack what it was about, you’d get that side-eyed grin and hear it took place in a coffeehouse in Greenwich Village about 7,000 years ago. (Saw it happen, with my very own eyes and ears. Not just once, but a couple of times. More questions almost never helped.) After all, there aren’t many songs about magic, astronomy & how the constellations move with the precession of the earth’s spin axis over 26,000 year periods, deep history, the myth of the year king, the bardic tradition, and the tension felt by herders about the invention of agriculture. At least, that’s what I could glean from Bullfinch’s Mythology and Frazer’s Golden Bough. (And now you know a little bit about my misspent youth. For all I know, the song took place in a coffeehouse in Greenwich Village about 7,000 years ago.)

His political point of view was seldom discussed, more from it being obvious than anything else. It probably helped that I was in vehement agreement most of the time: it’s important not to give power to the barbarians!

Two of his political songs about come to mind, shown here:

• “Worst President Ever” does’t actually name George W Bush, but it was archly implied by lyrics admiring other political sarcasm that didn’t need to name the target.
• “I Ought to Know” is a song Jack used to swear up and down was not about W, but from my point of view it might as well have been. It’s about the sneering and proud ignorance paraded on the right, who think that because they’re conservatives they are somehow exempt from knowing much of anything about where & when they are, and how the world works.

Those are both strong candidates.

But for Trump, we need something special for the special boy. We also need something that lays responsibility for his removal, trial, and (one may hope) conviction squarely upon our own backs.

Thus, the song “Ask Questions”.

It’s about our duty to ask questions about policy, especially the questions leaders find inconvenient. It’s about our duty to rear up on our hind legs and act like responsible human adults, daring to hold our leaders accountable.

Pay particular attention to the chorus:

[Verse 1]
The dust bowl is flooded, the northwest is dry
Someone strike a match to shed us some light
But all that is burned is a cross in the yard
And a flood in the Ninth Parish Ward

[Refrain]
Climb up the hill to the Capitol
Dare to hold them accountable
Ask questions

[Verse 2]
And Jefferson the patriot, fearless and bold
Takes Sally Hemmings when she’s fourteen year old
Cannot resist, cannot deny
The way his descendants now have to try

[Refrain]
Climb up the hill to the Capitol
Dare to hold them accountable
Ask questions

[Chorus]
And history has eyes, history has ears
History finds secrets that are buried for years
Exploded, explained, exposed and explicit
History will judge us either stupid or complicit
And we know we are not stupid
Ask questions

[Verse 3]
Remember the Maine, Lusitania too
The Gulf of Tonkin and Pearl Harbor too
Where there’s a will there’s a way to go to war
And a profit without honor no more

[Refrain]
Climb up the hill to the Capitol
Dare to hold them accountable
Ask questions

[Verse 4]
And Joshua believes in heaven and in hell
Polishes his trumpet in a desert motel
Gamblin’ and whorin’ ‘til his time comes around
And the towers come tumblin’ down

[Refrain]
Climb up the hill to the Capitol
Dare to hold them accountable
Ask questions

[Chorus]
And history has eyes, history has ears
History finds secrets that are buried for years
Exploded, explained, exposed and explicit
History will judge us either stupid or complicit
And we know we are not stupid
Ask questions

The Weekend Conclusion

“History will judge us either stupid or complicit – and we know we are not stupid.”

(Ceterum censeo, Trump incarceranda est!)

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Notes & References