Helplessness Blues—Fleet Foxes
#365Songs: August 21st
I was raised up believing I was somehow unique
Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you can see
And now after some thinking, I’d say I’d rather be
A functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me
But I don’t, I don’t know what that will be
I’ll get back to you someday soon you will see
It’s been a long, long time since I felt hope for the future of America, or a sense of pride in the core values of what it means to truly be American. Over the past decade, I’ve run from my Midwestern roots in disappointment over their loyalty to Trump. Since the long dark summer of 2016 — as Black Lives Matter rallies kicked up protesting police brutality, as families began to split between Trump and Clinton — every day has felt darker than the day before. The Biden victory celebration was muted as a result of COVID, Trump’s insurrection attempt, and his inability to communicate and energize us around his accomplishments. It was barely a month ago when we’d all been written off the future of Democracy.
In his DNC speech last night, President Obama summed up what we’ve become over the past several years: “We live in a time of such confusion and rancor, with a culture that puts a premium on things that don’t last: money, fame, status, likes. We chase the approval of strangers on our phones. We build all manner of walls and fences around ourselves, and then we wonder why we feel so alone. We don’t trust each other as much because we don’t take the time to know each other. And in that space between us, politicians and algorithms teach us to caricature each other and troll each other and fear each other.”
What’s my name, what’s my station? Oh, just tell me what I should do
I don’t need to be kind to the armies of night that would do such injustice to you
Or bow down and be grateful and say, “Sure, take all that you see”
To the men who move only in dimly-lit halls and determine my future for me
And I don’t, I don’t know who to believe
I’ll get back to you someday soon you will see
But then, Obama flipped the script on us. As he tends to do. “All across America, in big cities and small towns, away from all the noise, the ties that bind us together are still there. We still coach Little League and look out for our elderly neighbors. We still feed the hungry in churches and mosques and synagogues and temples. We share the same pride when our Olympic athletes compete for the gold. Because the vast majority of us do not want to live in a country that’s bitter and divided. We want something better. We want to be better. And the joy and the excitement that we’re seeing around this campaign tells us we’re not alone.”
Suddenly it’s 2008 again. The DNC feels more like a music festival than a political conference, a diverse representation of the real real America, a celebration of all lifestyles and socio-economics — from the hourly union worker to the billionaire class, the teacher to the scholar. Perhaps this is why the past decade has been so impossibly gutting. We’ve known all along what we’re capable of, what’s buried under the surface, and finally all that potential has come flooding out these past few days.
If I know only one thing, it’s that everything that I see
Of the world outside is so inconceivable often I barely can speak
Yeah I’m tongue-tied and dizzy and I can’t keep it to myself
What good is it to sing helplessness blues, why should I wait for anyone else?
And I know, I know you will keep me on the shelf
I’ll come back to you someday soon myself
If we’ve learned anything these past several years, it’s that things change fast and everything is possible. While I’m certainly cautious in my optimism, I haven’t felt this energized in a long time — and judging by the pressure released in Chicago’s United Center and across social media, I’m not alone in that feeling. None of this will change the most devout MAGA cult members, won’t shift their hateful rhetoric or alter their vote. But there’s a whole lot of folks in the middle, the “neighbors” Tim Walz keeps referring to, the good-hearted who lost their way because they’d felt forgotten for so long. It’s time we change that, and that takes effort from each of us.
And that gets me to the music. Fleet Foxes is one of the most talented bands of this generation. Though not prolific, they’re masterful crafters unafraid of experimenting with their sound — true artists intent on making great art, without catering to the sound of the moment or audience expectations. Frontman Robin Pecknold is always introspective and curious, exploring big concepts rhythmically and lyrically.
About the title track off of 2011’s flawless album Helplessness Blues, he said: “I don’t want to sound too political or anything, because this is just my personal thought, but I guess I feel like in being a white male from America, a member of the most privileged sect on earth, I have everything that people all over the earth are fighting for, and sometimes I just feel like I’m not really doing enough with that. That song is basically about that, the desire to cultivate something more than oneself.”
There’s no shortage of songs fit for this moment, for this feeling, but Helplessness Blues hits all the complexities — the journey from selfish to selfless, from hopeless to useful. This is an anthem for a generation lost in that sea of likes Obama referred to but who now feel a calling to save not just our individual souls, but the future of everything and everyone we care about. We don’t have long, so what are we waiting for?
If I had an orchard, I’d work ’til I’m raw
If I had an orchard, I’d work ’til I’m sore
And you would wait tables and soon run the store
Gold hair in the sunlight, my light in the dawn
If I had an orchard, I’d work ’til I’m sore
If I had an orchard, I’d work ’til I’m sore
Someday I’ll be like the man on the screen
~
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