As you may have heard, a lot of emo veterans sing on the upcoming album from Scott Morrow’s “super-collective” Plutocracy Planet. We recently posted the songs with Braid’s Bob Nanna and Far/onelinedrawing’s Jonah Matranga, and today we’re premiering the one with The Get Up Kids’ Matt Pryor.
The song was inspired by police brutality and killings against people of color, and the dark subject matter is matched by haunting acoustic guitars (performed by Mike Kinsella of American Football/Owen) and buzzing synths. It also features rapper Swamburger. Scott tells us:
Though there have been countless killings of unarmed and non-threatening people of color, easily captured in the smartphone era, the killing of George Floyd really woke a lot of people up. It was a ‘crossing the Rubicon’ for a lot of people who perhaps weren’t paying much attention or made excuses for simple police stops turning deadly, usually victimizing non-white folks. It’s been four years since the historic protests of the summer of 2020, and it feels like the issue has largely disappeared from mainstream view.
But the average annual number of people shot to death by police—at least those that are reported—has actually gone up in the past four years. It’s a complex issue, and I don’t think that calling for police abolition or reductively calling all cops bastards is helpful. I was hit by a stray bullet in 2021, and if not for a very quick police response, I’d probably be dead. But you can demand accountability for killer cops, enforce punishment for ‘the blue wall of silence’ and ‘testi-lying,’ and take steps to address institutional racism while understanding the need for officers who respond to violent situations. It’s tragic that we’re still dealing with racist vigilante cops and can’t even get bodycam footage much of the time, let alone mandate it across the United States.
Listen and watch the video below.
The upcoming album also features collaborations with Protest the Hero’s Rody Walker, Emily Jane White, The Callous Daoboys’ Carson Pace, Spitalfield’s Mark Rose, Yakuza’s Bruce Lamont, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum members Nils Frykdahl & Carla Kihlstedt, The Dillinger Escape Plan bassist Liam Wilson, The Sound of Animals Fighting live bassist Jonathan Hischke, Secret Chiefs 3 contributors Jason Schimmel & Adam Stacey, and more. Mark Rose also produced the album.