This day—the day after solstice—in 2002 we lost the mighty
Joe Strummer, former frontman for The Clash. Today’s song, by Bob Marley, is a song
that Strummer recorded with his band of the early 21st century, The Mescaleros.
He also recorded it with Johnny Cash, not long before the death of both (Cash
died in September of 2003). The duet appears on Unearthed, a collection released posthumously in November 2003.
Marley’s version, solo on acoustic, was released on his
final album Uprising; Marley died in
1981.
All of which is a way of saying that the song has a definite
“late in life” feel to it, if only by association. In the case of Marley, who
was already very sick by the time the album was released, it feels like a final
affirmative statement, a song about dedication to a cause and about belief in the triumph of the
spirit. In all the versions I mentioned, the proximity to death of the singers
makes of the song a kind of last testament, “We forward in this generation /
Triumphantly.”
Whether or not you see evidence of such triumph, the point
of such a song is to attest to the sense of progress, to provide a rallying
cry. Marley begins by describing slavery and lets the forward movement from those dark
days speak for a sense of eventual emancipation. But, like Christ who was always
quick to point out that the fulfillment of his talk about the “kingdom of
heaven” wasn’t likely to take place in this world, nor as a political nor
material advantage, Marley—borrowing from Marcus Garvey—makes a statement about
the kind of incentive for change he has in mind: “Emancipate yourself from
mental slavery / None but ourselves can free our minds.”
The idea recalls to me both John Lennon saying “you better
free your mind instead” and Joyce’s Stephen Dedalus laughing “to rid himself of
his mind’s bondage.” “Mental slavery,” we could say, is a habit of mind, a way
of being chained, by your own lack of knowledge or imagination, to burdensome
ways of thinking, to ignorance, to unjust, uncharitable, unenlightened views.
The notion of the free play of the mind, of the mind as unshackled by its own
materiality, is one of the mainstays of philosophy and of some religions. (Which recalls
to me my boy Rimbaud: Par l’esprit on va à Dieu! Déchirante infortune! [Through
the mind we go to God! A wrenching misfortune!])
But, whether or not our minds can lift us to God and whether
or not that in itself is a form of mental slavery, I’ll leave aside at the
moment. Well, maybe not. Since Marley does invoke some of that sense of
fulfillment when he sings: “How long shall they kill our prophets / While we
stand aside and look / Some say it’s just a part of it / We’ve got to fulfill
the Book.” The book here is the Bible or
at least a prophetic tract. The idea being that the killing of prophets is
something that happens regularly in “the Book” and so it’s almost pointless to
inveigh against it as it seems to be a fulfillment of God’s plan, which “the
Book” is taken to be the text of.
That kind of thinking for me, frankly, smacks of mental
slavery. And what I like about a song like Marley’s, as can be found in some of
the lyric utterances of Dylan or Lennon and others, is that it can support
various interpretations. The intention of the song, as stated in its recurring
refrain, is to invite the singing of “songs of freedom,” while the line “’Cause
all I ever have / Redemption songs” makes a comparison between songs of freedom
and redemption songs. They may be one and the same, or it may be that the call
for freedom and the call for redemption are not always the same call.
In other words, “what profit a man if he gain the whole
world but lose his soul”? If “freedom” means you can do as you please and can
ignore what must be done and can retain your vain pursuit of nothing but your
individual happiness, then better to have “redemption”—a calling beyond “success
in life” to, perhaps, action to a purpose or even simply to prayer or to
utterance—as for instance songs—that can speak to the spirit and offer it a
guide, a signpost, a banner even.
That, to many, is what Marley’s song is. A redemption song
because its message is about the need for redemption, maybe even the promise of
redemption. The point, within the tradition of the Spiritual or hymn, is simply
to attest to that sense of need and promise, for without some sense of
redemption the world is a much less valuable, much more limited place. It all
goes back to suffering—and the trials of life—as having a purpose beyond the
merely factual or purely utilitarian. And so Marley’s great late song is, in
that sense, as much as anything a cry in the wilderness.
Long, long ago, the time of year of the winter solstice in the northwestern
hemisphere became the time to celebrate the birth of Christ. The
confluence is meaningful, as all sun myths must take stock of the shortest day
and the longest night. Reason enough to sing a song of redemption and a song of
birth.
My boy Rimbaud again: “Quand irons-nous, par-delà les grèves
et les monts, saluer la naissance du travail nouveau, la sagesse nouvelle, la
fuite des tyrans et des démons, la fin de la superstition, adorer—les premiers!—Noël
sur la terre! [When shall we go, across the shores and mountains, to hail the
birth of new labor, new wisdom, the flight of tyrants and demons, the end of
superstition, to adore—the very first!—Christmas on earth!] How's that for redemption?
’Cause none of them-a
can-a-stop-a the time
No comments:
Post a Comment