Carsie Blanton is an American Folk music icon- just one that not enough people have heard of yet. If you’re on social media, and have certain leanings, her music might have been sponsored on your algorithm. She has bucked the record label process and pays money to increase her reach. She’s given away thousands of CDs to increase her exposure. Sometime early this year she released her Red album, a 6 song EP that contains what I consider to be her best work yet. On September 6 she released the album to streaming sites. If you haven’t heard it yet, I highly recommend that you correct that. These songs are direct, poignant, powerful, and catchy.
Every folk musician tends to draw comparisons to Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger if they have a political slant. Carsie is no different. Her songs are political, educational, informative, and designed to get you to take action. Her music is her method of education, and does an amazing job of reaching a broad and diverse audience. She coins her music “revolutionary optimism” and I find it impossible to argue against the claim.
Normally, when I review an album, I pick a few songs to discuss and let those represent the whole album. However, I feel like this album is designed to be educational, and it feels like an injustice to not say something about all six tracks, to at least help spread the message inherent in each song. Despite being a folk album, this album is as punk as any album ever written.
The album begins with the incredibly catchy “Ugly Nasty Commie Bitch”, a song that begins by seemingly embracing stereotypes used to slander leftists. The second verse seems to retaliate by using all the stereotypes and insults used to attack “rednecks” and right leaning people. At the end the song questions if she accurately described the listener, or if, perhaps, none of the stereotypes are accurate, and that we don’t really know one another, and that the division created between the two groups only functions to benefit the already wealthy and powerful.
The second track on the album is “You Ain’t Done Nothin (If you ain’t been called a Red)”. While the title itself describes the theme of the album. Not only does it tell you to embrace being called a red, it promotes marching, agitating, brings attention to landlord corruption, organizing, and demands action. If you’re not being called a Red, then it’s time to step up your level of activism. Embrace it, being called a red is a sign that you are making a difference.
The third track is probably the most well known, and one of the more catchy tracks. You hear the snaps and upright bass, and you know the track. The little touches on the piano make the perfect highlights, but the message is clear, and it’s a message we should all be shouting. Instead of summarizing or paraphrasing, I’m just gonna quote the first verse.
“Don’t be ashamed if you get confused when you talk to your friends or you watch the news. They’ll try to tell you where it all went wrong, now you don’t need to argue just sing this song- it was rich people stacking the deck, it was rich people with big fat checks. It was rich people having a ball, rich people been fucking us all”.
The song goes on to dispel stereotypes people have against various groups of people, but reminds us that it’s never the group being blamed for a given problem, in every case, the real problem lies with rich people. Always.
“Dealin’ with the Devil” is a fun song on the piano that starts off talking about a few good men, but not having time to deal with lying, cheating, double talking men. The end of the song is a fun twist, and it seems the lyrics can be switched up a bit to ensure that they are timely and relevant while maintaining the same theme. The lying, cheating, double-talking man is now a politician making promises he has no intent to uphold, saying what it takes to get elected and protect wealth and power.
The fifth song “The Democrats” reminds the listener that Carsie means what she says, and that rich people and politicians doesn’t just mean the rich people and the politicians in the party that you oppose. Beginning “The Democrats won’t save you if you’re drowning, they won’t help you if you are in pain, they’ll ask you for your vote, they’ll tell you they are broke, and send a lot of money to Ukraine”. If your first instinct is to get upset, you are exactly the person who needs to hear this message- and then maybe go back to track two and figure out why nobody is calling you a red. The song goes on to say the Republicans will shoot you in the head, the Democrats will shoot you in the back. I’d love to write a review of this song, but it really is that self- explanatory, and direct, and you just need to get the message. To continue to quote the song “this is the best democracy ever seen anywhere- if you’re a millionaire”.
The album ends with “Song of the Magi”, a slow piano ballad that juxtaposes the story of the birth of Christ with the story of a child born in the West Bank today, while maintaining a positive and hopeful tone. The child is not killed, but born in a border town, checkpoints, arms raised at gunpoint, but destined to bring peace to the world. Full of love. I want to have hope. I fear the world is beyond this hope. I see the bombs I pay for. I see the starvation. The death. I need more revolutionary optimism. We all need to do more to be called a red. I know I do.
Written by Gimp Leg
