Jazz Album Criticizes American Culture ... Culture Awaits Apology

Wynton Marsalis has been called jazz’s most recognizable name, which doesn’t say much about the genre if you haven’t heard of him. However, after more than a dozen classical albums and more than 30 jazz albums, Marsalis is making perhaps the biggest splash of his career with his new politically charged album, From the Plantation to the Penitentiary, due out March 6.

The title track is actually not about bananas being served to convicts in prison, but is a message about how America has gone from one type of slavery to another--from the enslavement of Africans to the booming prison trade. Sounds like someone is taking his car’s license plates for granted.

While Green Day is calling the President an American Idiot and the Dixie Chicks continue to criticize U.S. foreign policy, Marsalis uses lyrics to motivate people to change society from the bottom up. "Instead of saying ‘What can we do about it?’ we have to be spurred to action," he said in a recent interview on EURweb.

In the song with the rhetorical name "Where Y’all At?" Marsalis accuses rappers, activists from the hippie-era and political leaders of making promises and not following through on them. Turns out gangsta rappers, pot-smoking hippies and politicians are not the most dependable people on the planet.

Marsalis expresses a desire for the "return of romance" in the modern music industry. In the song "Love and Broken Hearts," he writes, "Oh safari seekers and thug life coons/ You modern day minstrels and your songless tunes" verbalizing his disdain for rap music, which he finds degrades African-Americans.

"Rap has become a safari for people who get their thrills from watching African-American people debase themselves, men dressing in gold, calling themselves stupid names like Ludacris and 50 Cent, spending money on expensive fluff, using language like 'bitch' and 'ho' and 'n**ger,' " he elaborated to the Post Chronicle.

Marsalis also takes a shot at America’s flagrant, excessive consumerism with "Supercapitalism," which is sure to make anyone who listens to it, after spending 20 bucks on the album, feel like an idiot.


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