Reggae month in Jamaica.

Reggae's never been my go-to in a purely musical sense, but it's been ubiquitous throughout my adult life, and the story is fascinating.

An off-beat festival: reggae

Jamaica is home to just 2.9m souls. Drop a gungo pea on your atlas and you might cover it. Yet its influence on world culture is outsized. That, in part, is down to reggae. This week begins Jamaica’s annual reggae month, which attracts 40,000 devotees to exhibitions and performances. The music developed in the 1970s, a slowed down, cooler version of the ska and rocksteady beats that dominated Kingston’s dance halls in the 1960s. Most date it to the 1968 release of “Do the Reggay”, by Toots & the Maytals. The meaning of the word is unclear—perhaps it refers to islanders’ ragged clothes, to quarrelling or even “kings’ (‘reg’) music”. The beat has always been deeply political, rooted in Africa, slavery and Rastafarianism, which encouraged black people to rise up against white oppressors. Through Bob Marley and Jimmy Cliff that message conquered imperial Britain and America. Nowadays, Marley once observed, Babylon is everywhere.

The proper word for the alt-right is puke, not punk.

“I think people ought to know that we’re anti-fascist, we’re anti-violence, we’re anti-racist and we’re pro-creative. We’re against ignorance.”
-- Joe Strummer

Of course the alt-right steals ideas. That's what you do when you have none of your own.

5 Punk Rockers Explain Why the Alt-Right’s ‘Punk Movement’ is Garbage, by Michael Tedder (Playboy)

First, the alt-right stole Pepe the frog from cartoonist Matt Furie. Then, they stole enjoying milk from the calcium-deficient. Now, they’re trying to steal punk. Members of the alt-right have of late made the argument that “conservatism is the new punk” and that gadflies like Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos are the modern day truth-telling equivalents of the Sex Pistols and the Clash, pushing back against social justice warriors and political correctness culture. In their eyes, their old, retrograde ideas—which inevitably manifest as fear and outrage at attempts to curb white male privilege—have suddenly become avant-garde because of…safe spaces or something.

As if.

Since it’s impossible to physically punch this loathsome idea in the face, Playboy reached out to some of our favorite young punks and some members of the old guard to talk about what punk really means. Many of our contributors pointed out that even though as a cultural movement it has always had its flaws and problems with representations, punk is still a place where people threatened by the right’s crusade can find strength, safety and community.

One specific pull:

I think that this is exactly why it is nonsense when the alt-right strings together vapid words to try and incite a playground fight with those of us who put blood, sweat and tears into creating an expression that is the antithesis of everything that these alt-right meatheads represent. They are simply a distraction to the women, femmes, queers and people of color filling the columns of Spin, Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, the New York Times and numerous other publications that report on culture. I don’t see actual alt-right bands headlining Coachella, I see Beyoncé and Kendrick Lamar—two of the most punk in terms of crystallizing dissent about the status quo —artists taking the stage. Real punk is and will always be a total threat to the alt-right and their culture, which is based on white supremacy. Otherwise it isn’t real punk. The alt-right’s tactics are FAKE PUNK. The alt-white (I mean right) want us to sip tea, but we are drinking fresh water from a firehose.

Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello captures the "submitting to authority" component of New Albany's zeitgeist.

I know, I know.

It's here, Shane. As for the interview at Rolling Stone ...

In a new interview for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, guitarist Tom Morello talked about the political nature of music. "100 percent of music is political. Music either supports the status quo or challenges the status quo. So every artist is political," Morello said.

"Now, Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez probably don't identify as political artists, but their music – while often very entertaining and loved by their fan base – is the bread and circuses of our times," Morello added. "If you're not questioning authority, you're tacitly submitting to authority. And that's not to say I have a long list of booty-shaking jams on my iPod, and there's certainly a place for that, but I am also conscious of the fact that in my own work, that what you say and what you do matters."

Which helps to prove that just because you're a politician, it doesn't mean you're the only one allowed to be political.