Dave Eggers Enlists Musicians to Defeat Trump with 30 Days, 30 Songs
Dave Eggers and the team that urged voters to re-elect Obama in 2012 with their 90 Days, 90 Reasons campaign, are back at it. This time around, the group, which call themselves Artists for a Trump-free America, have launched 30 Days, 30 Songs, an independent project in support of defeating Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and electing the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton. From now until the election, the group will maintain a playlist that will be updated daily with new material and unheard tracks by a variety of musicians. Today, the project kicked off with the release of “Million Dollar Loan”, an original Death Cab for Cutie song accompanied by a lyric video directed by Simian Design. You can watch it below.
Eggers was motivated to start 30 Days, 30 Songs after attending a Trump rally in Sacramento for The Guardian. While he was waiting for Trump to appear, the campaign played songs by Bruce Springsteen, Elton John and Queen. He knew that none of these musicians support Trump and started thinking that the election might benefit from the return of political protest songs. Eggers elaborated, “From Woody Guthrie to Public Enemy, we know that songs can change minds, and particularly now, we need to motivate voters to stand against bigotry, sexism, hatred and ignorance.”
As for the first song out of the gate, Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie explains:
“Lyrically, ‘Million Dollar Loan’ deals with a particularly tone deaf moment in Donald Trump’s ascent to the Republican nomination. While campaigning in New Hampshire last year, he attempted to cast himself as a self-made man by claiming he built his fortune with just a ‘small loan of a million dollars’ from his father. Not only has this statement been proven to be wildly untrue, he was so flippant about it. It truly disgusted me. Donald Trump has repeatedly demonstrated that he is unworthy of the honor and responsibility of being President of the United States of America, and in no way, shape or form represents what this country truly stands for. He is beneath us.”
In addition to Death Cab for Cutie, the first week features original songs by Jim James, Aimee Mann, Thao Nguyen, clipping., and Bhi Bhiman, as well as a never-before-released live song by R.E.M.
The playlist can be found below, and also lives on Spotify, Apple Music, and the 30 Days, 30 Songs website. “Million Dollar Loan” is available for purchase at Apple Music. Proceeds from by 30 Days, 30 Songs will be donated to the Center for Popular Democracy (CDP) and their efforts to achieve Universal Voter Registration for all Americans.
On a related note, singer-songwriter Kyle Craft released a Trump protest song in August. You can listen to it here.