With all the attention Billy Bragg receives for being a thorn in the side of England’s political conservatives, it’s easy to forget that he hasn’t always been an issue-oriented songwriter. Indeed, Bragg, who comes to the Orpheum this Wednesday to support his new Elektra album England, Half English, feeds as much off his sense of humor as he does off the daily papers. On 1983’s "A New England," for example, he announced, "I don’t want to change the world/I’m not looking for a new England . . . " And then, instead of a diatribe against the powers that be, he delivers a disarming punch line: "I’m just looking for another girl."
It’s a strategy the Essex-bred Bragg has deployed time and time again over the course of his two decades as a folk-punk messenger who usually comes to the stage armed with little more than an electric guitar. Both live and on record, his good-natured use of humor has made his otherwise serious desire to rattle the status quo in Britain and beyond that much easier to tolerate. After all, a spoonful of sugar does make the medicine go down.
Nevertheless, Bragg backs up the socially conscious message of his lyrics with action. Last year, this staunch Labour supporter helped organize rival political groups against the Tories in a vote-exchange program aimed at unseating Conservatives in the Dorset general elections. But whereas a politically conscious artist like U2’s Bono has increasingly kept his politicking separate from his music, Bragg has never separated his grass-roots crusades from his songwriting.
"I choose to use my music to ask questions," he says over the phone from Hamburg as he discusses England, Half English, his first album with touring band the Blokes. "Not everybody does that, not everybody should have to do that. But the thing is, whether or not you’re interested in politics, the events of September 11 proved that politics are going to come find you, and you can’t just switch off, you can’t pretend the world isn’t there. Because eventually, either in a huge way, like September 11, or in a local, personal way, these things intrude into your life."
Bragg is well aware that no matter how locally focused his political interests might be, he’s from a country with a multicultural society. His new album is grounded in a belief that the English identity should be an inclusive one — a rallying cry for the acceptance of a modern and diverse England. But if that’s the overall theme, then it’s certainly not the only topic on his mind, and his cheeky wit is in full play — "She filled my head with the awful noise/Of her disappointment and the Pet Shop Boys" is one of the more amusing lines he gets off. What’s more, Bragg and his Blokes (an ace group whose line-up includes former Small Faces keyboardist Ian McLagan and former members of Shriekback and the Damned) show off a variety of styles. "Baby Farouk" is an ebullient world-music percussive celebration. "NPWA" is a smoky blues number with heavy riffs and Hammond chords; the title track is adapted from an Algerian folk song. "He’ll Go Down" is slow-burning C&W. Other numbers boast a staggering array of exotic instruments — bouzouki, kraksh, udu.
This tendency to musical reinvention can be seen as a logical extension of the recent Mermaid Avenue collaborations with Wilco. Both Mermaid discs, which were released on Elektra, found Bragg and Wilco writing music for recently discovered Woody Guthrie lyrics that revealed Guthrie to be more than just a protest singer. In fact, much like Bragg, Guthrie turns out to be a politically active singer/songwriter with an active sense of humor and fun.
"I think there are two types of music," he suggests. "There’s what you might call pop music, which by its very nature is disposable. You don’t have to keep it because it never goes away. But there’s another kind of music that doesn’t get onto MTV and doesn’t get used for adverts and doesn’t very often get played on mainstream radio. The people who find that music, because they’ve found it themselves, it means so much more to them. It really strikes a deep chord with them, and they keep that music with them forever. That’s the kind of music Woody made. And that’s the kind of music I would like to make."
Billy Bragg and the Blokes come to the Somerville Theatre with opener Sarah Harmer this Wednesday, April 10. Call (617) 931-2000.
