Monday, January 17, 2011

Next Hype: EMA Protests, Wed 19 Jan


The Conservative government's abolition of the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) is an unabashed assault on the education of the British working-class. Quite simply, large numbers of students from low-income backgrounds will not be able to afford to stay on in post-16 education if it is abolished. The Tories were going to push through the abolition of EMA without even having a vote in Parliament (their contempt for democracy matching their contempt for the poor, as usual) - but thanks to the protests, and the official Save EMA campaign (website), the House of Commons will at least be voting on EMA abolition, this Wednesday 19 January.

Following my blog post on 'riot music', grime, and the EMA kids, several videos have emerged which connect one particular track to the protest movement - some of them are footage of the song playing off mobile soundsystems (as I documented in my blog on the Parliament Square kettle, above). I'd be tempted to write reams about Tempz's 'Next Hype', but after asking Tempz himself what he thought of his tune being a soundtrack to the protests, I don't think I need to. Try and find a more perfect encapsulation of grime's power than this first sentence, this tune, and these videos.
"It's not about the content, it's about the energy and aura. The persona I portray gives a voice to those who use it as a way of expression, to combat the injustices of the immense increase in student fees." - Tempz, January 2011



On #dayx3, in Parliament Square (the track drops towards the end of this video):



Finally here's a montage of footage of the Millbank protests, set to Next Hype:



Assemble 4pm on Wednesday, Piccadilly Circus (Facebook event).

Yeah yeah yeah, we're still about...

1 Comments:

Anonymous Russ said...

Nice choons!

3:45 PM  

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