Unrelenting pop-punk protest anthems

The thirteenth studio album by outspoken punks Anti-Flag Lies They Tell Our Children is another dose of leftist medicine sweetened by the band’s pop chops. The Pittsburgh quartet’s pandemic record is a bracing 33 minutes of shiny and crisp chants and hooks reminding citizens where their priorities should be. 

As the track listing suggests, from “Sold Everything” to “Imperialism” to “Work and Struggle,” Justin Sane, the two Chris’ (Head and No. 2) and Pat Thetic aren’t discussing their personal relationships or taking any of the usual artsy liberties less politicized acts do on this one. They’re simply raising hell about nothing less than the world’s problems—the world’s real problems, which is a distinction they have to make in this bizarre conspiracy-laden zeitgeist.

A few lines from “Work and Struggle” line up some of the bleak conditions Anti-Flag feel so justifiably “anti-” about: [they—corporations, industrialists, neoliberals—] “Poison the rivers, slaughter the cows / Build up the prisons, burn forests down / Food to the landfill, patent the seeds / They waste your labor, and your dignity.” The vision is direct yet (unfortunately) general and liable to be relevant for the foreseeable future.

The catchy ditties this polemic comes couched in justify its familiar message. Fresh, bop-you-on-the-head melodies are never unwelcome. Sometimes the notes are croaked and squealed, and sometimes they take the form of trendy, coffee shop vocals. The bottom line is that they are undeniably catchy and memorable. See “Imperialism,” a song that lambastes colonizers over a surf beat.

Speaking of surf beats, this pop-punk album borrows little formal touches here and there from other genres to suit its sub-themes. Besides the expected nu-metal emoting throughout, there’s a dash of modern folk on the track “Shallow Graves” which is about immigration and massacres of Indigenous peoples. There is also gospel on the song “Victory or Death (We Gave ’Em Hell)” about dying with your boots on. Even while shifting styles throughout, Anti-Flag never slow down or pull their punches. 

Though Lies They Tell Our Children doesn’t entirely teach anything new, it does preach core values that should never fall out of fashion, lest the fascists win. “Can you hear me, hear me calling?” goes the chorus of the first single “Laugh. Cry. Smile. Die.” “I got this worry that we’re falling, for nothing.” All it takes to make a difference, for starters, is to listen to that shout for fellowship, truth and generosity that’s always rung out in times like these. And this time it’s a shout people can hop around to.