Declan McKenna

One Liner:  Fun, bright, poppy rock that sometimes gets political

Wikipedia Genre:  Glam rock, indie rock, indie pop, dream pop, neo-psychedelia, alt-rock

Home: London

Poster Position: 3 (10) 
Both Weekends.
Saturday.

Thoughts:  I thought that this was the same guy as the Devon Gillfilian dude.  I know those names aren't that similar, but when I saw I still needed to listen to this guy I figured I had just forgotten to cross it off the list.  Another name that absolutely sounds like a dude from England (or maybe Scotland?  Declan is a cool name).  Absolutely random aside here, but if you haven't yet read A Man With One of Those Faces, by Caimh McDonnell, it is a really fun crime thriller/mystery story set in modern Dublin.  I've now read three of the books that start off with that one, and am about half way through the fourth, and they are very entertaining.

Anyway, this is an English singer who first gained notoriety with a self-released single called "Brazil" that protests FIFA (soccer) and the FIFA World Cup being held in Brazil in 2014.  He had entered the Glastonbury Festival's Emerging Talent Competition, which he won, and then was a sought after artist from the labels.  After struggling for a while to get a song worthy of a first single, he finally self-released "Brazil" on his own YouTube channel.  It blew up.  Still his top track on Spotify with 416.2 million streams.

I gotta say, those lyrics are really inscrutable for a protest song.  I just pulled them up, expecting that maybe I just couldn't quite understand what he was saying and that somewhere in there he decried the poverty of Brazil and needless expense of hosting the World Cup.  Maybe the first four lines - "I heard you sold the Amazon, to show the country that you're from, is where the world should want to be, for a fine something all people need."  But that's a pretty weak protest.  I need more "fuck you I won't do what you tell me" in my protest songs.

A lot of these tunes make me think of Jake Bugg and Two Door Cinema Club.  Bright rock that is fun to listen to.  Some old Arctic Monkeys in there too.  And lyrically, he seems to court controversy, with other songs about treatment of transgender folks or UK foreign policy.  Also, I love the way that British artists get lines like this in their Wikipedia - "He is a vegan and supports Tottenham Hotspur F.C."  Haha.  OK.

2 albums - 2017's What Do You Think About the Car? and 2020's Zeros - and one new recent single.  His second biggest tune is, like "Brazil," from his debut album.  I think we should try out something more recent, so here is the new single, "Sympathy."  1.3 million streams for now.

Got that freaky Beatles goofiness, and he keeps it kind of raw and unpolished.  I have really enjoyed the last day of jamming this stuff - I'd absolutely go check it out.  Feels like he would put on an energetic live show.