Jeremy Messersmith, Hastings 3000 join in the Occupy movement

By Andrea Swensson Mon., Oct. 24 2011 at 12:50 PM

Categories: Local Music

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Photo by Nick Vlcek

As Occupy Wallstreet and our own local version, OccupyMN, wear on, more and more Minnesota musicians are asserting themselves as vocal members of the 99%. Over the past few weeks, artists ranging from hip-hop acts Toki Wright, Sean Anonymous, and Guante to R&B maven Mayda to former Husker Du drummer-turned-songwriter Grant Hart have performed in solidarity with the Occupy movement, and over the weekend a few more notable musicians threw their hat in the ring.

On Friday afternoon, Jeremy Messersmith announced that he had written, recorded, and uploaded a new song in less than 24 hours. The song, called "Blue Sky (Corporations Are People My Friend)," is a contemplative acoustic ballad that concisely sums up some of Messersmith's thoughts on the current situation and offers a sentiment of hope.

Just a few hours after the song was released, Messersmith took to his Twitter account to defend his new tune: "I guess a few people are weirded out that I wrote something "political." I'm not sure how to console them... I write what I feel. I always have, otherwise there isn't much point in writing about something, at least for me. These are complex and serious issues we face and sometimes writing a song can be a great way to explore an idea or point of view."

In true democratic fashion, Messersmith is offering the track as a free download and invites others to remix and reuse the song at will. Read the lyrics at his SoundCloud page, and listen to the track here:

Blue Sky (Corporations Are People My Friend) by Jeremy Messersmith

Hastings 3000, meanwhile, seized the opportunity while in NYC to head down to Occupy Wall Street and participate in the protests, and he shipped over some photos of his experience there on Friday. He was in town to perform at the CMJ music festival.

"He was down at Occupy in NY at the Zuccotti Park near Wall Street holding signs," writes his manager, Karrie Vrabel. "He also went to the Verizon rally in front of the NY Stock Exchange."

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