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By Root 881 0

everything, problematizing the given. It interrogates the ideological as well as the idolatrous (two words for brainwash) in the way it speaks truth to power, its relentless lyricism of protest. It isn’t merely lyrical in the sense that it could be regarded as irrelevant to other more reality-based concerns, because the lyrical precedes the analytical as well as whatev-er we call the philosophical. We might try to distinguish between the witness of mystic traditions (institutionally sanctioned or otherwise) and political concerns but this, again, does justice to neither. It’s politics all the way down. As the scholar of Buddhist traditions, Richard King, has observed: “The very fact that ‘the mystical’ is seen as irrelevant to issues of social and political authority itself reflects contemporary, secularized notions of and attitudes toward power. The separation of the mystical from the political is itself a political decision!”35

There Are No Unrelated Phenomena

Against the rationale of myriad forms of officialdom whose discourse would carefully separate issue of business, “the economy,” security, and the government in such a way as to pre-empt meaningful critique of the status quo, The Eraser speaks out of a world where everything is connected to everything else. It is out of this sacred an-archy that the poetic, as well as the prophetic, speaks. We can call this space religion or literature or philosophy or the folk tradition of truth-telling, the wisdom tradition of the folks, by the folks, and for the folks.

As practitioners and partakers of the tradition understand, such folk will have their work cut out for them. So much energy and so many resources are devoted to broadcasting disinformation which insists that this has nothing to do with that, that events are unrelated to other events, and that some dots should never be connected. This is why collation of information, like the transformation of data into metaphor has always been an act of communal resistance, dangerous news for the powers that be, subversive meaning-making in the shadow of reigning mythologies. Within this space I mean to celebrate and describe, Yorke and his fellow artisans produce their alternative broadcasts. In this space, there are no unrelated phenomena. Sacred music has always said as much.

While The Eraser stands alone as a powerfully life-affirming witness, I can’t help but add that “Reckoner,” played live by Radiohead as early as 2000 and eventually appearing as a remark-able Talk Talk-infused standout track on In Rainbows, is especially representative of the witness forecast throughout The Eraser. “Dedicated to all human beings,” decrees the chorus. It’s as if the voices working their way through Yorke’s solo project land within a space of affirmation and infinite hospitality made known in an enduringly communal sound (of all of Radiohead’s work, it’s the one I most want to hear sung by a large crowd of people, it’s as if it’s made to be sung this way. As of this writing, it’s the opening number on their set list). It calls the past and the future to the rescue of the present, and by performing a sort of vigil in anticipation of joy and justice to come, it realizes, in no small degree, something of that joy now. Not negating what The Eraser cultivates but enriching its life-giving witness.

Radiohead and the Music Industry.(Rainbows and Arrows.)

8.

Taking the Sting Out of Environmental Virtue Ethics

DANIEL MILSKY

Time is running out for us But you just move the hands upon the clock

—Thom Yorke, “The Clock”

The headlines are dire. The end of the world is near. Our planet is headed for environmental destruction. Like many, you feel a duty to repair the damage we have done—even as you head out the door, bottled water in hand, hop in the car, stop at the filling station, drive to Lollapalooza, and catch Radiohead live in Grant Park.

If you see the contradiction—if, say, while driving to the show, you wonder about the car, the bottled water, the long, hot shower you took last night, and the acres of trash