Amanda Palmer’s Rendition of Pink Floyd’s “Mother” a Unique Take on the Current Trump Moment

Singer/Songwriter Amanda Palmer was in Melbourne, Australia during the Trump Inauguration, holed up and wondering like the rest of us what the hell the world was gonna be in store for. A few days later, she scripted the above video, and started gathering talented artist friends around her to help make it. You can check out the result above. BE WARNED: there is a scene in which Palmer breastfeeds a Trump-like character. So…NSFW?

It’s a unique take on the current U.S. Administration, imagining through song and choreography a conversation between Trump and his mother by covering the Pink Floyd song “Mother,” written by Roger Waters. It’s kind of amazing how perfectly the song fits, right down to the “should I run for President” and the talk of building a wall.

Palmer’s video as much an ode to motherhood and the power of women as it is a response to and indictment of Trump, and it’s one of the most interesting things that Palmer has created. Palmer herself is a mother, and she managed to pull together a team of women with different experiences of motherhood. On her webpage for the project, she writes a lot about what the project means to her, but here’s the part that jumped out at me:

listen, my dears….i’ve made over a dozen big-production videos with huge budgets and massive casts and crews.
and nothing felt like this. ever. even the videos i’ve produced myself completely. something was different.

it was THIS: ever since having a baby i’ve been continuing to work, and often i bring said baby to recording studios and video sets where it’s cheerfully tolerated.

this time it wasn’t just tolerated. it was CELEBRATED.

i was a mother, hiring a mother director, with my mother friends and their kids all gathered around me…making something huge and real.

we were in charge.

there wasn’t anyone to tolerate us and our kids being around the production because we WERE the fucking production.

what a metaphor for life right now, and for women everywhere, no?

we are the fucking production, indeed.

you can try all you want to build a trillion-dollar wall: but suck it.

we have the children, and we get to teach them.

Mothers can be a huge part of the solution, but this video is also a reminder of the moment in which we find ourselves right now: women raising their voices and telling their stories in a way they never have been able to before. Whether mothers or not, women are at the forefront of the revolution.

(via Patreon, image: screencap)

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