Koolaid

Warbler's sophomore record, Sea of Glass, is a folk rock album, but it is much more than that. It is a politico-personal commentary in three parts, following the classical narrative arc—environmental exposition (framing the problem), internal transformation (recognizing the solution), and synthetic resolution (implementing the solution); consisting in four moods—ignorance, despair, surrender, and assurance; all set to music fitted to our time.

“Be the Beast” opens up Sea of Glass with a bang. It begins to frame the problem: from corrupt politicians and Machiavellian bottom-liners all the way to the ugly root—a complicit populace. See, we don’t just feed the beast. We are the beast.

After the first suite of political songs fades out, Sea of Glass transitions to address cultural and social issues. “Vacuum Aspirations” concerns abortion, especially its roots in racism and eugenics. The title is drawn from a procedure sometimes used for abortion (“vacuum aspiration”), where suction first dismembers an unborn baby and his or her womb effects and then removes them from a uterus. Of course, the title also has a double meaning. Abortion creates a personal and societal vacuum—is that vacuum what we truly aspire to achieve?

The tender beauty of the music is intentionally at odds with the grotesqueness of the lyrics. The music highlights the dissociation of sensibility inherent in the euphemisms (e.g., pro-choice, fetus, “therapeutic” abortion) we use to talk about cutting short the lives of unborn babies. The music becomes a beautiful euphemism packaging a harsh truth.

After framing the political and cultural problem with American society, Sea of Glass moves on from the environmental symptoms of our national decay to the root of our problem and the heart of our solution: the individual. This is where the album becomes appropriately autobiographical and personal. By doing so, Sea of Glass rejects a popular misconception: to change a systemic problem, you must repair the system. Many do this through politics or cultural programs. It seems logical. A large-scale problem requires a large-scale solution. Not so, our problems are national, but the only solution is a return to personal responsibility and individual freedom.