Though it was out of sadness and outrage that the song “They Shot Trayvon Martin Down” came to be, the mood in the studio was joyous and full of love. We were blessed to work with people who were not just wonderful musicians but wonderful human beings. In one day’s work we completed the song. It was a labor of love and I hope that love can be heard and felt when the song is released.
The idea for the song came to me after listening to a collection of chain gang songs recorded by Alan Lomax. These were the real thing. The real, deep blues which comes from field hollers and work songs which themselves came from Africa. As these songs grew and changed over the years they became what we know today as the blues. This music has always been carried by and reflective of the lives of African Americans but generations of white Americans including white musicians (like myself) owe their musical identities to this legacy as well. “The blues is a feeling” the saying goes. After Trayvon Martin was killed, that’s the feeling I had.
As a white songwriter and group of mostly white musicians we tried very consciously to tread lightly and pay respect to the legacy of African American music throughout the recording process. I could never know the blues the way Muddy Waters knew it. I could never truly understand what Trayvon went through in his last moments or what his family has had to endure. I can tell you that in my heart Trayvon feels no less to me like my brother than anyone else in this strange and troubled but somehow beautiful country. In the end, all anyone can be is honest, and this is what honesty sounded like to me.
It’s been months since Trayvon’s murder and his killer is at least going to be brought up on charges. Time will tell if justice will be done. Now, I find myself stepping back and analyzing and what I feel is hurt. Not just anger or sorrow grown out of this one incident but a deep hurt because what happened to that innocent young man is not unique. It wasn’t the first time, not by a long shot and what stirs a deep hurt in my soul and I would hope in the souls of everyone in this country, is that it won’t be the last. And so I and all of the musicians involved in this song offer it as our honor to a young man who should never have lost his life and to all of the lives lost in this country’s history of racism. I hope that one day we will live in a truly post-racial America but for now what we have is the blues.
-Chris
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