Premiere: White Beast Survey The Wreckage Of Capitalism In New Video For “The Richest Land On Earth”
How’s everyone enjoying late-stage capitalism? Don’t you just love that inflation is so ubiquitous that we need to break it out into subsets like shrinkflation, skimpflation, and excuseflation? Are you over the moon about the fact that being burned out is accepted as a way of life and we’ve moved on to talking about quiet quitting, rage applying, and acting your wage? Or what about the need to fill your already limited free time with an endless parade of side hustles, ones that will never make you rich but might just make your bank account feel like it’s 2017 again? Or the race to put everything on a subscription service and dominate your thoughts with content every waking moment?
Don’t for one second think it’s the system to blame. It’s doing exactly what it’s designed to do. Top-line profits have to go up every year for every single industry, of course. What are investors to do otherwise? That can’t be the problem. It’s you. Hi. You’re the problem. You’re only worthwhile when you’re spending or making money. That’s the reality of every single last thing around us these days. Welcome to the wealthiest country in history, or as neo-noise punk duo White Beast puts it on their new single, “The Richest Land On Earth.” This six-minute pipe bomb is a biting critique of the self-imposed isolation society has forced upon us, where a fever dream of high anxiety in the quiet night is yet another large pill to swallow while starin’ at the ceilin’. It’s a feeling White Beast know so well that they’re able to convey it visually as well as musically with their latest music video, which The Auricular is proud to premiere today.
The music video, shot and edited by White Beast’s bassist and vocalist Jeffrey Rettberg, shrinks this conversation down to the consumerist paradise drilled into us from early on in life: being a homeowner. Front and center is that picture-perfect colonial house, with enough windows for natural sunlight and a porch wide enough to enjoy the vivid promise of dawn and the relaxing calm of dusk. As the song opens on a strolling beat and nodding strum, we see the house framed in context with the idyllic countryside: scenic and harmonious. But as the song builds up speed and scenes of urban sprawl fly by, the once immaculate house is quickly boarded up, an early casualty in the so-called march of societal progress. The degradation of the consumerist ideal comes into focus here, with unbridled metropolises of reckless growth glorifying a utopian promise they so gleefully place just out of reach for the masses.
“The only home I knew\ Boarded up, entombed\ A dead end,” Rettberg sings early in the song, staking his own personal despair within the societal examination. The lyrical ire fuels the rising musical intensity, where fuzzed-out dissonance roars into harmony alongside elegiac prose that moves from personal lamentation to general scrutiny. Consumerism is specifically denounced here as the reality of being priced out of living is confronted with seething skepticism (“Down by the shore what do I see?\ Plastic hopes and dreams, false memories\ Always wanting more was never me\ But I can barely afford the air I can’t breathe”). The promise of a life well-lived is no more. It’s been corrupted and subjugated into a contest where the most avaricious are rewarded with stronger illusions of prosperity.
Something bothering you? Don’t worry. Open your wallet and it will fix all your troubles. If you’re having trouble sleeping, then subscribe to the new Ultimate Global Plus Max platform and spend your extra time binging this twenty-two part documentary series. Tired in the morning? Don’t worry — here’s a lemonade loaded with societal that surely won’t hurt you. If you’re looking to shed some weight, you can spend more money on this targeted health food and join this swanky gym they just built five minutes from your house. Met your goal? Well, then treat yourself to a fancy dinner and don’t skimp on dessert! You only live once after all, even if that life is controlled by the whim of consumerism which White Beast rails against in a thrilling buzz of roaring defiance (“An ugly menagerie\ Of consumer loyalty\ Unrestrained\ Now I’m spending more just to stay afloat\ Love’s found in a store, change in a vote“).
Unfortunately, it doesn’t take long for an abandoned house or ideal to turn to ruins as the video shows. While viewing those ruins, the band dials back the blasting sound, letting their bleak truths air out in between punctuated beats. “I haven’t failed an honest game, I’ve fulfilled a destiny,” Rattberg sings with the treacherous landscape of consumerism in the backdrop. “This deadly despair beneath the surface that you keep\ Knows the richest land on earth is not for me,” he concludes, summarizing the profound disillusionment that’s truly at the end of that pursuit of the American dream. Your hopes and goals will always be transient, darting further away with each new trend and innovation that distracts us all from the fact that we’ve been both spiritually and physically priced out of this society. Understanding that is the first step to changing it and while that journey is even more daunting than the one capitalism offers, at least that one actually has something at the end that will better our lives.
“The Richest Land On Earth” is the third single from White Beast’s debut album Suffering Time, after “Fencewalker” in March and “Branded” in May, both of which also received their own visually striking music videos. Like this single and video, those two grapple with the disorder of the world in their own chaotic manner, represented both musically and visually in a way that gives White Beast its own decaying aesthetic, mirroring the society of today with its own distinctive and thought-provoking identity. “The Richest Land On Earth” is just another chapter in the band’s narrative of societal critique, one that will certainly give you the passion needed to spark that change in the future so we can make scenic promises a reality instead of a corporate-designed fantasy.
Suffering Time is now available digitally on all streaming platforms (click here) as well as physically with a limited edition vinyl release (click here). Make sure to follow White Beast on social media so you can stay up-to-date on all news, releases, and concerts in the future.
