North Carolina's Senators Give Local Music a Nice Big Middle Finger
With its series "Shaped By Sound," PBS NC put a spotlight on acts like Reuben Vincent, Sonny Miles and Shirlette Ammons. Months later, Sens. Tillis and Budd voted to cut $4 million of their funding.
You wouldn't really expect U.S. senators Thom Tillis and Ted Budd to be able to carry a tune or move to a beat. I mean, just look at them — there are department store mannequins with more dynamism than these two:
In Tillis's case, though, that scarecrow-like countenance may belie some legit musical chops: in 2016 he was the only North Carolinian to make Spotify's list of the "biggest music fans in Congress" (whatever that means), and many years ago I heard a rumor that he was a fan of the Raleigh rapper then known as King Mez. Less is known about Ted Budd's musical sensibilities, but I suspect they're about as cool and hip as you'd expect from someone who says things like "small businesses — they don't want a handout," while his family business pulls in a PPP loan worth $10 million.
But for the purposes of this ridiculous internet post, let's imagine that Tillis and Budd really know ball. That we simply aren't familiar with their game. That in between calling protesting college students "anti-American" and targeting certain North Carolina counties for not throwing enough people into unmarked Gestapo vans, they are indeed connoisseurs of Carolina sonic creativity.
If that is in fact the case, then man — they would really love the PBS NC-produced show Shaped By Sound:
Touching nearly every corner of NC's musical spectrum — from Chapel Hill rock legends Superchunk and Durham jazz luminary (and GRAMMY winner) Nnenna Freelon to emerging hip-hop/soul acts like Sonny Miles and Reuben Vincent — Shaped By Sound did something that music fans like Budd and Tillis surely appreciate: provided regional acts with the kind of immaculate live studio productions normally reserved for much larger acts.
And it didn't stop there! Alongside the performances, the show also included high-end video podcasts — wide-ranging, long-form conversations that gave NC artists more space to tell their stories than they typically get on radio interviews or quick social media hits. See: Vincent talking about the power of creating alone, how the 6th grade mixtapes that got him discovered by 9th Wonder were made all by himself; Shirlette Ammons charting the through line of her creative work, from poetry and music to TV and film production.
It is a great show, and a testament to the enduring value, even in the social media era, of PBS North Carolina.
It is also a testament, albeit indirectly so, to the value of the Corporation For Public Broadcasting, which provides $4 million to PBS NC annually, and which earlier this year became severely endangered when Republican lawmakers realized that — with enough bad faith, cynicism and cartoon-villain shamelessness — $1.1 billion of its previously approved Congressional funding could simply be stripped away.
The vote to do so, after months of impassioned advocacy from groups like Protect My Public Media, took place on July 17th. If either of our audiophile senators wanted to avoid gutting funding for the makers of North Carolina's most beautiful music program, they didn't show it. They voted, along with all but two Senate Republicans, to rescind the funding. In response, the CPB (which has existed since 1967) announced last Friday that it will begin winding down operations immediately, and cease to exist in January of next year.
In email responses to constituents concerned about the defunding, Tillis wrote: "Commercial broadcasters now offer quality educational, world and local news, and entertainment programming. Given this new landscape, we must find economically-sound solutions and do not impose any additional burdens on the taxpayers."
As can be easily ascertained by anyone who isn't in the business of willfully ignoring facts and common sense out of subservience to their corporate overlords, there is no "commercial broadcaster" offering a show like Shaped By Sound, because commercial broadcasters have to make money, and shows like Shaped By Sound do not do that. And yet there are still many of us — and I know this is a difficult concept in Trump's America — who believe they are still worth making anyway.
While Shaped By Sound is not directly funded by the CPB — its first season, and a second one now in production, were funded by a grant from the NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources — Tillis and Budd's cuts will impact content production across all of PBS NC (not to mention at other public cultural outlets, like WUNC/WUNC Music, which will lose $800,000 annually). Whether or not a Season 3 of the show will be possible, like most things in public media right now, remains up in the air.
In striking another devastating blow to the Woke Liberal agenda, it seems devoted music lovers Tillis and Budd may have cut off their nose to spite their face. Sure, one can only imagine how pointless they consider PBS NC programming like "Black Issues Forum" — but... don't they love music? Wasn't that the whole imaginary premise introduced at the top of this thing?
In May, MAGA country singer John Rich took to the White Power social media site to post a terrible little song that mercilessly drags Senator Tillis, repeatedly referring to him as "thomb" (and saying he's been "wrong, wrong, wrong").
Maybe a version from North Carolina — and, frankly, one that is less shitty — should be next.
Ryan Cocca is the founder/editor of Super Empty, a former furniture entrepreneur, and just a humble chicken farmer. He (I) can be reached at ryan@superempty.com.