The Street - September 1989

Beyond the Heart

by: Jesse Nash and George Flowers (pages 26-27)

The release of Blind Man's Zoo (Elektra), the latest album from 10,000 Maniacs, finds the group continuing to address several important social issues with songs which raise our collective consciousness about such topics as single motherhood and corporate carelessness. The overall experience of Blind Man's Zoo is not only musical, it is educational and enlightening, a microscopic look at some of the many frailties and imperfections of the human condition

Natalie Merchant, lead vocalist and lyricist for the group, is responsible for much of the subject matter - and she's not afraid to speak her mind about it.

Merchant says there are a lot of things that "disturb" her. She explains to THE STREET: "As a professional communicator. I feel it is my responsibility to write about the many social issues that affect our daily lives. There are so many situations around the world that need to be addressed. I feel it's important to make people aware. That's the least I can do as a public figure."

Although Natalie Merchant doesn't consider herself "political" many of the issues she addresses are powerfully political in nature.

To Merchant, politics involves the "governing body of the country, and what the elected officials do to make both national and international policy." Her songs, she insists, are merely, "influenced" by politics. "The way people act with one another and the way they treat themselves and how they treat their environment. I see it as more sociological - than political."

However, when called a crusader, Natalie is initially reticent, but she does eventually, give in. "I guess I am," she slowly admits. "People don't really want to be crusaders; they don't want to be evangelized. I certainly don't. But, as long as I disguise it in narratives and ballads, well, that's alright. Maybe people won't feel manipulated."

She has consistently written and sung about tough issues that have perplexed and enraged society: alcohol abuse, drug addiction and child abuse. On Blind Man's Zoo, Dust Bowl spotlights the plight of a woman who has been forced to support her family without the aid of a husband. "She works very hard, but can't make ends meet," explains Merchant. "I think that's something that a lot of people in this country can identify with."

Poison In The Well considers the problem of corporate negligence. "The song deals with the discovery of poison in the water system in a neighborhood similar to Love Canal in New York. Coincidentally, the song could be applied as well to the recent oil spill off the coast of Alaska."

Natalie Merchant and her band once played in West Virginia, "Where Union Carbide had a horrible leakage (four years before they performed) which killed a lot of people. We stayed in this hotel right across the street from the plant where the leakage occurred, and people were still talking about the compensation they were trying to receive. They talked about how this cloud descended over the entire city."

To Merchant, no matter who is responsible for the tragedy, it still affects the very essence of humankind. She puts life on the bottom line, not dollars. And asks, poignantly, "Is there any way that money can repair someone's lungs or return the sight of those Indian children who went blind that night? Or pay for the lives that were lost? Is there any way to pay for all the seals and birds and wildlife that died in the Alaska oil spill?" She answers her own questions with an emphatic, "No! Money is a poor substitute. We're talking about life. There's no price you can put on life, whether it be human life or animal life."

While Natalie Merchant respects all forms of life, she is not necessarily anti-abortion. Commenting on the abortion controversy, she takes a pro-choice stance. Merchant feels that women should have the legal right to an abortion and that the procedure should be affordable to all. "I don't like the idea of abortion. Infanticide - the killing of children after they are born - still takes place quite often. The Chinese used to throw their female children off cliffs in the old belief that having a boy resulted in great happiness and having a girl did not. Thank heaven, it's not like that anymore." she adds.

"I'm pro-choice, and my main interest is in preventing unwanted pregnancies - preventing unwanted births. There are certainly many cases where abortion is necessary to save the life of a mother. But I'm not really sure how I feel about the issue because of potential chromosome damage - if the child is to be born mentally retarded. I've worked with handicapped children and I've known the parents of handicapped children. They look at these children sometimes as a blessing. I don't know, whatever God is ... well. Some of these things I feel are God's choices."

Natalie Merchant is highly principled - and her principles clearly carry over into her work. Before Cat Stevens declared his support for the Ayatollah Khomeini's death threat against Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie, Merchant had recorded Stevens' Peace Train for In My Tribe. She was incensed by what she considers Stevens' "hypocritical remark," and emphatically declares that on any re-pressing of the album, the song will be removed. "We've made a vow never to sing the song again. It's not a form of censuring him either. We chose to record the song, and we can choose not to record it."

Is the socially conscious Natalie Merchant, who seeks to elevate the awareness of her listeners, as conscientious about the promotional efforts made on the group's behalf by her record label? "Oh, yes. We make sure that they are provided with photographs that we approve of," she explains. "We are involved in the videos we make. We're very specific about how we like to be represented. Usually, it's a compromise, or the decision goes to what we want. When it comes to how we're represented, we're very stubborn." She stresses that she and the group try to be cooperative, but notes that it can sometimes be frustrating. Peace Train is a good example:

"We liked the song, but we never wanted it to be the first single. The label encouraged it. It's a very naive song. I never thought the rest of the album was naive. I thought that my lyrics were taking an open-eyed look at the world, and I felt like Peace Train was this blissful, nostalgic step into this hippie optimism that I don't necessarily agree with. The most impressive thing about Peace Train is that the single flopped."