This Week with David Rovics

Here's the podcast rendition of a guided tour of my upcoming album, In Our Dreams, wherein I share with you ten of the songs that will be part of the album, in the order I wrote them, with commentary.

As Israel continues its bombing campaign against Iran and Trump considers whether to join in, I witness intelligent-looking pundits with reasonable-sounding voices discuss matter-of-factly whether dropping massive amounts of bombs on the cradle of civilization again might make the world a more peaceful place this time around.

A song I originally wrote soon after the murder of Dr. George Tiller (May 31st, 2009), which we thought we'd put on the new album (2025). New instrumentation by Chet Gardiner, harmony vocals are Laura Love.

The reality is incomparably worse than the movie.

What's in a tweet?

As much of the US military heads in the direction of Iran, the fighters and bombers and destroyers are all armed with missiles made by 5 American corporations, otherwise known as the War Machine. Powerful remix from Chet and Laura, destined for the upcoming album.

Most recently the daily massacres of starving Palestinian children seeking small packets of flour are being carried out by drones and tanks. Haunting remix from Chet and Laura for the upcoming album.

In the wake of the killings of the Israeli diplomats in Washington, DC, and the bizarre press reports about antisemitism, I wrote this song. This is the version destined for the upcoming album, brilliantly transformed by Chet Gardiner and Laura Love.

All this talk of "coming to the table" after being bombed some more is just so crazy.

As my friends are trying to reach Gaza by sea and trying to gather at the border in Egypt, the Israelis are proceeding with their plan for the expulsion of any Palestinians who manage to survive Israel's famine, bombings and daily massacres. This is another brilliant remix from Chet and Laura.

Throughout 2024 and early 2025, in between writing songs and essays, touring and raising kids, a side project has been another memoir project. I declared it finished, and recorded the whole thing. The memoir is in the form of an audiobook. My Life as a Protest Singer is my third or fourth effort at writing a memoir.  This may seem ridiculous, but those who have engaged in the practice of memoir-writing know it's not.  There is so much to write about, and so much that will inevitably be left unwritten.  There are so many angles, so many approaches.  The vast majority of whatever it is will never make it in. The full production of My Life as a Protest Singer consists of 11 episodes of about an hour each, or about 11 hours of me wagging my jaw.  In its full 11 episodes it's available exclusively for members of my Community-Supported Art program.  Whether you're a paid member via my website or via Patreon, Substack, or Bandcamp, you've been given a link to my Everything folder.  It's in there, within the “Extras” folder.  If you're a CSA member and don't have the link to the Everything folder handy, just email me for it. What I have made available for free to the general public is the very abridged version, Selections from My Life as a Protest Singer, which is a 3-episode series. Starting with Selections from My Life as a Protest Singer EPISODE 1.

The song I wrote about recent events in Los Angeles, transformed by a chilling and very electric remix from Chet and Laura.

I spent an hour yesterday talking with Tom Walker, who was interviewing me for the Peace & Justice Report on WSLR community radio in Sarasota, Florida.

The final phase of the genocide involves daily massacres of Palestinians so driven to feed their families that they're ready to risk being shot by Israeli soldiers in order for a chance to get ahold of a little pasta.

Brilliantly rocking remix from Chet Gardiner and Laura Love of this song I wrote a few days ago about the horrific conditions in the Krome detention center in Florida -- which are a lot like the horrific conditions at so many other ICE facilities in this land of cruelty.

Among the various absurdities is Trump saying Los Angeles looked like "occupied territory." It is, of course -- since at least 1846. But he probably wouldn't get the irony.

The point, obviously -- and openly stated by our government officials -- is to make the USA such a terrible place to seek asylum that people would rather face torture or death or hunger at home, than to even try to leave.

Whether it stops the genocide or not, the upcoming album is going to be really good, full of remixes like this one just in from Chet Gardiner and Laura Love of my latest song, "Gunning Down Little Girls and Boys."

Every day since the US/Israeli mercenaries set up their fake aid distribution killing field, they have committed a massacre of starving children -- children who have been starved by those very same governments who are putting food parcels in their hands and bullets in their backs.  Was there something else in the news?

The Israeli regime has been telling us all along what's coming next: mass expulsion or death for everyone in Gaza. Do you believe them yet?

Israel has one company that makes the sorts of bunker-busting missiles that have been annihilating the population of Gaza for so many years (Elbit Systems).  The US has the rest of them, which provide Israel with most of its missiles, fighter jets, etc.  Otherwise known as the American war machine -- without which the genocide would not be possible.

The girl in the flames the world has been seeing over Memorial Day weekend actually survived the bombing of the classroom she was sleeping in, unlike the many other children and women and men who were burned alive, in that and other Israeli air strikes targeting children throughout Gaza, throughout the weekend.

I spoke at length with folks from Atlanta, Georgia for the What the Folk? show on WRFG Community Radio. Here's the whole show -- the interview segments as well as all the excellent song selections from various artists that comprise the rest of this wonderful two-hour radio show.

I'm very excited to announce that the brilliant Laura Love is contributing vocal harmony parts to tracks on my upcoming album, such as this one.  What these harmonies are adding to the impact of the songs is immeasurable, in my humble opinion.

In the Israeli military there is a popular expression.  They say the soldiers of the world's most moral army, as they call themselves, care so much about humanity -- even Palestinian humanity -- that they are all crying while they're shooting.  I'm quite certain the same is true for Elias Rodriguez as he shot the Israeli diplomats.

On my recent trip to BC I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Brian Charlton & Stephen Harvey for their Labour Beat radio show. We had a wide-ranging and downright fascinating conversation. The first 40 minutes of this episode represents Part 1.

When I was in BC recently I was interviewed at some length by Cornelius Lundsgaard for Hornby Island Community Radio.

When all is lost, all that's left is our dreams.

Another powerful and timely remix to the latest song I've recorded, from Chet Gardiner.

While EuroVision was getting the headlines, FalastinVision was where you could find the most relevant music.

Some thoughts on the silent majority.

There is a mythology so many of us grew up with, that because of the experience of the Nazi holocaust, Jews were generally a more moral people, as a whole, and no state run almost entirely by Jews could possibly do something like genocide another people. This mythology was wrong, and Gaza is the evidence.  

Chet added some musical touches to serve the song and turn up the intensity a notch.

Chet Gardiner has made some powerful improvements to the song, with various instruments.  The genocide of the people of Gaza is happening now, via famine and disease.  One thing you can do right now is share this song.  Songs can reach places the news stories don't.

The Israeli plan is to kill everyone in Gaza -- "to holocaust them," as Netanyahu's advisors say live on national TV, in Hebrew.

I had a good time chatting the other day with the hosts of the podcast, Unfinished Business with Paul & Rob. We talked about Gaza and music and other things.  The interview with me begins 12 minutes in.

A few thoughts from my recent travels in Canada and Denmark.

Entering the third month of Israel's total embargo on Gaza, the starvation has begun.

Americans Who Tell the Truth -- americanswhotellthetruth.org -- is a brilliant project that's been going for decades now, which involves portraits painted by Robert Shetterley of many wonderful people.  I was interviewed recently for the website by Constance Carter, AWTT's Director of Education, and the interview was so nicely edited that I thought I'd share it with you.

Do it well, and you might just grow a movement. Do it badly, and you can kill it in the bud.

Here's a little Earth Day preview of the sort of concert folks have in store coming right up in BC and Denmark...

Some of us were just going for the bread and circus, but when we went there, we found neither.

After our visit to Mexico, we spent several days in southern California and three weeks between England and Scotland.

Almost a month into Israel's complete blockade of food, water, medicine or anything else getting into the Gaza Strip, as the Israeli military orders mass evacuations of Palestinians to an unknown destination, here is Chet Gardiner's chilling remix of my most recent song about all of that.

The only groups that are actually trying to enforce international law when it comes to Israel's war crimes are organizations that are illegal in many western countries to say anything nice about, or you risk being considered a terrorist.

Normally the ruling elite is supposed to be able to distinguish between reality and their own propaganda, even if most of the commoners believe it. With the new administration, it appears that these people actually believe their own lies, and are actively setting up a whole regime based on them being true.

A song about what Kamala and I have been doing for the past several days in Mexico City.

As we wait to hear whether Mahmoud Khalil will be given a trial, be deported without one, sent to Guantanamo, or who knows what, here's Chet Gardiner's powerful remix of the song I just wrote.

ICE agents taking orders directly from the top and disappearing a student activist with no warrant, no due process, canceling his green card and holding him incommunicado in an unknown location, this is what's happening in the USA right now.

Some thoughts on that majority element of top-quintile US society that persistently refers to itself as "the middle class."

Another fab remix from Chet Gardiner, of a song that's at least as relevant as it was a few days ago, when I wrote it, after that meeting in the Oval Office.