Single Review: MC16 - Polytechnic
Reviewed by Dan Barnes
This week, our good friends in MC16 released another track from a forthcoming album, in the shape of Polytechnic; a typically acerbic consideration of the once-respected institution of further learning, now becoming factories for conformity.
Opening with the trademark jangling guitar from Carson, along with his trenchant lyrical barbs, the band take aim at another of the country’s failing sacred cows. Just like previous tune, One from Another, Polytechnic flexes its musical muscles, moving through a fierce mid-section to a reggae-influenced chorus.
Rhythm section, Duffy and Quinn build the supporting foundations for such a muti-faceted sound, letting the guitars transition from clean to overdriven to Caribbean.
Lyrically, the song concerns itself with the push toward education – which is only ever a good thing – but the nefarious methods employed to part the unsuspecting from their money for worthless degrees. To educate is to enable folk to think critically for themselves; rather, as seems to be the case, regurgitate and priorities feelings over hard facts.
Sure, we’ve all been there. I remember getting leathered on a Tuesday night watching Therapy? in the Student Union and missing a lecture on Wednesday morning due to “being under the weather.” But, as much as we’d like to live the Student Life – both actually and theoretically – the real world comes a knocking and responsibility must be faced. Narcissism and political naivety being as incompatible as trying to balance work, home and family.
In the end, we’re all just consuming units, milked for all we’re worth and worked until we drop. The First Century Roman poet and satirist, Juvenal, warned of being distracted by Bread & Circuses [panem et circenses] and we need the education – either formal or informal – to be able to recognise that sleight of hand when it’s tried, and to stand against it.
I’ve been fortunate to get advanced access to MC16’s creative output in the run up to the oncoming full-length and, as big a fan of No Blood, No Guilt as I am, what Carson, Quinn and Duffy have been cooking up in their writing room and studio for the new record certainly whets the appetite for that release later this year.
