Recommendations of the Editorial team
Tom Waits’ first new original music in 15 years is called “Boots on the Ground” – a visually powerful, cruel reckoning with wars abroad and at home, recorded together with Massive Attack (and also their first new music since 2020). Waits castigates soldiers who hunt people deemed “brown, mean and young, dumb and full of cum,” saving his harshest anger for the senators who send them into action. “Now who the hell are these federal pricks? … air-conditioned fuckstick loafers, sittin’ in a room full of army posters,” he asks about halfway through the song, which plods along at a bluesy pace with Massive Attack’s signature brooding atmospheres. It all leads to the eerie refrain: “Boots on the ground, boots on the ground.” Waits’ son Casey also appears as a vocalist on the track.
The song was released on streaming platforms on Thursday, accompanied by a music video designed by Massive Attack and showing images by the American photo artist thefinaleye. “This montage work portrays a momentous American era that has yet to be named, and was created in the wake of the largest public protests in U.S. history against ICE raids, domestic militarization of security forces, and state authoritarianism,” reads the video description, which includes links to various U.S. organizations that support immigrants. The song will later be released as a 12-inch – available for pre-order now – with “Boots on the Ground” on one side and a spoken word piece by Waits, “The Fly”, on the other. Proceeds from the 12-inch will benefit the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) and the Immigrant Defense Project.
“Many years ago, I accepted an invitation from Massive Attack to work together,” Waits said in a statement. “Their long release delay has never troubled me. Today, as in all of humanity’s yesterdays, it guarantees that this type of song will never go out of style. The madhouse of human missteps is a feast for flies. Therefore, the B-side of Massive Attack’s upcoming 12-inch ‘The Fly’ honors my appreciation for this winged troublemaker.”
Massive attack on chaos
“It’s an honor for our career to work with an artist of Tom’s stature, originality and integrity, but this track arrives in an atmosphere of chaos,” said Massive Attack. “Across the Western Hemisphere, state authoritarianism and the militarization of police forces are once again merging with neo-fascist politics. In the context of American exceptionalism – both at home and abroad – this track contains impulses of cold ruthlessness and a forsaken mind.”
On Friday, Massive Attack will release a spoken-word piece based on the writings of Omar El Akkad, whose novels include “American War” and “What Strange Paradise” and whose “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This,” which Massive Attack calls a “nonfiction masterpiece.”
The song marks Waits’ first music release since his 2011 album “Bad as Me” – in recent years, the roughneck poet has devoted much of his creative energy to acting. The throaty, raucous singer-songwriter will play John Malkovich’s brother in director Martin McDonagh’s upcoming film Wild Horse Nine.
Waits and Massive Attack as activists
A protest song like “Boots on the Ground” reflects the activism of both sides in recent years. Massive Attack have taken an unequivocal stance against Israel’s war against Hamas, and the group’s Robert Del Naja was among 500 protesters arrested in London on Saturday at an action in support of the group Palestine Action. The Brits also teamed up with Fontaines DC for an EP in 2023, the proceeds of which went to Doctors Without Borders’ emergency relief operations in Gaza.
In 2017, Waits granted street artist Banksy the right to use an instrumental version of his 1987 song “Innocent When You Dream” for his Walled-Off Hotel installation in the West Bank. “On the 100th anniversary of the former British colonization of Palestine and its devastating consequences, Banksy has combined opulence and dystopia with his desire to make visible the everyday life and art of Palestinians,” Waits’ social media said at the time. “The Irish are no strangers to suffering and division, and Waits chose this Irish-tinged waltz for its lyrical, wistful mix of regret and the dream of a world without walls.” He also sang about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in “Road to Peace” in 2006.
