Deliciously experimental in its instrumental and mixing layers, ANT ENOCH’s latest delivery is a bitter reflection on our work-home-sleep culture. As per the short bio on his Spotify profile, ENOCH’s songs are “anthems for crying on the dance floor” and this tune is no different. Drawing obvious comparisons to the lyrics of Dolly Parton’s classic, “9INE to 5IVE” could not be more different, though. Positioning itself much further on the nine-to-five spectrum, it is meant as a song for a generation exhausted by the office hours.
The sense of extreme frustration, in the musical layer of the song, is accentuated by the continuously distorted vocals and an exaggerated drum kit, processed with echoing sound effects. As if suffocating and drowning our existence, both at the same time. Practically a protest song, a cry for help sung for an entire generation of completely tired individuals, “9INE to 5IVE” brings images of street rallies organised to fight against the social status quo. But how can you fight if, at the end of the working day, you cannot even keep your eyes open from exhaustion?
ANT ENOCH does not provide ideas or, thankfully, any solutions to the issue at hand, as this is not the purpose of song-writing. Instead, he provokes us to visualise a society on the verge of a collective burnout. Oscillating between resignation and rebellion, I have personally been left with an image of a crowd made up of office zombies. Too tired to protest, and too tired to live a normal life.
This three-minute-long warning and a reminder to contemplate our present state makes its case fightingly real and contemporary. It is a brilliantly designed wake up call. Will you get up and do something about it, though, or will you press the ‘snooze’ button for five more minutes of a much needed sleep?
Photo: Press release
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