It speaks volumes that, even in the supposedly more enlightened modern Western world, something as basic as women’s rights is still a battleground. This age of equality, for many, is anything but. And, although written in the wake of the overturn of the historic Roe v. Wade ruling, a move by lawmakers in the USA that now severely limits women’s choices and freedoms, with the return of a Trump presidency, such issues are even more poignant, the two taken together potentially putting woman even more at risk, than ever.
A delicate subject requires a delicate approach, and that is precisely what we find here. “Lambs For The Slaughter” is woven from deftly applied textures of folk finesse and shimmering indie acoustica, ebbing and flowing between understatement and more urgent music, topped off with vocals that punch well above their sonic weight.
When we think of protest songs, we think of, perhaps, rabble-rousing calls to arms or Dylan’s early folk manifestos, but “Lambs For the Slaughter” is no less a song designed to seep into the public’s social consciousness, a song designed to make people think, to start a debate.
A song for herself, her daughters and granddaughters to come, and every woman living now or not yet born, Meghan Pulles has given us perhaps the most poignant and important song of the moment, a song about an issue that does nothing less than affects the rights and freedoms of half the global population.
Perhaps in the wake of such political gains from those who would seek to restrict and deny the rights of others, music will return to a place where it can be an essential part of the broad conversation once more, a rallying cry, a voice in the wilderness. Perhaps songs such as this will Make Art Great Again!
