Photo Credit: Stefan Brending
YUNGBLUD is the moniker of 19 year old English alt-rock musician Dominic Harrison. He recently released his full length debut album, 21st Century Liability. The album is full of protest songs written from the youth perspective.
One of the more potent tunes off of the album is “Machine Gun (F**k the NRA)”. It analyses the stigma of mental illness and how easy it is for the mentally ill to obtain guns.
The song also links the desire of notoriety as a motive for mass shooting, which is highlighted with the lyric “You’re making me famous.” This is one reason many gun violence activists are now pushing the media not to publish the name of mass shooters.
As long as there is a lack of funding for mental health and as long as you have powerful lobby groups like the NRA who oppose efforts to make it harder for the wrong person to purchase guns, these issues will still exist. Fortunately there is an increase in young voices who are now pushing for change.