Given the current geo-political context, Mary Ocher’s new album, The West Against the People, coming up in March on Klangbad, might be more relevant than we’d like, and its second single “Arms” is already quite something.

Watch the video that candidly shows frolicsome youths carrying arms; you might feel scared, but you will also feel empathy. What world and values are we passing on to the next generations?

And while we still have the comfort of our homes and electricity to power our laptops, listen to the ten remixes of the track. Proceeds will be given to a Berlin NGO helping war asylum seekers should you choose to download them.

Mary gave carte blanche for the remixes, special mention to the ones by Autist and by Peter Kirn who has a few words for us, “I found myself repeatedly listening to the a cappella of the vocal from “Arms”. It’s just magical and moving — there’s this real fragile power to it, and it’s harmonically beautiful. So I wound up playing out this improvised ostinato with it, and that’s how the remix came about. It’s nice to hear the compilation; it’s such a lovely melody that I’m more than happy to listen to a bunch of remixes back to back.”

You can find the remixes on https://maryocher.bandcamp.com

And to finish, the first track and video out of the album, the hypnotic “The Endlessness (Song for Young Xenophobes)”.