Bob Vylan is a grime punk duo who recently released their 2nd full-length album Bob Vylan Presents The Price Of Life.
Just like their 2020 debut album, We Live Here, the album features incisive political commentary addressing issues such as systemic racism and poverty. It features radical potent slogans such as ‘Wage war against the state’, ‘England’s fucking dead, let it burn’, and ‘Alexa, take me to prison’.
Among the album’s many highlights include the track “GDP” which is a poignant thesis on economic policies which benefits the rich but screws over the poor. It points out the lunacy of countries that base their economic growth on gross domestic products, especially when those figures can be bolstered by negative factors such as Russia’s war on Ukraine. This is highlighted in the lyrics: “Yeah, the BBC are talking ’bout the GDP. That means fuck all to me. I gotta eat. You know I gotta eat, right? … Cash rules everything around me that matters. So the purse strings are tighter than Thatcher’s.”
The lyrics continue to pull no punches with ““Let me make it clear: This wretched system isn’t playing fair,” and “I couldn’t give a fuck if this country hates me here, they stole our people, displaced and placed us here.”
Concerning the topics covered by this tune and the rest of the album, singer Bobby Vylan (not to be confused with the drummer Bobbie Vylan) made the following statement: “Money is a tool. It’s neither good nor bad. Unfortunately, there are some people that are using it for evil and to keep other people down.”