The line “If I can’t dance, it’s not my revolution” is truer than ever in Ana Tijoux’s latest single, “Antifa Dance.” Released on Friday, ahead of her upcoming album by the same name, the Chilean rapper’s song stands against the system, in a time when black, brown and working-class communities continue to be faced with inequality. This would be her latest album since Vengo, which was released in 2014.
The visual for the single features Tijoux in a dark underground metal and neon realm surrounded by youth, people with masks, and others dancing and painting graffiti. “If you touch one, you touch all,” she raps. The visual also features a bold vogue choreography by Chilean synth-pop singer and dancer Alex Anwandter.
Over the past four years, the word “Antifa” and those who associate with it have been placed under a microscope during the Trump presidency. “Antifa” means, “antifascist,” as Tijoux says in the song: “Antifascista, internacionalista, anti-colonialista, contra dominación.”
“A few years ago, it was unthinkable to reassess the word fascism,” Tijoux said in a press release, “Facing authoritarianism, unrelenting hatred for the other, we again return to art, with all its force. Art that is charged with music and color. Art that responds in dance, an organized movement of beautiful rebellion. This is why we decided to make a danceable album. It is our profound belief that from pain, the purest act of love and resistance is born.”
More than an indictment of the system, the song is an ode to the sub-culture and los de abajo—which Tijoux always pays homage to in honest ways.
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Amanda Alcántara is the Digital Media Editor at Futuro Media. She tweets from @YoSoy_Amanda.
