Subcultures battle political fires
By Grace Esquibel, April 21, 2026
Music is heavily influenced by the political state of the world. If there’s one thing that’s true, creatives, including musicians, don’t stay quiet – and neither do I.
As a loyal concertgoer who has attended about 15 shows and festivals over the past two years, I take pride in being a part of the alternative subculture that stands for basic human rights. These communities fall under an umbrella of genres that include goth, punk, indie and even soul. Nearly every concert I have attended since President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January 2025 has had a sentiment along the lines of “F*** ICE.” Sextile, a goth electronic band performed at the Novo in Los Angeles and started off the show by waving a flag that said, “No one is free until everyone is free” to their song “Resist” with lyrics that challenge the government like, “I can learn to close my eyes to anything but injustice.” The band has also performed for LA fights back, a benefit concert series that raised $52,688 for the Coalition for Human Immigrant Rights LA. Another show in Riverside at the Mucho Gusto music festival, showcased many Inland Empire and surrounding area Latinx bands and musicians. I was specifically excited to see Brainstory because they have this unique psychedelic soul sound.
In between the jazzy low-fi beats lead singer Kevin Martin started a chant yelling, “When I say f***, you say Donald Trump.”
While the most recent show I attended at Sid the Cat Auditorium in Pasadena featured a five-band lineup under the Eternal Love theme, which included heart photobooth ops and music highlighting themes of love, the headliner Deceits played their post-punk songs that include Spanish lyrics and stopped the show midway to throw a piñata in the shape and looks of Trump.
The crowd annihilated that piñata; moshing over it and around it, tearing its limbs off and hurling it to the middle of the crowd. The Mexican candy went flying, and the crowd grabbed the remains like little kids at a birthday party.
These brief moments, whether before the set or between the next song, always, without a doubt, get the crowd riled up. The current political ruin of society ignites the need for community, prompting many organizers and bands to create spaces that welcome people of all cultural backgrounds, especially Latinx who have been a target to ICE raids taking place in major cities throughout the United States. Evan Ware, the music department chair and an associate professor at Cal Poly Pomona, has attended shows throughout Canada, Japan and the U.S. Although he noticed the differences in the communities, he was also made aware of the way music intersects across all cultures. He explained he would much rather listen to music live in a group setting to get the real lived experience.
“There’s nothing better,” Ware said. According to a 2023 study, physical concert presence was proven to offer the best music experience with not only the ability to absorb the music but form strong bonds with the crowd as opposed to recordings of songs on a musical platform or live stream.
“We live in ‘imagined communities,’” Ware said. “We never encounter in the flesh, and we connect over a medium that’s actually pretty weak in terms of human expression.”
This empty perception of community is the consequence of an era consumed by social media. Real community is in the spaces people with common interests, morals and values go to fulfill that desire to interact and connect. In this case, that includes listening and dancing to live music performances as a release or act of protest. I do not believe it is possible to identify as a conservative and an “alternative,” which is a group on the outside of mainstream society norms with similar music preferences, appearances and values. These two things cannot be true at the same time because of their polarizing definitions. Conservativism refers to the preservation of American founding fathers’ ideals and Western civilization. The two values and morals do not align, at all.
I am aware of the punk skinhead movement but refuse to believe it follows original core punk values that surfaced in the United Kingdom in the mid-1970s. An established definition I think encapsulates punks came from the Black Flag band formed in the 1990s. They defined punk as a do-it-yourself attitude that rebelled against the elitist music industry and mainstream culture.
“Punk is an entire philosophy promoting freedom of the individual and working against conforming to the cookie-cutter form of existing we are told we must fit into,” said Alexander B. Wolke, author ofthe article “The philosophy of punk.” The movement was and remains on political grounds highlighting the counterculture I believe is resurfacing in its own ways across an array of genres within the alternative subculture. These groups stand for anti-capitalism, anti-fascist and other surrounding ideologies at their core; it is not just an aesthetic.
Currently not only punks resist against the inequalities of the economic, social and political state but also post-punk bands such as the Deceits who stated, “DECEITS believes in keeping the punk in post-punk!” on an Instagram post.
I think it is crucial artists use their platforms to bring attention to current events and issues. To not do this would be a disservice to the art of music. Music is persuasion. Music is political.
Abigail Brown, a music industry student and a vocalist in a post-hardcore band Selah, elaborated on the evolution of scenes like hardcore, punk and emo she has witnessed throughout the years of being an IE and LA concert goer.
“I do think music can be political,” Brown said. “A good musician has to take that and be able to spread that message correctly without just saying it as fluff.”
My generation has faced many challenges economically and politically. For example, inflation has caused economic disparities that have affected Generation Z. The Republican and Democratic party are at a constant fight instead of convening in a time of emerging war. And not to mention the release of the Epstein files has unveiled the secrets that lie beneath the elite class, according to the Huff Post.
Our communities, youth and adults, seek ways to express their protest. One of those outlets can be music, which entails concerts and a community of these subcultures uniting with similar morals and values.
In my personal experience of being a speck in the sea of different subcultures, I have found home in the punk, goth and indie communities. In goth culture the abnormal macabre is celebrated and despite the dark moody appearance of the aesthetic, the people are welcoming. In the indie culture the people are filled with childlike joy and crowd surf like it’s a sport.
All subcultures within the alternative community intersect under similar ideas that surround music. This is our form of protest. This is how we fight back.
Feature photo courtesy of Grace Esquibel