The essence of punk is not a haircut or a pair of trousers or anything like that. It’s an attitude. A do ityo

Faith from his 2008 album Mr Love & Justice, which is not about faith in a higher spiritual being.

“It’s about my faith in the ability of the audience to change the world. People tell me it moves them to tears. I’m like, ‘Good. I’m glad to hear that mate.’ It’s very easy to make people cry by hurting them. But to make people cry just from emotion… that’s really something special. I always give them a hug if they say they’ve been moved to tears because my favourite music has that effect on me.”

For Bragg, it was The Clash that famously had the biggest effect on him. He first saw them on their White Riot tour in 1977 and again the following year at the Rock Against Racism concert in Hackney, London. He describes this as “a watershed moment”.

“The thing that gave me the courage of my convictions that day wasn’t actually The Clash. The Clash got me there. But the thing that made me feel that I needed to step up was the 100,000 kids just like me in the audience,” he remembers. “I saw them and realised that discrimination of all kinds was going to be the issue that defined my generation. Like, the Vietnam war defined the previous generation. We were going to be opposed to discrimination of all kinds. They were the battles that we would fight. It wasn’t The Clash specifically that said that or told me that. They inspired me to understand that. But it was being in that audience. Being in the crowd was the most powerful thing. It sent me out with a different perspective.”

The solidarity he felt between himself, the 99,999 other people in Victoria Park that day and the importance of the cause inspired him to pick up a guitar and turn the poetry he’d been writing into songs.

“I’d been writing since I was about 12. I wrote a poem at school that the teacher liked so much he wrote to my parents to ask if we had a poetry book at home that I copied it out of,” he laughs.

“I was writing songs before I could play the guitar. Keeping the tunes in my head. What happened with seeing The Clash was that I realised I didn’t need someone to come and discover me. I didn’t need permission to be a performer. It was down to me to go and do it. That’s the great thing about punk. The essence of punk is not a haircut or a pair of trousers or anything like that. It’s an attitude. A do-it-yourself attitude. An attitude that says, ‘if you want to do this, then go and do it’. It’s that attitude that I got from punk and it served me well all these years. I’m still motivated by that idea.”

He’s good company, Billy Bragg. Quick with a laugh and full of incredible stories from his days

Book: Billy Bragg’s New Zealand tour starts in Wellington on February 17. For ticket info visit billybragg.co.uk on the frontline of the punk rock revolution where he was in the trenches with nothing more than his cheap electric guitar and angry songs about politics and beautiful songs of love.

It was an exciting time for music. Full of great ideas and powerful songs about kicking it all down and bringing about change. It has to be disappointing then, to look back now and see that his generation didn’t fulfil those ideals. That the world remains unchanged.

“Oh, the world has changed,” he counters. “Ten years before punk you could get put in prison for being gay. Now, gay people can get married. So the world has changed. But music hasn’t done it. One of the things I’ve learnt since I saw The Clash is that music can’t change the world. They told me it could. And they thought it could. And I thought it could. But I came to realise that music can’t change the world over the years. I’m glad because it’s allowed me to be honest with people and say, ‘look, I’m not here to change the world. That’s not my job. It’s your job.’”

He pauses, then grins and says, “People say to me after the show, ‘Bill, keep doing what you’re doing, mate’. I’m like, ‘I did. You just saw me do it! That’s it. I’ve done my bit. What about your bit now, mate?’”

Then he gets serious and says, “People don’t like to hear that music can’t change the world. It’d be great if it could. I’d love to say it could. It would absolve the listener of so much responsibility. But that’s not been my experience. That doesn’t mean I don’t try to give people the idea that the world can be changed.”

He’s spent decades as a true believer, fighting for that change. And when he realised he couldn’t, that music alone couldn’t, he didn’t throw in the towel. Instead, he shifted that belief to his listeners, writing I Keep Faith and believing in his audience to pick up what he was putting down. By connecting on an emotional and meaningful level he believes he can open your eyes by connecting your ears with your heart or your mind. To inspire you to become the change agent.

“I’m trying to find that place every night,” he says. “To send people home having had that emotional experience. The power music has is not the power to change the world. The power that music has is to make you believe that the world can be changed.”

Then Bragg says, “Ultimately it’s your responsibility to do that. To take that from the music.”

Next month he’ll be doing his bit. From there? Well, it’s up to you.

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