News: Devo

Sterling work from BBC Radio 4 this morning as interviewer Colin Paterson asked Gerald Casale of new wave legends DEVO for his thoughts on ‘devo max’ in Scotland.

‘Devo max’ means granting Scottish government fiscal control over all taxation levied in Scotland, and is one of the ‘compromise’ measures currently being touted as an alternative to the country’s secession from the Union.

However, Casale — whose own group, as Paterson reminds us, took their name from a “belief that mankind was in a state of genetic and cultural devolution” — was sceptical about the freedoms such a solution might have to offer.

“Devo max certainly sounds like a nice marketing term,” he said. “It sounds positive like maxi pads, like it’s really gonna take care of all the dripping and goo, it’ll clean that up — devo max. And I understand what it’s about is having political independence without really having full independence, having control over your local economic destiny. And decision making, somewhat like our states in the US where they have autonomy over a number of things, but they belong to the United States of America, which are not so united.

“It seems that devo max offers offers you that chance to feel free, where your cage got bigger and maybe you can’t see the bars when you travel. It’s the perfect compromise in a modern corporate world.

“You can watch what’s going on around the world both economically and environmentally with resources, were reaching that critical point with 7bn people on the planet, there’s big problems, just about allocating resources and feeding this parasitic organism that’s taken over the planet known as human beings.”

Oh dear. He’s got a point, hasn’t he?

Casale then went on to suggest a campaign version of his band’s song ‘Jocko Homo’ be drafted with lyrics that run: “they tell us that we can’t go free to control our own destiny / I say it’s all hype-ocrisy / are we not Scots? / we’re devo max / are we not Welsh? / d-evo max”.

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