Toni Morrison once famously said to a friend: "This is precisely the time when artists go to work ... not when everything is fine, but in times of dread. That’s our job."
When you put it that way, Jesse Welles has definitely gone to work. Welles most recently performed in Iowa at the Val Air Ballroom Aug. 19, appearing shirtless and with no shoes, where he played songs from his newest album, Masks Off.
As you might have expected, the album gets started with two overly political songs: the title track and a song called "The Ballad of Big Balls." Welles makes his feelings (about a lot of different subjects) pretty clear on both. "The songs really speak for themselves," he said.
The third track on the album, "Everything Must Die," is a little more open to interpretation, and Welles acknowledges he's "probably singing to (himself)." "How does it feel to be free?" asked Welles, when talking about the song.
"What does it mean, and what does it feel like to finally get what you thought you had wanted? I don't think that's an uncommon theme or trope in really any art. 'Everything Must Die' is my take on that."
Things are much less open to interpretation on "Join ICE," which appears later on the album, and which went viral in the fall after Welles performed the song on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. It's another song that "speaks for itself," as Welles would say:
"I was familiar with that psyche, the psychology behind the men that would be compelled to join an operation like ICE," said Welles. "As really anybody who goes to public high school is, or anybody who grows up with humans. We all know about little men."
Welles is no stranger to viral moments. He's been putting his music on social media for years, in many cases before the songs appear on an album.
"That's how you get music out today, and that's how I like to do it," said Welles. "You are completely unencumbered by a label, by even management, by anything else. You have a direct pipeline to the people. You can talk with your peers this way, start conversations this way, make a place for people to have a conversation about issues. Really what you're doing is watching me, in real-time, make sense of the world around me."
After a pretty jam-packed August, Welles only has a few shows happening in September, including his second appearance in Farm Aid. For Welles, supporting farmers is something he feels "compelled" to do because of his Arkansas roots.
"The middle of America is where I'm from. These are (the) surroundings that I grew up in," said Welles. "I sang a tune last night called 'See Arkansas,' (which is) about growing up in the poverty of Arkansas. (But if) you sing in different states across the Midwest, you realize it doesn't have to be 'See Arkansas.' It could be 'See Oklahoma,' it could be 'See Missouri, 'See Nebraska,' 'See Iowa.' This is my context. This is where I exist, mentally and sometimes physically. I see no separation or any kind of delineation between what I'm thinking about over here. The lines are imaginary."
After Farm Aid, Jesse Welles will hit the road again in October. If you missed his show at the Val Air Ballroom, the closest he's going to be to Iowa this fall is Chicago on Oct. 17, but you'll have to look in the resale market for tickets — the show is already sold out. All of his music (released on his own label, of course) is available at his website and Bandcamp, and also on streaming services. Finally, be sure you're following Welles on Instagram and/or TikTok. You never know when you're going to hear his next song!