Mark Garvey doesn’t do subtle, and “Truck Fump” proves it on every level. The St Albans artist works entirely solo out of a shed, writing, recording, and producing everything himself, and this one is a full-on anti-Trump tirade, part punk-rock protest, part grunge outburst, aimed directly at what Garvey sees as the world’s most powerful clown. It’s another dirty corner of his third album, “Blue Bone,” and true to form for an artist who gets stuffed into the “grunge revival” and “alternative rock” pigeonholes without ever quite fitting either one cleanly, the song makes zero effort to find common ground or soften its message for anyone uncomfortable with it.
Listening to this song is as depressing as it is rage-inducing because I am still in disbelief that such an incompetent and evil person is in charge of the most powerful country in the world. That’s the exact space “Truck Fump” is built to sit in, an ugly, gloves-off attack with no interest in nuance, delivered with the kind of garage-rock urgency that makes the anger feel earned rather than performative. There’s something almost admirable about how unwilling Garvey is to hedge here; whatever side of the politics a listener falls on, the conviction behind the delivery is impossible to miss.
What makes Garvey’s whole approach even stranger is the process behind it: this track, like the rest of his catalogue, was built entirely inside Adobe Premiere Pro, video editing software rather than anything designed for music. It’s a fittingly DIY, against-the-grain method for an artist who treats every song as a multimedia project rather than just something for your headphones. “Truck Fump” isn’t aiming to change anyone’s mind so much as give people already furious about the state of things somewhere to put that energy, and it does exactly what it sets out to do.
