Music

These days, the rock scene is low on mysterious figures. As the music has lost its countercultural edge, many of its champions have transformed into average celebrities, happy to speak into any microphone that wanders by. That's not true of Zack de la Rocha — The Rage Against the Machine vocalist is the rare rock star who keeps his distance from the hype.

De la Rocha is as famous for his radical politics as for incendiary poetics. Between his retirement from Rage in 2000 and his recent reunion with the band, he's limited his public appearances to the occasional rally or benefit show. His musical output has been spare too: Only a few songs have seen light.

But this summer, the 38-year-old Southern California native is back and seemingly unstoppable. He has a new musical project: One Day as a Lion, which pairs him with drummer Jon Theodore. One Day as a Lion's self-titled debut EP, on Anti Records, hit No. 28 on the Billboard charts with minimal media attention and is gaining traction nationally on rock radio. A full release will come in the fall.

How did One Day as a Lion come about?

I've known Jon for several years now, and I saw some of his first performances as a member of the Mars Volta. It was clear that music in L.A. was never going to be the same now that he was here! I've worked with some great drummers, but I hadn't seen drumming like that in a long time. So I immediately felt compelled to ... pick his brain and find out what kind of music he was interested in.

The first single is called "Wild International." That implies global politics from the get-go. How does your work fit into that scenario?

I'm speaking toward a deeper sentiment that I feel and I know a lot of people feel. Most of the songs have to do with redemptive moments that come in the face of some real indignity. And that's the current that I'm trying to tap into, because I think that for a lot of people — for the real participants who've been left out of the debate, who live in the shadows and work at car washes and are forced to cross the border and are struggling and facing the real economic consequences — they're often left out of the debate, on the right and the left, because of the language they speak or even the terminology that they use. They're out working every day, facing the real consequences of living in this country.

On the surface, some of these new songs seem very anti-religious, including the single.

I don't see it as an anti-religious song. I see it as the West has been using Christianity as a way to justify its actions when in reality, those figures, Christ and Muhammad, were rebels. These two religious figures have been co-opted to justify power, although they fought against the abuses of power and the expansion of empire. It's almost like, what would Christ and Muhammad do?

What do you think of the state of political art now? Sometimes it seems to have really died down, what with a mainstream full of teen pop and reality TV.

I'm listening to things all the time. There have been eight years of the Bush administration and the decline of real wages, and people are responding. It's unfortunate that more conscious artists or political artists in general haven't been heard in the mainstream. But I think back to when I was going to hard-core shows and I saw the Bad Brains, those moments resonate and are life-altering moments. Those people who were at those shows have become artists or activists as a result of having their perspective shifted. ... So I don't necessarily feel that music within the mainstream is always an indication of the political frustrations that exist beneath the surface.

How do those two elements of your own life — activism and music-making — intersect or diverge now?

I don't think the separation is valid, especially in these times. ...

Participating in the Son Jarochos work (his activist work with urban farmers in South Central Los Angeles, which included playing folk music with the group Son de Madera) felt more community-based, more collective. I was part of a collective voice and not on my own as an artist, and something about that attracted me.

It's an election year here in the U.S. Did that factor into your decision to debut new music now?

I'd be lying if I said it was coincidental. I think that it's an interesting moment. The lowest approval rating in the history of any presidency — and for Congress. There's this interesting rupture developing, and I think it's a healthy one.

Now more than ever, there's a more fertile ground for artists to try to reveal the nature of both parties, who are mainly the public relations team for transnational corporations.

You've been touring with Rage again. What is your relationship like with those guys now?

So much has changed. When you get older, you look back on tensions and grievances and have another perspective on it. I think our relationship now is better than it's ever been. I would even describe it as great. We're going to keep playing shows — we have a couple of big ones happening in front of both conventions. As far as us recording music in the future, I don't know where we all fit with that. We've all embraced each other's projects and support them, and that's great.

Can we look forward to some live Lion gigs in the near future?

Definitely. I've always hoped that a project I was involved in could be a little more spontaneous, set up on a block and play. Me and Jon see eye to eye on doing that.