Ambassador for Humanity
The Colombian musician Alais Clay puts herself on the line with uncomfortable political themes that her German colleagues so often duck away from.
Again and again it shows: the songs that would in the truest sense of the word be necessary are not being written. Or they never even reach our awareness, because they get cancelled, find no forum. And so German-language songwriting has in recent years become an art of anxiously avoiding the truly important themes.
Fortunately, though, a kind of small Gaulish village has by now formed around the guitarist and songwriter Jens Fischer Rodrian and his wife Alexa, a cell of artistically high-calibre resistance. Just as gratifying: the lamentable development we have had to observe in Germany is not happening in the same way everywhere in the world.
While visiting an international cultural festival in Mexico, Fischer Rodrian and his companions Nicolas Riedl and Tom-Oliver Regenauer made inspiring contacts, so that they can now report on a lively international movement of politically committed art. One of their “discoveries” is the Colombian Alais Clay, who produces high-quality videos with mostly spoken, illuminating texts on explosive topics. Her song “Propaganda Overload”, which the author presents here, refers above all to the Corona lies that are not unknown in Germany either. The song shows that clever people all over the world, and independently of one another, can arrive at similar thoughts.
Travel opens the eyes and the heart. Travel helps you understand. Travel – open in all directions.
That is how it went for me over the past ten months, in which I had the good fortune, on my travels, to have inspiring encounters with very special musicians.
On my way to Greece I had often played in the street – as I did in Kalamata, where a music teacher who listened to me for a while invited me into a Greek tavern. A trio was playing there – from midnight until 5:00 in the morning. What an experience: five hours of live music of the finest kind – non stop. If someone in the trio had to go to the toilet, the others kept playing. There were no breaks. Old and young sang, danced, laughed, ate delicacies from the local cuisine and drank Greek wine.
Rarely has it become so vividly clear to me how thoroughly we Germans have had our songs taken from us. We no longer cultivate folk music. Folk songs that everyone knows barely exist any more. They carry the foul whiff of the national, in the worst case of the ethnic-nationalist.
In Greece they do not have this problem. Nor do they in other countries. A friend of mine once sat, many years ago, at a campfire in Portugal, together with travellers from various countries. Each sang a song from his homeland. When it was his turn, he could not think of anything that would fit.
That evening in the Greek bar left a lasting impression on me, above all because of its cultural authenticity – and that on many levels. Food, music, Greek hospitality – nothing felt contrived. All of it served not the business of tourism, but an inherent feeling of togetherness – a generous, matter-of-course sharing.
A few months later I was in Mexico with Nicolas Riedl and Tom-Oliver Regenauer at the congress THE PEOPLE’S RESET. In the Manova report Nicht meckern, machen! you can learn a little more about the trip. Both on the way to Morelia and at the congress itself, hospitality was constantly palpable – much as it had been in Greece a few months earlier.
Besides the many talks and workshops, the event also featured exhibitors and magnificent musicians on site. One of them is Alais Clay. She and her colleagues Sol Disciple, Prezence, Dub FX and others shaped the evening programme. Not only the artists’ solo performances, but also the warm sense of togetherness once more proved impressively how connecting art can be. They invited one another onto the stage and supported each other. Another highlight: Alais Clay can also be seen in a short interview in the accompanying Manova report on the event mentioned above.
The Colombian musician, who by now lives in the USA, articulates in some of her songs many of the themes that have preoccupied us for years: the pharmaceutical industry, the military-industrial complex, geoengineering, propaganda – again and again she takes up in her art everything that many stars of her genre shy away from.
That is precisely why the song Propaganda Overload – her statement on all the Corona lies – also cast its spell over me.
Who was there, then, in the so disappointing hip-hop genre, who opened their mouth? B-LASH, Kianush, Bustek, Lapaz, the guys from RAPBELLIONS – and … right, there really was not very much more.
Alais began pressing her finger into the wound long before Corona, for example in 2016 with Deadly Rain. But the so important spiritual approach is also part of her personal and musical journey, as she sang in the duet Wake up with Chances R Good in 2025. The theme of peace and freedom always resonates alongside – as it does in the following song, which I would still like to present here: Shape Up featuring Freedom Movement.
You share this one experience, whether you were in Germany, Greece or Mexico. Experiences that brought you to the edge of despair, yet also opened your eyes. Corona washed a great deal to the surface that some, however, had already been aware of beforehand.
Artists like Alais Clay know that the decentralised path is part of the solution – away from state institutions, NGOs, tech companies and Silicon Valley – towards the connections that endure. Events like “THE PEOPLE’S RESET” bring together people who are ready to go new ways and to network in a decentralised manner.
And so it came about that Alais will be part of the fourth “Protestnoten” album, which will be released in the autumn of 2026. Together with Alexa Rodrian we will record a song and additionally present one of her tracks.
The artists who have committed to the album stand in solidarity with the authors and journalists sanctioned by the EU. Of course, for someone like Alais – she made this unmistakably clear in our conversation – the alternative media scene is essential when it comes to access to information and to investigative journalism in general. The mainstream media are failing not only in Germany; the phenomenon exists in the USA, where Alais lives, just the same. Whether it concerns the Greater Israel fantasies of the Netanyahu government, the genocide in Gaza, the war in Iran that violates international law, the one-sided reporting regarding the war in Ukraine, or a serious reckoning in the Epstein case – the bought-and-paid-for corporate media have become completely worthless. The new, independent media, by contrast, are gaining more and more relevance, influence and reach.
Already today a large part of people inform themselves outside the mainstream bubble and follow podcasters and investigative journalists worldwide. To lend this particular emphasis, the artists whom we will present in one of the next issues of “Friedensnoten” will actively take part.
Alais Clay is one of those artists you ought to remember. Woman power in the best possible form – not with a cramped distancing from her male colleagues, but again and again with duets on equal footing, whether with Prezence, Dub Fx or Chances R Good – or now with us.
Art as it should be: relevant, topical and poetic – with heart and soul, without borders in the mind. You go Alais!
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