The art of the protest song is not dead. Fiona Apple has a compelling one with her first new composition to be released in five years, “Pretrial (Let Her Go Home),” which turns a spotlight on the cause of women and especially Black mothers who are jailed without conviction because they can’t afford bail.
Apple released a music video for “Pretrial (Let Her Go Home),” although only her hands appear in it, playing percussion, along with the briefest appearance orf her face popping into frame. Instead, the video is filled with still images or video clips of hundreds of women who have languished in jail in a cash-bail system that Apple contends results in rampant, systemic injustice. It also includes some of the singer’s written information about the cause, after years of serving as a volunteer “court watcher,” and links where viewers can take action.
It’s the first original track Apple has released since “Fetch the Bolt Cutters” became one of the most acclaimed albums of 2020. In the interim she has not been altogether silent, having recorded a few songs written by others, including a Bear McCreary-penned “Rings of Power” theme song. Most recently, her cover of “Heart of Gold” was released as the title song of an all-star Neil Young tribute album last month.
In a statement, Apple explained: “I was a court watcher for over two years. In that time, I took notes on thousands of bond hearings. Time and time again, I listened as people were taken away and put in jail, for no other reason than that they couldn’t afford to buy their way free. It was particularly hard to hear mothers and caretakers get taken away from the people who depend on them. For the past five years, I have been volunteering with the Free Black Mamas DMV bailout, and I have been lucky to be able to witness the stories of women who fought for and won their freedom with the tireless and loving support of the leadership. I hope that this song, and the images shared with me, can help to show what is at stake when someone is kept in pretrial detention. I give this song in friendship and respect to all who have experienced the pain of pretrial detention and to the women of the group’s leadership who have taught me so much and whom I truly love.”
The video for the song, produced by Zealous and Special Operations Studio, features the stories of women who have been separated from their families due to not being able to make bail, often with devastating results on school-aged children or elderly parents they were the sole caretakers for. Some of the women are portrayed as disappearing from the frame of images from happier times, as their confinement leads to what a press announcement calls “a downward spiral of lost wages, unpaid rent, custody loss and crushing shame.”
“They wouldn’t let her go home and now there’s no more home,” Apple sings, as the image of a house itself begins to fade from a photograph.
Apple has put up a “Let Her Go Home” website, which includes a five-minute video in which the singer-songwriter further explains what has moved her to take action. She says she has watched approximately 4,000 bond hearings.
In the video message, she shares: “A lot of you probably know that I was a court watcher for Prince George’s County, Maryland for two and a half years. And what that means is, in my estimation, I have listened to about 4,000 bond hearings… And I am gonna talk to you about mothers being held in jail, pretrial, being separated from their babies, and what we can do about it.
“Tme and time again, court-watching, me and my fellow court watchers would hear the defense talking about their clients… They would say, ‘Look, she has children at home. There’s nobody else in the area that she can have take care of the kids… Some of these women had a sick mother at home that they needed to take care of. They worked two jobs, but they don’t have enough money to pay a bail on these minor, minor charges. These women are not flight risks or dangers to the community at all. But time and time again, these judges would give them these bails that they can’t afford… They have not had a trial yet, they haven’t been convicted of anything, and yet they are put in cages and they get in there… And while they’re still in there, a lot can happen. I mean, for one, any time in there is traumatic, and you could die. Short of dying, you lose your job, you lose your housing, you lose your kids…. You take them out, the community falls apart, families fall apart.
“So the group that I volunteer with, Life After Release, — along with Harriet’s Wildest Dreams and Out for Justice, all great organizations — they’ve been doing this for six years, I think. This is my second year being involved and I’m on the fundraising committee, and this campaign is called the Free Black Mamas DMV, [which stands for] D.C., Maryland, Virginia. They free women. And they don’t just free them and pay their bail and say, ‘All right, you’re free. Good luck out there. Hope you do all right.’ … They do this wraparound care. They fold them into the family. They help them get jobs, housing, navigate whatever more legal troubles they may have, help them navigate the system, get them Ubers to medical appointments, supply them with phones that they need, clothing, toiletries, everything that you would need. … They’re a family for these women.”
Looking at the bigger picture in asking for donations or time spent watching court proceedings, Apple says, “There’s so much stuff going on in the world right now that you feel like you can’t fucking do anything about it. … You can’t affect any change. You can’t ease anybody’s pain. Well, this is something that I’m telling you [works]… I know that I’m talking to a lot of people with big hearts right now, so I just want to thank you for caring.”