Listen: Will Butler writes song about the Greek debt crisis, ‘Clean Monday’

Arcade Fire’s Will Butler is tackling the tough topics this week, with the intention of writing a new song for every day this week, based on The Guardian news headlines.

He’s started the week off with ‘Clean Monday’, a song relating to the Greece banking crisis. “I’m rooting for Greece,” he explained to the UK paper - check out his full explanation above the player:

“I’m rooting for Greece. I mean, broadly, who the hell isn’t rooting for Greece? Even if you’re super right wing, or super German, or super capitalist you probably don’t want Greece tumbling out of the Euro and defaulting on its debts.

But beyond that, I like that they’re a young government. I like Yanis Varoufakis, the new finance minister. To a certain extent, I’ve bought into the media portrayal of him (from the Guardian and NPR and all over) as a straight shooting rapscallion who might – just might – be crazy enough to, um, responsibly manage the Greek financial situation?

I was reading the Guardian’s live coverage of the forthcoming Greek proposals of how they’re going to pay off their debts, when a little blurb popped up explaining that the Greek markets were closed today because it was “Clean Monday” – the Greek Orthodox equivalent of Ash Wednesday. It was an amazing/hilarious (well, maybe mildly amusing) coincidence to me that the Greek ministers were scrambling and figuring out how to avoid strict austerity on the day that Lent starts.

And all this scrambling is just to figure out the next few months. It’s gonna be a long winter, and a long spring, and maybe a really long summer for Greece. But my fingers are crossed.”

Will Butler’s debut ‘Policy’ solo album is out 9th March on Merge. Get the new issue of DIY this Friday to read our interview with Butler.