Nearly two-and-a-half hours into a monumental gig on her “Human” arena tour in support of her 2025 LP, Returning to Myself, Brandi Carlile stood before a roaring, sold-out Minneapolis Target Center crowd. Behind her, a group of local freedom fighters known as the Singing Resistance stood with her in both musical and spiritual solidarity. Together they sang a powerful and poignant song, the title of which has become a rallying cry among Minneapolis protestors over the past month in response to ICE’s cruel occupation of the city: “It’s Okay to Change Your Mind.”
“It’’s okay to change your mind / And you can join us / Join us here any time”
The Minneapolis show was always on Carlile’s tour calendar, but after witnessing the injustice plaguing the residents of the city at the hands of a federal government supposedly charged with protecting them, Carlile felt it would be impossible to perform in the city without contributing in some fashion.
“It pained me not to be with you guys [in recent weeks],” Carile said early in her 24-song, career-spanning performance dubbed “Be Human: A Concert for Minneapolis.” (The show was live-broadcast globally and proceeds benefited the Advocates for Human Rights. At the time of publication, the show had raised more than $600,000. The performance remains available to stream through tomorrow). “You have been through so much,” she told the impassioned crowd. “And you’ve been on my mind every second of every day. This is home to me.”
“It’s very clear that this administration is not interested in legal immigration,” Carlile tells Rolling Stone backstage, just a few minutes after finishing the concert, her red bandanna still covering her forehead, steely determination and passion burning in her eyes. “They’re interested in violent theater. Violent theater and dominance over other people. I don’t believe most people signed up for that. Even people who voted for Trump, who I’m angry with, I don’t think they voted for this and I do think that they can still change their minds.”
She’s certainly no stranger to advocacy work, but in speaking with Carlile, it’s clear she’s disgusted but not deterred by where the country is headed. Carlile admits she possesses a palpable anger toward the current administration, and more specifically, their inhumane immigration policies. Despite being a self-described hopeful person, Carlile says the time is now to take action.
“We can’t let down our guard. We have to be resilient and loud and unwavering in our commitment to justice,” she says. “We can overpower oppression by deciding to not be disenfranchised. We can change the outcome of this oppressive regime. We can resist and not submit.”
What went through your mind in recent weeks as you watched the horrors unfold in Minneapolis?
I was really angry. My heart is on the side of displaced people. I think about displaced people — economic migrants, immigrants, asylum seekers, and refugees — all the time. I think about the displaced movement of people globally as the test of our humanity in this time and age. I’m concerned about it all the time. I don’t like the part of the argument where people are pontificating about what an injustice it is that these things are happening to American citizens or in America. The fact that these things are happening to black and brown people is just as important as what happened to Renee Good and Alex Pretti. And I know if both of them were sitting here right now, they would say the exact same thing to me. I don’t know how people on the right can wax philosophical about doing it “by the book” when ICE is literally zip-tying people on the floor of their immigration hearings.
I’m glad you’re using the phrase “change their minds,” which you did numerous times throughout the concert.
Do you have time for a story?
Of course.
When I first moved out of my parents’ house, I was poor, poor, poor. I got payday loans, I pawned everything that I had: I pawned CDs for a dollar, I pawned my tools, my guitars, I got my power shut off all the time; I was working doing roofing labor and as a barista. I was in the shit.
One day a vacuum salesman came to my door. He treated me like someone that had money, like someone that was important. And he started talking to me about this vacuum cleaner and he took this little fucking strip out of his pocket and he dipped it in a bottle of water and he told me that my entire house was toxic. I don’t know how he did it, but he sold me a vacuum cleaner. He told me I wasn’t going to have to pay for it, that I could make really tiny payments. He was going to talk to his boss and see if he could just give this one to me… it was going to be fine. So, he leaves and he leaves this vacuum cleaner — so heavy I can’t even pick the damn thing up. And a few days later I got a bill in the mail for $1500.
I was first really embarrassed. I was ashamed. And it wasn’t too long before I was just fucking mad. Because I realized the situation I was in. I realized I was vulnerable at the time. I realized the guy looked me in the eye and made me feel important. And I called the company that he worked for and I said, “I know what this guy looks like. And I know where he goes. And I’m going to go to Kinko’s and I’m going to make a stack of flyers and I’m going to follow this dude door to door and go to every house he goes to before he gets there.” Anyway, they came and they picked up the vacuum and they didn’t make me pay for it.
I love the metaphor. Donald Trump is the ultimate vacuum cleaner salesman.
So, you got fucking scammed. We’re living in a scammy time. That’s what people do. You can’t even pick up your phone without getting scammed. Doesn’t mean you have to double down. It doesn’t mean you have to pay for the fucking vacuum cleaner. And I just think there are a whole lot of people out there right now feeling duped and feeling ashamed and embarrassed. What they need to feel is angry. They need to get mad and change their minds. Get past the embarrassment, get past the shame that we got duped by a con artist. Get mad enough to change your mind.
Even though ICE says it’s scaling down its mission here in Minneapolis, there remains so much hopelessness among those living in fear of detainment.
Their fear is warranted. And that shatters my heart into a thousand pieces. If there’s any hope in that, it’s that I hope that those immigrants, those people who left their homes for the promise of safety or a better life, I hope they know how much we love them. I hope they can see they are welcome with open arms. That we believe in their contributions to this country and we believe that they belong here. That’s what I wish ICE did: I wish ICE found ways for paths to legal immigration for people. That they helped them with computers and forms. What if ICE just started giving everybody rides to immigration court instead of detaining them?
It has to be empowering to see thousands of people unifying with you, particularly on a night like this one.
I was on the verge of tears the whole time. When I feel that way I have to remind myself to get out of the way; it’s not about me. I have to remember I’m a surrogate of sorts for something else. I can tell we’re living in a deeply troubled time and music and art are so important to people and being able to stand in that violent threshold and be a conduit for it is a high honor and a big responsibility.
It’s maybe the most sacred responsibility that somebody has with a microphone and a platform right now, to show people how powerful that can be en masse. It’s not me: I may have pointed to an open door but it’s all these people coming together as a collective. It’s a very dangerous and very potent concept. Because we can become huge. We can overpower oppression by deciding to not be disenfranchised.
Does it make you feel hopeful about the future of our country?
Incredibly hopeful. I’m so lucky to have this job because — and I said it out there onstage — it’s not lost on me that I may have limited access to all kinds of people. It’s not lost on me that unless I’m singing at the Super Bowl, I may only really get to speak to and sing for one kind of person for the most part. But it trickles out. It aggregates. Because everybody has got brothers and sisters and moms and dads and family members. And if the message gets potent and cohesive enough, it’ll make it.
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