"Keep Moving On" by Echo Drift

"Keep Moving On" is a raw and unflinching piece of spoken-word lyricism set against the backdrop of American disillusionment. Written by Samuel E. Burns and delivered through the voice of Echo Drift, the song serves as both a lament and a battle cry—a meditation on class, identity, and political betrayal in the modern age.

At its core, the piece is a rejection of mainstream narratives that reduce complex struggles to binary race politics. It begins provocatively:
"They said it was always about race..."
With these opening lines, Burns sets up a central tension: the way societal fractures have been explained through racial terms while, in his view, a deeper and more universal wound—economic abandonment—has gone unaddressed.

The lyrics are stark and pointed, targeting both political parties and a media landscape that, the song suggests, has become obsessed with performative identity politics over meaningful change. Names like “Letitia,” “Fani,” “Ilhan,” and “Jasmine” are invoked not as individuals, but as symbols—"brands"—a criticism of how public figures are elevated for symbolic representation rather than substance.

Yet this isn’t a song of resignation. The voice is defiant:
"We are not gone.
We are not silenced.
We are not sorry."
There’s anger here, certainly, but it’s the anger of the forgotten—those who feel unheard, mischaracterized, and stripped of dignity. The repeated line, "Keep moving," becomes a mantra. It transforms pain into persistence.

Burns' lyrics are not subtle, but they aren’t trying to be. This is a mirror held up to a segment of the country that feels invisible, and Echo Drift delivers it with a bruised yet unwavering clarity. Some will view the song as courageous truth-telling; others will see it as incendiary. But perhaps that's the point: "Keep Moving On" is a challenge, not a comfort.