The studio was state-of-the-art...for 1957. Surgical masks were as common as sunglasses. Earthquakes shook the streets. This was Mexico City, 2009, the city that was the muse for Chuck Prophet's new album ¡Let Freedom Ring! Needing a vantage point outside his home country to make what he calls, "a political album for non-political people," Chuck and his band found themselves at the epicenter of the biggest pandemic scare of the new century. Swine flu was in the air literally and figuratively yet underneath the paranoia of H1N1 lay something more, something even larger. A cultural sea change was stirring. Brought on by the democratizing power of the internet, traditionally poverty stricken youth all over Mexico City were being exposed rapid-fire to music and art that had always been hidden from them. Inspired by this renaissance ¡Let Freedom Ring! billows with primal color and sound, evidenced by Prophet's return to the direct "two guitars, bass and drums" rock music of his past. On one hand a song cycle about breaking up but keeping it together, and on the other a political mission statement of hope, ¡Let Freedom Ring! doesn't incorporate the music of Mexico but instead imbibes its spirit and swims in its soul. Purposeful and rippling with rock sinew, this is Chuck Prophet 3.0.