Something for the People

As part of our Storytelling for Social Change Series, HRI will screen Something for the People (2025), a film about go-go music in Washington, D.C. and how the official sound of the city has been a catalyst for protests and social movements. Following the film, there will be a talkback with Director and Co-Director . A short reception will follow.

When a D.C. landmark is silenced after a noise complaint, the community fights back with music—blasting Go-Go in protest and sparking a movement known as Moechella. What begins as a grassroots rally becomes a powerful force for cultural pride and resistance, pulsing through the city during the 2020 protests and beyond.

But as the movement grows, so does the backlash. After a tragic shooting near a Moechella event, organizers are blamed by officials and threatened legally by corporate interests. Still, they persist—keeping Go-Go alive in a city trying to silence it. Something for the People is the story of sound as survival, and music as a tool for justice in the heart of the nation’s capital.

Host or Publisher Human Rights Institute at Georgetown Law