Whenever I imagine the Voodoopunks (New Albion Tetralogy) I kind of always imagine them being representative of different groups within each instalment.
During The Dolls of New Albion (DONA) the Voodoopunks are first being invented and are still feeling out what they are as a group. Since it's primarily composed of teenagers and young adults the Voodoopunks are foundationally a sub-culture within New Albion born from the cultural installation of necromancy as an everyday standard consumer's commodity. However I would like to argue that they are specifically a counter-culture within New Albion. It's stated that most people treat Dolls as accessories or objects of projection rather than as real people but - while the Voodoopunks aren't much better - the Voodoopunks seem to take an almost opposite stand to this. Instead of objectifying the Dolls to the point of dehumanisation, the Voodoopunks objectify the Dolls to a point of reverence or deification. Most people would begin to think of death as trivial in the face of being able to reverse it, but the Voodoopunks instead revere death more than they appreciate their lives - they revolve themselves around death rather than trivialising it. They're countering the cultural perception of the Dolls. This idea of them being analogous to a counter culture is also supported by their political motivations. Most sub cultures - especially counter cultures - have some ideological or political motivation within them which ran against the popular zeitgeist of the time (grunge came from the rejection of the idea that poverty produced only undesirable things, emo from the rejection of the idea that negative emotions should be hidden away from public view, etc). The Voodoopunks are an anti-establishment group, and essentially voting for them would have been a vote to get rid of the establishment of the DONA-era New Albion government (something which was known to be corrupt and unforgiving as seen throughout the tetralogy). What sets them apart from most anti-establishment groups within media however is their emphasis on spirituality born from the change in culture around death in New Albion. The society of DONA-era New Albion is very scientifically- and economically-centred, they prioritise the advancement of science and enterprise over civilians wellbeing or connection. The Voodoopunks counter this cultural president by embracing the inherent spirituality of spirit summoning and co-existence - spirituality being something often seen as antithetical to science. They're basically a youth counter-culture, young political ideological group, and a rising religion all wrapped into one born from the birth of an economic enterprise and the culture surrounding it. Each aspect runs both parallel to each other and intertwined with each other, one aspect never dominating the others - although it all stems from the inherent counter- culture of the Voodoopunks.
Compare this to the Voodoopunks of The New Albion Radio Hour (NARH). Due to a prolonged sense of isolation from the larger connection of New Albion society for around a decade (most likely longer), the Voodoopunks have all but basically lost their counter-cultural roots since they've been disconnected from the culture they were countering. Additionally the ideological aspect of the Voodoopunks seemed to have seeped and been absorbed into the now more religious fanaticism aspects of the Voodoopunks. This isn't to say that they aren't a significant political and ideological force - they are literally the face of the residents against the New Albion government after all - but their ideological aspects have some second to their spiritual religious ones. They're basically a cult now (not in the exploitative way, but in the collective of concentrated religious activity kind of way). They have their own religious wrights and rituals, they have self proclaimed hymns and chants and prophets. Thomas is literally able to recognise them by their sound of their singing alone. The Voodoopunks in NARH are identified by their religious aspects, with other aspects of them being second to their fanaticism.
Both previous installations of the Voodoopunks have been similar in the fact that they aren't the status queo, they were in fact counter to the status queo and actively against the establishment of New Albion. However in The New Albion Guide To Analogue Consciousness (NAGAC) they are the establishment, or at least they run the establishment. Something noticeable is that in NAGAC the only time the Voodoopunks are referred to as the Voodoopunks are in reference to the people, while in previous narratives the title Voodoopunks referred both to the people and what they represented as a group. No, in NAGAC whenever the Voodoopunks are referred to as a collective outside of its people they are referred to as Arcadia Corp. I think this is indicative of the fact that the Voodoopunks as a group have lost almost all of their back bone in the sense of counter-culturalism and ideological individuality. What are the Voodoopunks in NAGAC except for just being the people who run Arcadia Corp? A religious group? Not really, they've lost almost all of their fanaticism as they became more mainstream and palatable from the population of New Albion. The religious aspects they have left are all watered down, music sounding like it's been Christian Rock-ed and sanitised. Heck there isn't even a song called The Voodoopunks in NAGAC! There's "The Voodoopunks Ascension" but that isn't even the Voodoopunks main/signature song in this album - Kyrie is! Essentially in the shuffle of becoming the mainstream and publicly acceptable norm for the pursuit of power, the Voodoopunks as a group lost what made them themselves - ending up with the people being only the Voodoopunks in name until they too die out.
I find the development of the Voodoopunks so interesting. They're never truly all good or all bad, but they are a significant driving force in New Albion throughout the years in the pursuit of their own goals and desires until eventually they drive them into extermination.
It's a really good representation of how ideology, government and politics, economics and innovation, and culture all interact with and influence each other within history and the real world. Also on how as years go by often sub-cultures and counter-cultures will lose their connection to their original purpose and become almost bastardization of themselves as they become sanitized and stripped of their essence as they enter the view of the socially accepted public eyes.
