Comments on: Republican Party Dance-Mix

By: perianwyr

perianwyr — Wed, 24 May 2006 13:20:14 +0000

I find Aphex Twin to be perfectly expressive of conservative values. Prove me wrong, why don’t you. Can you?

By: Anna in Cairo

Anna in Cairo — Wed, 24 May 2006 05:14:23 +0000

Vanya, yes the song Rock the Casbah is about telling elders to leave us kids alone, and that is why Middle Eastern kids like mine can totally relate to it. They love the line “Sharif don’t like it” – it makes all kinds of sense to them.

Generational gaps don’t just exist in the west.

I want Pithlord to elaborate on how rock is the anthem of imperialism. I just don’t see it. Pop being the anthem of commercialism, maybe, and commercialism being related to imperialism, OK, but that’s not the same thing really. I mean, there’s no intent on the part of the musicians – and also, rock does not equal pop.

By: joel turnipseed

joel turnipseed — Wed, 24 May 2006 05:11:58 +0000

Anna, et.al., no idea whether the kids in Iraq are singing the Cure, but I know that when I received my M16 in USMC boot camp the first thing I and the guy next to me (a kid from Berkeley) did was sing—very much under our breaths after exchanging a sly grin—”Killing an Arab.” Of course, that was 1986 and was done with all ironic intent. And for all that, as compared to “Napalm Sticks to Little Children” (sung to “Jesus Loves the Little Children”) and some of the other shit these sick bastards sing, Robert Smith’s Stranger tribute is a lark.

Of course, I’m sure there are plenty of young Marines smart and ironic and nihilistic enough to know & sing the Cure song in Iraq—as well as all-too-painfully aware that the most relevent words in the tune might well be “I’m alive—and dead. I’m a stranger…”

So—don’t be too righteously outraged.

As to the rest of this: agree w/majority of the posters—it’s something of a head exploder to see some of these as “conservative” ditties. What next, Woody Guthrie’s guitar on NeoCon rally poster in cause against “Islamo-Fascism?”

W/r/t Dylan—there is, no doubt, a free and early sense of mocking the petty and utopian. But you know, Woody Guthrie had his own problems with the Communists (and his own women problems). What can one say other than that they were both artists and looking to be free before all else & also that a certain class of leftist does need a swift kick in the ass now & again (or at least a really good verbal tweaking).

By: Barbar

Barbar — Wed, 24 May 2006 02:37:30 +0000

Jaybird gets it right.

By: Pithlord

Pithlord — Tue, 23 May 2006 23:38:02 +0000

Unfortuantely I can’t source it, but I remember watching some footage of some Marines humiliating Iraqi teenagers with “Rock the Casbah” in the background a few years ago. I remebered it because of the irony. I do think that “rock and roll rebellion” is totally bogus, and that rock and rap are both the soundtrack of American imperialism worldwide. That’s not to say that there isn’t some good stuff, or that people are bad to like it. But it is worth being more critical than just accepting the artists’ own leftist politics as the sum of the effect of the music.

In response to “engels”, Cobain was obsessed with this problem.

By: Ben Alpers

Ben Alpers — Tue, 23 May 2006 14:15:54 +0000

Since my old paper was cited, I should explain something about it that may not be clear. It was presented to an organization of conservative intellectuals. Many in the audience were quite old and still held the view that rock & roll is the devil’s music. In fact, these lists of "conservative" rock songs are strained enough that they almost make one respect Evangelical tract cartoonist (and Old Christian Right throwback) Jack Chick's claim that even Christian rock is the work of the devil.

By: vanya

vanya — Tue, 23 May 2006 13:09:35 +0000

Almostinfamous,
Sorry, I gotta disagree. “Rock the Casbah” is not exaggerating a position to make it look stupid,, it’s a straight forward anthem about people refusing to bow down to an autocratic anti-fun regime. It has nothing in common with songs like “kill the poor” which is plainly meant to be ironic. For a punk group the Clash were pretty irony free. I do believe that Strummer probably meant the song to be symbolic, I don’t think it was meant to really be about the Middle East, it’s an allegory about kids telling their elders to bugger off, and the inability of authority to control people’s lives. In that sense you could argue it’s not a conservative song. Still, it’s certainly one of Strummer’s weaker efforts.

By: Sam Dodsworth

Sam Dodsworth — Tue, 23 May 2006 11:51:44 +0000

If anyone’s playing “Killing An Arab” in Iraq at the moment then I withdraw what I said about the misreading being funny.

By: Anna in Cairo

Anna in Cairo — Tue, 23 May 2006 11:35:09 +0000

Actually, now that I reread this thread, poster #34 (pithlord) refers to Killing an Arab being played by US military in Ira. Maybe he can tell us if this is just a metaphor or if it’s based on some sort of fact.

By: Anna in Cairo

Anna in Cairo — Tue, 23 May 2006 11:31:35 +0000

I know it’s from Camus. But the title of the song is shock value, sorry. Otherwise they would have titled the song “the stranger.” And I have seen a story about Marines playing it in Iraq unironically. May be an urban legend—I devoutly pray that it is.

By: Sam Dodsworth

Sam Dodsworth — Tue, 23 May 2006 11:14:34 +0000

And, most people understand ironic shock value type songs like “Kill the Poor” or “Killing an Arab” or other such things..

Um… “Killing an Arab” is actually about the central scene from Albert Camus’ “L’Etranger” – existentialism, not shock value. I remember a couple of my schoolmates making that mistake back when Libya was the Designated Enemy. Are there people on the American Right who think it’s about killing Arabs? If so, that’s even funnier than thinking “Born in the USA” is patriotic.

By: John M. Burt

John M. Burt — Tue, 23 May 2006 09:44:01 +0000

How come nobody has mentioned one of the greatest conservative rock songs of all time, one which celebrates as does no other song, the selfless humble courage of our fighting men, as they march on, unquestioning, to battle?

I refer, of course, to the “Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die Rag” by Country Joe and the Fish:

And it’s one, two, three,
What are we fighting for ?
Don’t ask me, I don’t give a damn,
Next stop is Vietnam;
And it’s five, six, seven,
Open up the pearly gates,
Well there ain’t no time to wonder why,
Whoopee! we’re all gonna die.

By: Anna in Cairo

Anna in Cairo — Tue, 23 May 2006 06:40:39 +0000

I am Muslim, and my kids are Muslim Egyptians raisedi n the Middle East, and we love that song Rock the Casbah and think the video is hilarious. Who told you guys Muslims have no sense of humor, anyhow?

But, we definitely would not call the song “conservative.” That’s just idiotic. In what sense of the term?

And, most people understand ironic shock value type songs like “Kill teh Poor” or “Killing an Arab” or other such things, you have to be completely stupid to miss it and think the song’s actually in favor of those things.

By: Prudence Goodwife

Prudence Goodwife — Tue, 23 May 2006 03:28:53 +0000

25. “The Battle of Evermore,” by Led Zeppelin.
The lyrics are straight out of Robert Plant’s Middle Earth period — there are lines about “ring wraiths” and “magic runes” — but for a song released in 1971, it’s hard to miss the Cold War metaphor: “The tyrant’s face is red.”

Led Zeppelin- The Anti Hammer & Sickle of the Gods.

By: almostinfamous

almostinfamous — Tue, 23 May 2006 03:12:23 +0000

vanya, that’s in the same vein as saying the dead kennedy’s “kill the poor” was used by racists and supremacists as a theme song. the song is exaggerating a position to make it look stupid, not endorsing a position.

what people do with RTC or KTP is their business but i’m off to set up a turbine attached to Joe Strummer’s grave to see if i can;t solve the world’s energy problems.