bungalow

I am not one who goes for the cliche "bush suxxxorz" songs, put out by bands like Greenday, and all of these other wannabe punk bands bands that write songs with a political meaning, just to be accepted by the "Punk Community"

But I really do enjoy a song with good political meaning.
Especially when it is done tastefully and intelligently.

Lately, my favorite kind of music has been politically influenced rap (Immortal Technique, Nas) but I really go for any songs or artists that can get their meanings across in a song and do it with class.

Discuss politics in music, and, reccomend me some good politically influenced music (mainly punk, rap, country)

I think that this could spark some good conversation, kinda was sparked by the idea of a politics forum, but it combines the idea of music and politics

sleepy jack

Nausea, Contravene, Crass, Discharge.
Is like awesome x core political music.

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cardboard adolescent

I dislike political messages in music, because usually it's predictable, horribly biased, and never very unique. I don't mind it, just so long as it doesn't become more about the message than the music.

Personally, I prefer lyrics that are more introspective rather than, oh gosh the war is so bad blah blah blah.

adidasss

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TheBig3

What about Springsteens song "Devil's and Dust" which is a fictional introspection testimony from a solider in war.

Theres more than one way to approach a song, and while some songs come right out and say the usual stuff (sabbath "war pigs") this is a song that looks at it from a diffrent prespective.

Im sort of wondering what you think about songs like this.

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jazzfromhell

In my opinion, songs can be as political as they want, blatantly or otherwise, but the key is to offer a solution to the problems they're talking about. Green Day can talk about how much Bush sucks all day and into the night, but it's not as if Billy Joe Armstrong would know what to do if we put him in the white house. And who would he suggest putting in there, anyway? Kerry? Why? That's the biggest problem I have with politically influenced music, people not knowing what they're talking about, and not offering any solutions.

On a side note, another "political" musician who annoys the **** out of me is John Mellencamp. If you guys like his music, fine, but he's always seemed like a really bland, untalented Springsteen rip-off to me. These days, he's apparently a big symbol for pro-democratic, anti-Bush rock music. He started pulling all this political bull**** at the Bridge School Benefit (if you don't know what it is, it's a concert Neil Young does to benefit a school his wife made for kids with cerebral palsy), not even close to being the right time or place. On top of that, the messages in his songs were no better than Green Day's, just a bunch of "Hey man, Bush is a mean, stupid old redneck" junk. **** that, worst act of the evening (to put that in perspective, Good Charlotte performed that night), and completely broke the mood. Sorry for the Mellencamp rant, I felt like it fit.

Big3, I agree that it's cool to see musicians approaching politics from a different perspective. One example (sort of) is John Coltrane's "Alabama", which he wrote as a companion piece to MLK's eulogy for the girls killed in Alabama, back in the 60's. It doesn't have any lyrics, but it's interesting how the mood of the music fits perfectly with the subject matter.

cardboard adolescent

I don't mind it at all if it's done in an interesting manner, I don't even really mind Black Sabbath, I guess I'm just venting at punk bands who, while usually making valid points, rarely make new ones and just don't bring them across in an interesting manner.

I'm all about creativity and expressing feelings, but sometimes it becomes too much of a lecture and not enough of a means of expressing emotions.

Merkaba

I like some political lyrics. But I only like when an artist really gets stuck into what they believe.

Thats why I like RATM so much. They put so much energy into making their opinions felt that you almost didn't care what they were fighting for, as long as you were on their side and not on the recieving end. The fact that they were fighting for peoples rights did make it that much more emphatic however.

To really generalise right now, Greendays American Idiot is a terrible effort at being political. The presentation is not there. It's too watery and theres no punch whatsoever. Rage could have used the exact same lyrics and made a killer song out of it. Even though it's really short by their standards, I have no doubt that they would throw everything they had into that song and pulled it off.

My point is, I don't care if bands sing about cliched politics, I only care that they do it with some goddamn vindiction and passion. Politics play a massive part in peoples lives, in some places they are critical, and if a band is going to go down the political path I only wish they put their heart, arse and testicles into what they're fighting for.

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bungalow

See, that isnt the kind of political message I mean.
I can't stand it when a song is filled with "war is ghey"
There is nothing more aggravating than listening to Good Charlotte try to get us to take them seriously, by making a political song

EDIT: I know I keep referencing this song, but it is because it is a great song

The Prophecy- Immortal Technique

I calculate planet alignment like Mayan astronomy
Discovering atrocities worst than Aristotle
Subjecting children to sodomy
Your theory of the galaxy is primitive like telome
The truth about the universe stuck up like Aztec pottery
Unpredictable results like experimental psychology
I stomp the streets with emcee's beneath my feet in colonies
But presentation and spirit revolve around autonomy
Searching for monogamy
And cutting fake bitches out of my mind like a lobotomy
So obviously I'm not gonna be here to play games
Walked the top of the world and leave the arctic circle in
flames
Battle the beast and false prophet predicted in the King James
I give a f**k about your emcee name I don't admire you
Only by dental records will you be identifiable
Cause the future is not reliable
Remember when rap was not economically viable
Comparable to what motherf**kers think of me
I might be nobody but wait till I'm together like a symphony
Resounding sound that will continue infinitely
Angel of death punishing all those who live in infamy
And shine so far away from you
You'll never get a glimpse of me
Attempts to extinguish me don't even bother me none
Like retarded kids throwing ice cubes at the sun
A victory against Immortal Technique will never be done
Just degrees of losing it every second your adding one

Some niggas dream of pushing kilos but I drop tons
With more facts and formulas and philosophical logic
Then a basement full of scientists puffing on chronic
Dip the mic in potassium cyanide and liquid bubonic
And use it as a sonogram to find the spawn of the demonic
Screaming like onyx is of absolutely no consequence
The poison is dense enough to clog up your arteries
Mercy is not a part of me
I cause you bodily injury permanently because simply verbally
murdering me
Is inconceivable cause of the unbelievable evil injected inside
The blood stream of my people
And redemption is not located under a church steeple
The feeble and the meek in soul just like the technique
Will inherit the earth, But the earth will be weak
Mother earth in her decrepit terminal illness physique
The year three thousand is bleak no happily ever after
Just death following the forth reich disaster, a legacy of
bastards
With plastic explosives your futures been eroded
Cause you forgot that when your free it's multiplied
indefinitely
By the struggle that be the struggle I see
To socialistically united the third world countries
Expose hypocrisy in Americas democracy
Sloppily obsessed with stopping me cause I speak prophecy
Trample and dismantle your capitalist philosophy
The same way I stomp the conquering rap monopoly
And I'm not a ****ing prophet
But that's the ****ing prophecy


I think that he makes his point brilliantly in that song, and it is done intelligently, and without complaining
That is one example of what I mean, but to get an even better example of what I mean

Check out

"Dance With The Devil" by Immortal Technique

babakeatwix

You're right that is a good song. If you haven't heard listen to it...now.

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