Liberal or leftist rock bands didn’t succeed through politics, but rather, their politics succeeded through their talent and charisma.
by Andrea’ O. Letania
Let’s face facts. The main reason we listen to rock and pop music is for love and sex. I prefer love over sex in music. I can do without the hip hop, disco shake-your-booty, and metal stick-your-ass-out music. Of course, some of it’s pretty fun and thrilling, but romance and feeling–like in Unchained Melody, Just Like a Woman,, Yesterday, Woman (by J Lennon), Dreams (Fleetwood Mac), etc–are certainly nicer. It’s too bad that many young people aren’t introduced to romantic but to pornographic imagery and emotions through today’s TV and musical culture.
Even so, many, even most, people still want songs of love and romance, like Sting’s Fields of Gold. There have been songs about everything under the sun–God, society, politics, environment, patriotism, social critique, family, revolution, food, etc–, and why not? I suppose everything is worth singing about. I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream, right?
But no emotion is as natural to music as love is, especially romantic love. A song about how much one loves a friend, family member, or a dog is nice but not as moving or touching as a song of romantic yearning or loss. And even songs that aren’t really about romance or love–such as STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN, PURPLE HAZE, BOX OF RAIN, PINBALL WIZARD, BEHIND BLUE EYES, etc–have sexual appeal in that groovy or powerful chords and melodies stir the emotions. They beckon and allure.
There are two ways for men to attract women. One is to appeal to women directly, as through courtship, sweet talk, or serenades/ love songs. The other way is to showcase one’s masterful and impressive self. An athlete who wins in sports isn’t directly appealing to women, but in his victory and glory, he is proving his superiority as a man. In contrast, a man who woos a woman is appealing to her directly.
When a rock band plays hard–even songs that aren’t about love–, it’s trying to establish and prove its manly worth. When a rock band sings soft, it is wooing the ladies. A rock band is supposed to do both, which is why even the toughest rock bands have songs ranging from hard to soft. WHO’S NEXT is a great rock album with some of the toughest songs but also with lovely ballads.
The problem with most right-wing rock bands is they seem to lack this soft romantic quality. They are all about being bad ass and aggressive–usually in the most obnoxious and petty manner–or about putting on kitschy mythic airs, as if they are electric Wagner’s or something(because they add some classical melodies to their pestilence of insipid noise).
Given that the main point of popular music is to appeal to the opposite sex, how can right-wing rock appeal to most ladies out there? Where are its great or even good love songs? And I mean heartfelt personal love songs, not trite expressions like, ‘You are my kind of woman cuz you got blue eyes and blond hair, so be my bad ass Nazi-bitch lover gal.’ That’s not personal, it’s not heartfelt. That’s just love turned to politics and ideology. Boring! White or black or whatever color, love songs have meaning when they are about individual or personal love.
If the White Right is about race, then it must realize race is about love. Race continues itself by love between man and woman. For the white race to continue, white man must love and woo the white woman. And, even if one is racially conscious, love is ultimately personal and unique. Even if you, as a white person, seeks another white person as lover, it’s not ONLY BECAUSE the other person is white. It’s because he or she has attributes that appeal to you personally. So, even right wing love songs have to be personal than about politics to have true depth and meaning. Even within the race, there is only one ‘soul mate’. You don’t marry the entire race, for crying out loud.
But what is most right wing rock music about? About political rage expressed in the most ugly, demented, and degenerate manner possible. Much of it derives from possibly the worst form of rock ever created: punk music. Now, there are some good, even great, punk music, especially the early Clash, but most of punk is an assult on the eyes and ears.
When a bunch of guys play music that fails to attract decent women–ever notice most female fans of punk are freaks, hags, degenerates, uglies, gorkettes, and yucklings, people who look and act like Patti Smith?–, it is pathetic and pitiful indeed.
Punk was mostly a male phenomenon, and though it pretended to be about politics and revolution, it was about angry geeks and nerds pretending to be tough and badass by acting like musical shit flies and cockroaches. No self-respecting man of maturity and responsibility can be into punk beyond the age of 20.
Much of rightwing rock derives from punk and metal. Now, ther’s some good metal too, but the reason I dislike both is they turned rock into caricatures. Rock initially developed as an expansive and experimental musical form and idea. Rock n roll was fun but limited, but starting with ROCK–created by Beatles, Stones, Dylan, Beach Boys, Who, etc–, popular music could be lots of things. Dylan incorporated elements from country, folk, blues, rock n roll. Beatles took from Motown, rock n roll, classical, pop, etc. Rock meant freedom to experiment and try everything the sun. It could be very hard and loud, very soft and gentle, very whatever-one-pleased. This is why so much of 60s and early 70s rock were so rich in variety, texture, and meaning. But then came the ghettoization of rock music in the 70s. Some decided to turn rock into straitjacketed manifestos or formulas. Punk said rock MUST BE simple, rebellious, and unpleasant. Metal said it had to be loud, stupid, and dumb. The perimeters of rock got narrowed by all these different ‘movements’ or ‘genres’.
The best right wing rock was by Lynyrd Skynyrd, but then it didn’t follow any formula or manifesto. It respected and paid homage to the rich array and expanse of American music, South and North, hillbilly and Negro(there is no going around the fact that rock owes much of its origins to black-American music unless one chooses to be churlish and dishonest), traditional and popular. Its masterpiece SWEET HOME ALABAMA was so great that Neil Young once sang it with the band–though it puts him down. Now, that is the real way to create great right wing music.
Instead, most right wing rockers are hacks and idiots who mask their lack of talent with lots of growls or grunts, demented attitude, or kitschy and pompous mythic imagery. If a song sucks, it sucks. No amount of attitude or grandeur-mongering is going to fix it.
But even worse is the lack of human or romantic feelings in right wing rock. Where are the songs that appeal to womenfolk? Instead, most right wing rock expresses sexual frustration and angst, impotent rage, hissy and hysterical ranting, and pit bull barking. What kind of women would go for this? I suppose trashy skanks who are dumb enough to fall in love with skinhead morons. There’s some of this crap on the left too. I could never stand a second of Rage Against the Machine. Awful!
Of course, loud and brash rock can be great–Zeppelin, Hendrix, Stones, Who, etc–, but noise, volume, and attitude alone aren’t enough. One has to have the groove, the beat, the rhythm, the mastery of form, visionary drive.
I hate and despise the politics of Sting and Coldplay but they wrote songs that appeals to womens’ hearts, and that ability and talent are the source of their great power, legitimacy, and popularity in mainstream culture. Liberal or leftist rock bands didn’t succeed through politics, but rather, their politics succeeded through their talent and charisma.
Sting could have talked politics all he wanted but no one would have listened if it weren’t for his artistic talent.
Consider some of his songs: EVERY BREATH YOU TAKE, KING OF PAIN, WRAPPED AROUND YOUR FINGER, FIELDS OF GOLD. Whatever one’s politics, one just loves them and even begins falling in love with Sting ‘the lover’. Whatever one’s politics, a girl is gonna fall for a guy who looks and sounds nice. A liberal woman is gonna be more attracted to conservative Elvis than to liberal Bill Maher, and a conservative woman is gonna be more attracted to Sting than to Karl Rove. Whatever one’s mind thinks, heart goes with emotions. Right wing women may hate Sting the political prick but they love Sting the rocker-lover. And even Jews who hate Wagner’s antisemitism wet their pants when they listen to his gloriously romantic music.
So, the best thing for right wing rock would be produce some romantic love songs–personal and beautiful ones.
Take the song THE SCIENTIST by Coldplay at the end of the wonderful film WICKER PARK. I hate Coldplay’s politics, but I love and love that song. That is the way to win a woman’s heart. If the Right is sexually about white women sticking with white men, it better come up with some decent love songs that wins women hearts.
As it stands, most right wing music is by white guys for other white guys, and its message is ‘we are soooooo impotently angry and demented over the fact that our girls are running off with Negroes and Jews are lopping our balls off.’ I see the need for such messages too–though preferable if more thoughtful–, but most women not only don’t care for that stuff but are turned off by it. Indeed, much of right wing rock culture is so macho-masculine that it feels and smell like a San Fran leather and iron gay bathhouse. And even the macho shtick is so shrill that one senses not confidence but wounded pride putting on tough guy act to repress one’s deeper fears and resentments.
But this is a song that any woman can understand. It melts my heart and moistens my eyes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdBym7kv2IM