Right-wing music fans that don’t understand the lyrics
- Thread starter Bjork67
- Start date
foxwelljsly
Me too, I ate one sour too.
dubnobasswithmyheadman
Cheese
Bitter lover
Springsteen / Born In The USA kind of ?
The man (who I adore as a person as well as a musician) is somehow considered left wing. Maybe, but being the only singer arriving in a self-driven full-blown SUV at the recording session for ‘We Are The World’ is not exactly the most leftie thing to do.
The man (who I adore as a person as well as a musician) is somehow considered left wing. Maybe, but being the only singer arriving in a self-driven full-blown SUV at the recording session for ‘We Are The World’ is not exactly the most leftie thing to do.
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Tony L
Administrator
Trump using the Village People LGBTQ+ anthem YMCA (very much against the band’s wishes) was always baffling given the fundamentalist religious bigotry of much of his base.
There are very few right-wing bands, especially good ones. Nearly every time a song is used at some ugly GOP or Tory rally there is a usually complaint from the creators. It would be interesting and amusing to compile a list. I remember Heather Small & M People being absolutely livid when Tory economic terrorist Liz Truss walked on stage to one of their songs. Heather Small’s son is a Labour councillor! Johnny Marr forbidding David Cameron from liking The Smiths being another high-profile example.
There are very few right-wing bands, especially good ones. Nearly every time a song is used at some ugly GOP or Tory rally there is a usually complaint from the creators. It would be interesting and amusing to compile a list. I remember Heather Small & M People being absolutely livid when Tory economic terrorist Liz Truss walked on stage to one of their songs. Heather Small’s son is a Labour councillor! Johnny Marr forbidding David Cameron from liking The Smiths being another high-profile example.
wulbert
pfm Member
I had the same thought, but do his lyrics promote Germanic supremacy? Or is it all stuff about boy-meets-girl etc?
flatpopely
Prog Rock/Moderator
To my mind music is what you take away from it. I agree lots of music is politically motivated but if the people listening to it don’t agree with the politics or don’t get it does it matter?
Sounds like music snobbery to me.
Sounds like music snobbery to me.
Tony L
Administrator
If an artist has created something and a political entity subverts it for their own political/propaganda end I think the artist have every right to complain or ideally legally block that usage. The Heather Small/M People thing being a good case in point. The band oppose the Tory Party and in no way approved their art for that usage. I found it very funny as it highlighted just how far out of her depth Truss was before she even got to the stage. A premonition as to the catastrophe ahead.
paulfromcamden
Baffled
To flip it around and take a bit of an extreme example, I enjoy black metal but I've pretty much given up on it as a genre because so many bands seem to have some connection to national socialist black metal (NSBM) scene - same record label, drummer used to play in a NSBM band, shared a stage etc etc.
There was a PFM thread on this a few years back and a few members said they just enjoyed the music and weren't interested in a bands politics. I guess it's up to the individual.
Boy meets Sister, more like...
blossomchris
I feel better than James Brown
I remember when at a disco in some god awful place that was mostly filled with Germans, who were enthusiastically dancing to a Mel Brooks track, iirc one line of song was about joining the nazi party (from the Producers I think, it did chart)
MVV
pfm Member
Well there is a tendency for politicians to only listen to the chorus. Then some of us listen to lyrics others the music. Personally I find it unfathomable and wonder what the handful of right wingers on here listen to. As the vast majority of musicians or artists have values aligned with the left. I can only assume they like a good tune.
paulfromcamden
Baffled
Geri Halliwell, Johnny Ramone, Eric Clapton, Kid Rock, Ted Nugent, James Hetfield, Phil Collins, Tony Hadley, Gene Simmons, Sammy Hagar, Alice Cooper, Meatloaf, loads of country & western and metal bands...
Probably proves your point to be honest though Ian Curtin and Mark E Smith both voted Tory.
Finnegan
I like a bit of a cavort
Other than Nazi dross like Skrewdriver, I can really only think of Merle Haggard’s Okie From Muskogee as determinedly ‘right wing’ popular music (although he sometimes claimed it was a piss take). On the other hand, there are plenty of people whose music I admire that have, at one time or other, expressed right wing views- Van Morrison, Frank Sinatra, Eric Clapton, Rod Stewart, Neil Young. I am generally able to keep the art and the artist separate and usually able to judge music (and art in general) on its own terms and not according to the politics of its creator. Otherwise we lose the seminal contributions of TS Eliot, Ezra Pound, Evelyn Waugh et al (although I have nothing but contempt for Phil Collins; political and artistic).
But the music we love is, by and large, evolved from black musical forms that were themselves reaction to hardship and oppression. I dislike the misogyny in some reggae, but that doesn’t mean I don’t find Bob Marley and Burning Spear tremendously emotionally and spiritually uplifting. I’m enormously moved by the gospel of Aretha Franklin, even if I prefer not to accept the Christian content.
Rock and roll and soul emerged from the music of the dispossessed. It was an expression of suffering, hope and sometimes defiance- which is what makes it so exciting and inspiring. I just couldn’t get excited about any music that concerned itself with trickle down wealth, the rate of profit and middle class aspiration.
But the music we love is, by and large, evolved from black musical forms that were themselves reaction to hardship and oppression. I dislike the misogyny in some reggae, but that doesn’t mean I don’t find Bob Marley and Burning Spear tremendously emotionally and spiritually uplifting. I’m enormously moved by the gospel of Aretha Franklin, even if I prefer not to accept the Christian content.
Rock and roll and soul emerged from the music of the dispossessed. It was an expression of suffering, hope and sometimes defiance- which is what makes it so exciting and inspiring. I just couldn’t get excited about any music that concerned itself with trickle down wealth, the rate of profit and middle class aspiration.
Cheese
Bitter lover
Yes, pretty much. Have a google at 'Verachtet mir die Meister nicht' in Meistersinger. But I am neither very knowledgeable about Wagner's work as a whole, nor about its historic context. I can imagine that hundreds of books have been written on the subject you mention.
Not necessarily, some decidedly upperclass people were remarkably good at describing the life of the underdogs. Janis Joplin comes to mind, some of the Stones, even the Beatles weren't working class apart from Ringo. Some French chansonniers of filthy rich upbringing were equally impressive at it.
gavreid
Pretty Words...
and the Nazis loved Beethoven!