Pop Politics:

This May, John J. Miller of the National Review published a list of what he called "The 50 Greatest Conservative Rock Songs." Feathers, unsurprisingly, were ruffled - most notably those of Dave Marsh, whom the New York Times quoted as calling the list "a desperate effort by the right to co-opt popular culture." Miller's reply was predictably sarcastic, but on the surface defensible: "In other words," he rolled his eyes, "the 62 million Americans who voted for President Bush's reelection don't actually participate in the creation and consumption of pop culture, but we steal it and twist it in dastardly ways.Yawn."

Indeed, the question posed by Miller's list, as well as the follow-up which appended 50 more "conservative" songs and defended his choices against the likes of Marsh, was a reasonable one: with more and more Baby Boomers leaning right as the years go by, shouldn't political conservatives have as fair a shake at pop culture as their more traditionally "rock'n'roll" neighbors on the left? The only trouble was, Miller didn't make his point with songs by authentic right-wingers like Ted Nugent, Johnny Ramone or Lynyrd Skynyrd; instead, he did "co-opt" lyrics by everyone from Bob Dylan and the Beatles to the Clash and the Dead Kennedys, twisting a series of mostly progressive icons until his own ideologies were wrung out, like blood squeezed from the proverbial stone. Again, the backlash from (mostly liberal) bloggers and journalists was swift and well-deserved, and I have nothing to add to this six-month-old debate that a clear-eyed look at Miller's lists won't immediately underline - namely that the day Jello Biafra writes a "conservative" rock song, at least in Miller's terms, will be a cold day in hell indeed. What I do have to point out, however, is a disturbing trend of which the National Review articles are a symptom, not a cause. I'm talking about the wholesale theft of rock'n'roll music, by nefarious forces on both sides of the political aisle.


It's tough to say exactly when this phenomenon occurred. Obviously, politics have been a part of rock music ever since Alan Freed spun "Tutti Frutti," but traditionally the relationship has been an antagonistic one; from the conservative politicians who decried 1950s rock'n'roll for its delinquent edge and open embracement of black culture to the Parents Music Resource Center brouhaha of the 1980s, the establishment's place has been one of obstruction between "the kids" and their music: a paternalistic, authoritarian force whose very presence (and ultimate impotence) made rock's juvenile rebellion that much more appealing. But somewhere between "Cop Killer" and John J. Miller, the line in the sand disappeared. Ever so subtly, rock and politics laid aside their differences and participated in that most dreaded of modern corporate manuevers: the merger. Hence the Sex Pistols' "Bodies" - a grisly, bourgeoisie-spooking punk rock horrorshow if ever there was one - being spun as some kind of pro-life anthem, or the egregious use of The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again" during George W. Bush's 2000 presidential campaign. And all that's left to do is ask, what in the hell happened?

The most apparent answer - and almost certainly the correct one - is to blame rock's new acceptibility by the establishment on the same thing that unintentionally spawned prog rock, Hair, and all number of other sins against the spirit of rock and roll: the Sixties. It was during that decade of decades, after all, when rock musicians first began to lay claim to the idea of political relevancy - and when, thanks to the introduction of "kinder, gentler" rock and rollers like the Beatles, politicians began to look at rock with more than just their typical outrage. This is not to equate the flowering mid-'60s musical protest movement with the sickeningly close meetings between rock and politics mentioned above, nor to suggest that The MC5 playing the Democratic National Convention is in any way comparable to Black Eyed Peas playing the Democratic National Convention. But in the dawning of political consciousness for rockers in the 1960s lie the roots of more ambitious, more establishment-approved ventures, from Elvis in Nixon's White House to Bono with Rick Santorum. And let's not forget the aging Baby Boomers themselves: as the disillusioned late '60s and '70s trudged steadily toward the Reagan-era 1980s, the same generation which had caught butterflies at Woodstock and painted peace signs on their Volkswagens found themselves growing gradually more Republicanized, clinging on to their cultural ephemera as they went and thus radically changing the very meaning of their collective youth. Just call it the Sonny Bono Effect.

Thus from youthful idealism to ideologically neutral nostalgia can be traced an organic path for rock and politics, two seemingly divergent movements sadly destined to intertwine. By the same cultural irony which allows corporations to sell life insurance with a trip down flower-power memory lane, the rock iconography of the 1960s and '70s has been commandeered by straitlaced Democrats and Republicans alike, undoubtedly in the name of appearing "cool" and "relatable." Americans - and especially Baby Boomers - love rock and roll, goes the reasoning. And while apparently it's still not okay for politicans to embrace certain "other" aspects of rock culture, nobody said they can't cop a power chord or two to match their red, white and blue balloons.


By this logic, then, the threat is nearly over. After all, when members of my generation - the twenty-somethings who came of age under Clinton, and more importantly, in an era when rock music in the boomer vein was already considered passe - "grow up" and become the targets of politicians, the use of Fleetwood Mac's "Don't Stop" for campaigning purposes will feel just as hopelessly irrelevant to us as...well, frankly, as it did in 1996. Also encouraging is the fact that hip-hop (Black Eyed Peas aside) has still mostly resisted the lure of mainstream politics, proving that when it comes to conservative attitudes toward black culture, little has actually changed since 1956. But this is avoiding a larger issue, which is that the Man, for lack of a better word, is getting smarter. If the powers that be can shift from total opposition against rock and roll to savvy appropriation in just a few short decades, who's to say they aren't already cooking up new ways to make our culture safe, regulated and ideologically approved even as we speak? Who says that in ten years (or five), we won't be hearing about insurance bonds to the strains of Nirvana's Nevermind, or watching the latest family-values candidate take the stage to the sound of "The National Anthem" - as in the one from Kid A?

I wish I could say I knew a surefire way to prevent this eventuality. As it stands, however, my only solution is a simple one: constant vigilance. We can't let our music, our culture, be commodified and ideologized the way our parents' was. We must draw that line again, and draw it well; no more needless politicization of songs which rightfully belong outside the circus of mainstream politics, preferably as far from it as they can get. This is our music, god damn it, not some stuffed shirt's talking points. And lest you believe this is solely a left-against-right issue, for the record, I don't want Democrats' sweaty paws all over my music any more than I want Republicans'. What I want is my rock and roll back: pure, undiluted, and free of any establishment-endorsed social responsibility. They can keep their Fleetwood Mac and their Billy Joel; see if I care. But as the 2006 midterms fast approach - and as the rickety old democratic machine gears up for 2008's presidential election - just remember to keep those leeches the fuck away from the good stuff.

See Also: Rock and Politics, as they should be.