I am not going to comment on the budget, because quite frankly, I can’t be arsed. Gordon Brown fucks over people like me - low paid, no kids - with what amounts to be a tax hike after the abolition of the 10% base rate of income tax, whilst giving a tax cut to the corporations and business in order to “stimulate growth”. The only “growth” that has been “simulated” is in a particular region of males in boardrooms across the city (because, let’s face it, the City only enters the parts of the 21st century that it likes - equality amongst the sexes not being one of them).
Oh, that was a comment on the budget, wasn’t it? Oh well, the point is that it’s no change from the norm, so I don’t think it’s worth any new comment. Dave Osler has commented more on it over on his blog.
What’s provoked me to write is Times “comment centralist” Daniel Finkelstien is whinging that there are no centre-right rock stars and encouraging fellow wingnuts to help him compile a CD of tunes which wreck the mike in support of the family, low taxes, small government and other such bollocks.
Good luck to him, I say. Rock and roll, as one of his commentators pointed out, is anti-establishment, which is what the centre-right is. But it’s left me in a bit of a quandry, too, because apart from the Manic Street Preachers (who are a bit crap musically in my view as well as being politically crap - c’mon lads, quasi-Maoism is so 1970’s) and bands like Rage Against The Machine/System of a Down/Green Day which have a fairly limited fan base amongst teenagers in their bedrooms, there aren’t any decent far left bands or tunes since the 1980’s.
So, in response to Finkelstein’s challenge, here’s the KitNotes version: Find me left tunes that have come out since 1990, that don’t include the above bands. They don’t count. I don’t care what genre they come from, but they must have a radical message.
So, for example, “He Got Game” by Public Enemy with such lyrics as…
God takes care of ol folks and fools
While the devil takes care
Of makin the rules
Folks dont even own themselves
Payin mental rent
To corporate presidents
1 outta 1 million residents
Be a dissident
Who aint kissin it
The politics of chains and whips
Got the sick
Missin chips and championships
Whats love got to do
Wit what you got
… counts, as does, perhaps, “People Hold On” by Coldcut & Lisa Stansfield:
Everybodys looking for a meaning
Everybodys doing their own thing
And nobodys solving the problem
Aint nobody helping each other
Some people give into fear
Some people give into hunger
Some of us live for the future
And some of us wonder
Give a little life, give a little love
Maybe theres enough for everyone
Give a little hope, and a little trust
Maybe theres enough for everyone
… whilst being a bit hippyish, it’s quite clearly a critique of Thacherism. The person who nominates the best song, and gives the best reason for it’s inclusion, will win a copy of the final CD.
The winner will be announced at the Socialist Bloggers Meetup. My decision is final (this blog isn’t a democracy, you know) and no arguments will be entered into.
Get to it!
Chumbawamba
A Man Walks into a Bar
A man walks into a bar
He Says, “Give me a Bacardi and Coke.”
The back of beyond repair
Welcomes the broken and the broke
The latter hitches a ride
On the back of second-hand smoke
And the man,
Well he’d be the punch line
It’s someone else’s joke
I’ll beat this drink
It’s a habit I’ll kick
Please help me now
I’m gonna be sick
Something hit me
I wound up on the floor
Damn this Bacardi
I don’t want anymore
A man walks into a think-tank
Full of hooch and future sales
Mixing wish lists with extension plans
Re: Guantanamo Jail
Smell the solid beach
And a whiff of cannot fail
And a guilt trait shop with goblets
Dripping cutthroat cocktails
And they drink a toast to Florida
And all its air-conditioned hum
And they damn the health of Cuba
And they damn its bone fide rum
He sips a kalamata olive
Spits out the stone
And he mimics crushing people
Between forefinger and thumb
I’ll beat this drink
It’s a habit I’ll kick
Please help me now
I’m gonna be sick
Something hit me
I wound up on the floor
Damn This Bacardi
I don’t want anymore
The first man wakes up in the same bar
But it’s different as in a dream
In fact it’s someone else’s dream
Clean sheets & new regime
Fidel burns as Nero roams
Give the bar a zip code
See ya
See ya
See you
And it’s one more for the road
I’ll beat this drink
It’s a habit I’ll kick
Please help me now
I’m gonna be sick
Something hit me
I wound up on the floor
Damn this Bacardi
I don’t want anymore
Clearly there are more apt songs but they don’t come to mind.
No decent political bands since the 80s? Shame on you, you’ve just ignored the greatest band of all time and most influential since Sabbath…
http://www.napalmdeath.org/
Browse lyrics at: http://www.darklyrics.com/n/napalmdeath.html
My favourite ND song (for the music in this case, though the lyrics aren’t bad either):
I abstain!
Summon my pride?
What? Pride behind your blinkered eyes?
Your vigilance is shit
“The lads together” - you fall!
Smug complacency,
Notions of reserving the right to think with your fists,
I abstain from this mundane apathy.
Commited to “All for red, white and blue”
In effect you’re fighting for what’s really fighting you.
“Grit those teeth, push out those chests”
Tears only for the flag,
Always the brave patriot as you slip to second class.
But you stand stead fast?
People are not subjects,
Why should the few get more respect?
Open your eyes!
Imperialism feeds off you,
Not patrons but patronised,
Open your eyes!
They’re shaping you - you’re trapped with ‘pomp and
circumstance’
Lose your discretion,
Sodom, you’ll not fall from grace
Endorse their rhetoric
You fade, they prosper.
I abstain!
Don’t be a colonial slave,
Don’t substantiate the act.
Moving from death metal to socially conscious rap, some of Saul Williams’ music is pretty political. This, about reparations:
I want my money back. I’m down here drowning in your fat. You got me on my knees praying for everything you lack. I ain’t afraid of you. I’m just a victim of your fears. You cower in your tower praying that I’ll disappear, I got another plan, one that requires me to stand. On the stage or in the street, don’t need no microphone or beat. And when you hear this song, if you ain’t dead then sing along. Bang and strum to these here drums til you get where you belong.
I got a list of demands written on the palm of my hands. I ball my fist and you’re gonna know where I stand. We’re living hand to mouth! You wanna be somebody? See somebody? Try and free somebody? I gotta list of demands written on the palm of my hands. I ball my fist and you’re gonna know where I stand. We’re living hand to mouth! Hand to mouth!