National Review magazine has published a list of what it considers the 'Top 50 Conservative Rock Songs' Rockin' the Right The 50 greatest conservative rock songs Peruse the list at your leisure, wonder, be amazed, snort in contempt, or hell - ignore it if you so desire ! LoL Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
The conservative movement certainly has a love-hate relationship with us libertarians. They embraced us when our headlines were about gun rights, deregulation, foreign aid, respect for wacko religions, and lower taxes. Then they disowned us when we started harrassing them about unlimited immigration, censorship, keeping the military on the inside of our borders, respect for wacko religions, and lower taxes. Now here they are making nice with us again. . . or at least attempting to co-opt our music. At least half of those songs have nothing to do with the American conservative political philosphy, but are squarely libertarian. "Won't Get Fooled Again" is all about the evils of big government, leftist or rightist. "Sweet Home Alabama" was written more than thirty years ago, when the South was still Democrat country. The jab at Neil Young is strictly personal, a response to his songwriting, not his politics. The song contains much more clearly political statements against Governor George Wallace's die-hard enforcement of racial segregation and Republican President Richard Nixon's dishonorable behavior in the Watergate scandal. The quotes from other lyrics are just as selective. "Sympathy for the Devil" has a line bashing the quintessential right-wing Nazi government: "I drove a tank, held a general's rank when the violence raged and the blitzkrieg stank." And out of context. U2 is from Ireland, where Catholicism is still done the old way, in Latin. To quote a Latin hymn is to communicate with the entire Irish people. This list is just an illustration of how politicians can twist anything to support their case.
Next thing you know, someone will claim to have actually uncovered meaning in "Stairway to Heaven." Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I'm surprised it's not on the list... Surely the religious right would agree that there's a Heaven for there to be stairway to. "Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run There's still time to change the road you're on." A reference to redemption...? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
The first verse makes it clear that if the song is about anything at all, it's not being redeemed but renouncing materialism. That was a popular and politically correct theme in the Sixties. (That inaccurately named twelve year period between 1963 and 1975.) Any references to Christian themes in Zep's work would have been accidental and in the context of the liberally sprinkled references to other types of spirituality including paganism and the cult of "Lord of the Rings."Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
` They were stoned at the time... Now they're ho-bags for Cadillac, so clearly they themselves have been "redeemed". Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
` You must read between the lines... He's saying he's a Siiimpuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuulllllllll.... Kiiind-a maa-yuuuun.... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
