Rush the Rage

Again, I feel challenged to write something of import, and therefore, the message for today is the connection between bands and the messages they wish to convey, or more importantly, the messages they fail to convey. Let me put that another way. When I was 19 years old, a band came out—a band that held the power of the heaviest of heavies and combined that with the political mind of mid-90’s rap music. When Rage Against the Machine said that some of those that were enforcers were the same that burned crosses, you believed it. You weren’t sure whether, necessarily, that meant that there were too many cops who were also in the KKK, or that we shouldn’t believe that all cops were racists because, as the song pointed out, only some of the enforcers burned crosses, but nonetheless, it seemed imperative that they get their message out there, and I for one was glad to hear it.
Eventually though, the band broke up and as many of you now know, they bonded with Chris Cornell of Soundgarden fame to produce Audio Slave, which is neither controversial or good. The lead singer of Rage, whatever his name me be, must (I assume) have become tired of kids moshing to his music but never really starting a rebellion. Let’s put it another way. He says that he’s rolling down Rodeo with a shotgun and that these people haven’t seen a crowd get mad since their grandparents bought one. Does that mean that he’s hoping that the rich people shopping on Rodeo drive are the crowd and that they will be amazed by the power they can wield when they get together, or is he saying that others, like himself, will be rolling down Rodeo with a shotgun. Is this an invitation. Well, no one took it up. At least, I think if they had I would have heard about it on the news.
Now you may ask why? Why would so many people listening to this music, enjoying it—impressionable young people to boot—not go rolling down Rodeo with a shotgun. This failure to move the masses to open rebellion is clearly what eventually broke up Rage, but for a moment I’d like to switch gears before explaining why the movement failed.
There is a magazine for bass players which yearly has a contest to determine which bassist is the bassist of the year. Recently, said magazine has taken out of the running Geddy Lee of Rush and Les Claypool of Primus. The reason being of course that if these two were allowed to compete no one else would ever win, and I think it’s fair to mention that, as far as Les is concerned, Geddy is the better bassist—I myself would disagree, but then what do I know.
Now, many of you are probably saying, “Rush?” Yes, Rush…”But, but, but, Rush?” I know. Never in my life have I really thought to myself, whoa, I think I’ll go buy a Rush album. And yet they have the greatest bassist of all times. So, here we have it: two supposedly disparate bands that seem to have nothing in common except their talent levels and of course a message. Rush too has a message, but who would know it. No one listens to Rush.
I would like to say at this point that, fear not, I have the answer as to why neither of these bands was able to illicit the responses from listeners that they would perhaps hope to illicit. Let’s examine some lyrics. First Rage:
“I am the Nina, the Pinta, the Santa Maria,”
okay, okay, so far so good. He’s a ship, or three ships. Good stuff, but I’m still not raging against the machine like I aught to be.
“the blah blah, the blah blah, the walls of Recida.”
What? What did he say? Isn’t Recida the town that the karate kid moved to. I mean sure it had some assholes living there, but Mr. Miagi lived there too.
“the new style, the blah, the blah, the priests of Hiroshima.”
I don’t know what that means, but it really sounds cool. I think that I too want to be a priest of Hiroshima. The song goes on to tell me to sleep now in the fire, because it’s right outside my door. Seriously though, what the hell am I supposed to do. I think people were moshing at Rage concerts because the lyrics were just a little too confusing. Quit with the imagery already, I don’t get it. Stick with something. First your Columbus’s ship, and the next thing you know you’re worshipping atomic annihilation (I think). Does that make sense? I think not. And it doesn’t end there. What family am I rallying around? Is that bad? Is being a bull bad? What are my options?
Along those lines, here’s some lines from Rush:
“Bands are mediocre because once they are noticed by a production company they are forced to surrender whatever ounce of originality they had to get them noticed in order to create music according to some studio exec’s equation of marketable music.”
Well, that music’s message is clear, but it really isn’t fun to sing along to. I mean, if they want me to start a rebellion, they’ve told me why, but it just doesn’t have the catchiness of Rage. It’s very much like the weirdoes at coffee shops who are sitting around reading Sarte, who’s telling them, you can do whatever you want to do, and what are they choosing to do: read Sarte. That’s horrible.
In any case, I have a solution. Either Rush has to start making references to Pocahontas, Ruby Ridge, and/or NAFTA, or Geddy Lee will have to keep playing base, stop singing, and get the guy from Rage to sing from him. My thought is he’s probably in southern Mexico trying to help out the Zapitistas. Well, that’s just another bomb track, roll the bones.