Rock 'n Roll as a Reflection of Our Times: How Will the Artists Respond to the Tragedy?

This nation is involved in what may very likely be its very first sustained military action since the Vietnam War, which occurred when I was a youngster. It is too early to tell at this early stage what the ultimate artistic response(s) will be to the threatened actions by the United States in Operation Enduring Freedom. So far, artists have pretty much confined their focus on the tragedy that have motivated this engagement against terrorism; the attacks on The World Trade Center and Pentagon. While views on what to do about the attacks will grow increasingly divergent with time, there is unanimity in the grief and support being shown throughout the nation.

Assuming that the Bush administration's talk turns into reality, the attempt to stop terrorism will take many years. I've already seen newspaper articles chronicling the ambivalence of America's college-aged population regarding the draft and the 'war effort' itself. There is clearly no consensus yet, nor should there be, since no one knows what the hell is going on.
Throughout American history, music has responded to war, and normally in positive and patriotic fashion, as songs dating back to the Revolutionary War were used to rouse citizens, provide commentary and increase loyalty to the cause. You can find such songs during the Civil War and both World Wars. However, subsequent U.S. military action has not inspired artists in that direction.

The true beginning of rock and roll dates back to around the time of the Korean War. As with most forms of popular music, the fledgling style was simply not concerned with much in the way of social issues. Things changed in the '60s.
Two major ingredients turned rock into anti-war music. First, the incorporation of modern folk music influences, which relied a great deal on social commentary as a lyrical device, opened up some rock artists to actually singing about the world at large, and not just narcisstic youth culture issues. Second, the Vietnam War slowly but surely became a very unpopular conflict. Americans got to see war on television for the first time, and it was an ugly, unwinnable war. The voices of dissent began to rise.

And rock music was there on the scene. Just as the songs of Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley responded to a post-Depression/WWII youth culture with energy to burn and cash to spend (and some youth were awakened by those songs - the effect went both ways), artists like the MC5, Country Joe and the Fish and so many others not just reflected an anti-war sentiment, but sometimes did so in a stridently militant manner.

Once the door to true political expression was opened, so many others ran through it, generally expressing anti-Establishment sentiments - from Brewer and Shipley's "One Toke Over The Line" to the sharp anger of The Sex Pistols and The Clash, rock and roll was generally down on The Man. It's not that all rock was left-wing - see Ted Nugent - it's just that rock is in part (but not wholly) a vehicle for vocalizing against those in power - whether it be Mom and Dad, your boss or Uncle Sam.

While I don't want to stereotype, a lot of the artistic response to the issues of the '60s and subsequent decades has been predictably liberal. I think it is due to the nature of the artist to search for truths and break boundaries. Conservatism, from a conceptual standpoint, does not need to search for truths, since the truth is already at hand, and thus boundaries don't need to be broken. That is, the conservative mindset is probably more likely to become a banker than a painter. This isn't to say that all pop music inevitably leans left. The one form of popular music in the latter half of the 20th Century that most often reflects conservative thought in socio-political commentary is country music. This is certainly no coincidence, given the cultural make up of a substantial percentage of the country audience.
Will the liberal trend continue in the new 21st Century version of war? This is tricky. For one thing, America's actions are the result of the first true attack on the United States since Pearl Harbor. Where it was easy to deride the nation in wars against people who had done nothing to tangibly injure us, things are much different now. And as we've already seen, voices of dissent are finding that now is not a good time to suggest any flaws in America relating to the attacks. Still, if military strikes kill numerous civilians or prove to be ineffective, there will be less fear for artists to be critical of any efforts.

However, I will not be surprised if we see a wave of uncharacteristically reactionary rock. This is partly due to the fact that many popular rock acts, though packaged as rebellious for their frank attitudes on sex, violence and such, at their core often represent a huge backwards step for intelligent thinking in rock, stoking a nihilistic worldview with a very sexist undercurrent. I venture to say in the next six months, there will be publicity for the first rap-rock 'bomb the Arabs' song. The other reason is that rock has been so corporatized that there are very few artists on major labels who have the brains or guts to rock the boat. I foresee an upward trend in patriotic songs - less than six months for the first boy band/pop gurl jingoistic dance tune (I'm actually surprised Jessica Simpson hasn't released one yet).

I'm writing this column at about the last minute - though I don't feel the attacks are reason not to think about, discuss and enjoy music, the magnitude of what happened makes it tough to avoid. But I wanted to avoid any political polemics - not that I'm worried about offending, it's just that this personally isn't the right forum for my thoughts on what happened. I don't think events like this put things in perspective - they actually throw the little and big things that make up our everyday lives way out of focus. There's nothing wrong with enjoying your leisure time or taking your hobbies seriously. What's out of whack is failing to stay informed of what is going on in the world.

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