Album: Rage Against The Machine
Artist: Rage Against The Machine
Artist: Rage Against The Machine
Born: Los Angeles, California
Released: November 1992
Genre: Rap Metal
Although metal's short-lived popularity had waned significantly by the early 90s, its influence was felt on grunge and bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers (fused with funk) and Rage Against The Machine (fused with rap). Incendiary is the best way to describe RATM's sound on this album, from the anarchic politics screamed out by frontman Zach de la Rocha to the Black Sabbath-style power riffs peddled by guitarist Tommy Morello. Both singles released in 1992, Killing In The Name and Bullet In The Head, were unlike any other music around in terms of sound and intensity, while also at odds with the apathetic, slacker ethos of Generation X. The picture on the album cover, depicting a Buddhist monk in 1960s Vietnam engaging in an act of self-immolation (the word was new to me, like many people, at the time) was just as striking as the music itself. In the sleeve notes, de la Rocha thanked political activists like Bobby Sands and Black Panther founder Huey P. Newton for inspiration, while on songs like Wake Up he points the finger at "networks" suppressing movements inspired by black leaders such as Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Released in the year of the LA riots, triggered by the acquittal of the police officers on trial for the brutal beating of Rodney King, this album had huge political resonance.
Killing In The Name, with its simple production and political edge, has come to represent everything that modern pop music isn't, as exemplified by the 2009 Facebook campaign to make it the Christmas No.1 instead of the latest X Factor vehicle. I also love the fact that BBC breakfast radio DJ Bruno Brookes accidentally played the uncensored "f**k you" version in 1993. Just as fiery as Killing In The Name was album opener Bombtrack, with its video in support of Peru's violent Maoist insurgency group Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path). RATM also trained their sights on South African apartheid in Township Rebellion and the US media on Bullet In The Head, one of the album's highlights. Like REM (in their song, Ignoreland), RATM must have been aware of Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent and its central idea that the US media is in cahoots with the government to control the minds of the population, distracting their attention from real issues with a diet of sports, entertainment and advertising ("Believin' all the lies that they're tellin' ya / buyin' all the products that they're sellin' ya"). From Brad Wilk's furious drumming to de la Rocha's throat-shredding rendition of the chorus and distinctive "ugh", as well as Morello's mind-blowing guitar work, Bullet In The Head is probably the best thing RATM ever did. Although the band spawned a legion of awful rap metal imitators like Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit, it's not really fair to hold that against them.
Although metal's short-lived popularity had waned significantly by the early 90s, its influence was felt on grunge and bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers (fused with funk) and Rage Against The Machine (fused with rap). Incendiary is the best way to describe RATM's sound on this album, from the anarchic politics screamed out by frontman Zach de la Rocha to the Black Sabbath-style power riffs peddled by guitarist Tommy Morello. Both singles released in 1992, Killing In The Name and Bullet In The Head, were unlike any other music around in terms of sound and intensity, while also at odds with the apathetic, slacker ethos of Generation X. The picture on the album cover, depicting a Buddhist monk in 1960s Vietnam engaging in an act of self-immolation (the word was new to me, like many people, at the time) was just as striking as the music itself. In the sleeve notes, de la Rocha thanked political activists like Bobby Sands and Black Panther founder Huey P. Newton for inspiration, while on songs like Wake Up he points the finger at "networks" suppressing movements inspired by black leaders such as Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Released in the year of the LA riots, triggered by the acquittal of the police officers on trial for the brutal beating of Rodney King, this album had huge political resonance.
Killing In The Name, with its simple production and political edge, has come to represent everything that modern pop music isn't, as exemplified by the 2009 Facebook campaign to make it the Christmas No.1 instead of the latest X Factor vehicle. I also love the fact that BBC breakfast radio DJ Bruno Brookes accidentally played the uncensored "f**k you" version in 1993. Just as fiery as Killing In The Name was album opener Bombtrack, with its video in support of Peru's violent Maoist insurgency group Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path). RATM also trained their sights on South African apartheid in Township Rebellion and the US media on Bullet In The Head, one of the album's highlights. Like REM (in their song, Ignoreland), RATM must have been aware of Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent and its central idea that the US media is in cahoots with the government to control the minds of the population, distracting their attention from real issues with a diet of sports, entertainment and advertising ("Believin' all the lies that they're tellin' ya / buyin' all the products that they're sellin' ya"). From Brad Wilk's furious drumming to de la Rocha's throat-shredding rendition of the chorus and distinctive "ugh", as well as Morello's mind-blowing guitar work, Bullet In The Head is probably the best thing RATM ever did. Although the band spawned a legion of awful rap metal imitators like Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit, it's not really fair to hold that against them.
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