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Musicians vs. Politicians, Part XCLVII
As Gov. Scott Walker took the stage at Saturday’s Iowa Freedom Summit, a Celtic-tinged rock tune blared through the speakers. The song pumped up the crowd and garnered a few compliments on social media.
Campaign walk-on music usually consists of patriotic standards, inoffensive baby boomer nostalgia, or “Beautiful Day” by U2. (If C-SPAN paid ASCAP fees, Bono & Co. would own the network by now.)
Walker’s team (or event organizers) chose the intro to “I’m Shipping Up to Boston” by Irish-American punk band the Dropkick Murphys. Even if you don’t recognize the song’s title, you’ve heard it a zillion times on ads, sitcoms and at sporting events.
Looking back, the choice was somewhat subversive since it’s a cover version of a tedious old Woody Guthrie standard. Considering Walker’s famous battles with out-of-control government unions, it could have been a subtle dig at labor’s heroic narrative, though I doubt anyone thought that deeply about it.
Conforming slavishly to stereotype, the Dropkick Murphys are boring lefties who get offended when non-approved people enjoy their derivative tunes. The over-the-hill band bravely took to Twitter to react precisely as everyone expected:
@ScottWalker @GovWalker please stop using our music in any way…we literally hate you !!! Love, Dropkick Murphys
— Dropkick Murphys (@DropkickMurphys) January 25, 2015
The last time I saw the words hate and love so close together they were tattooed on Robert De Niro’s knuckles. No one ever mistook the band for competent writers (just look at their lyrics), but they got their message across: We are offended by people different from us.
For his part, Walker had no comment, because what’s the point, really? Pretty much every song a conservative chooses outside of the Oak Ridge Boys or Lee Greenwood is going to get a rise out of the people who recorded it. Bruce Springsteen whined when Ronald Reagan played “Born in the U.S.A.” John Mellencamp and Sting asked George W. Bush to stop playing their songs while Tom Petty filed a cease-and-desist order. Living up to his name, Petty also freaked out when Michele Bachmann used “American Girl,” and almost every song chosen by McCain/Palin made the musicians squawk.
This reaction has always confused me. If somebody compliments my work, I don’t demand to see their voter registration before thanking them. If someone on the other side likes an article of mine, I consider it an unexpected win. No musician is actually offended by praise; he just wants to show the rest of his progressive tribe that he’s as much of a boring conformist as they are.
For Walker, et al., I recommend they just ignore the whining. Let the pampered artists kvetch while the candidates focus on the voters. And, by the way, would it kill you to play some Ramones?
Image Credit: Ivica Drusany / Shutterstock.com
Published in General
If the Beatles are “rock” then so is Iggy Azelea. And I would take two bars from the Black Keys over their entire catalog.
I agree with a similar sentiment expressed above, that, if I confined my music listening to conservative artists, I’d be left with Ted Nugent and Charlie Daniels. That is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, because certainly there are more rock and pop artists than those who are libertarian or conservative-leaning.
That said, Republican politicians are constantly falling into the trap and being burned when they try to be hip and play a cool rockin’ tune in front of a live crowd.
There must be a way to vet these decisions. Like Mitt Romney cozying up to Kid Rock (I know, I know, a lotta good that did him) certainly someone has a list of prospective “friendly” artists and phone calls could be made well ahead of events. And I’m just talking about using a song…not touring with the artist like Mitt and Kid did.
This isn’t rocket science. It should be part of basic GOP campaigning and event-planning. The GOP has an extra high wall to hurdle. They should realize the blowback of using a song without permission. Maybe it wasn’t necessary in the 80s and 90s, but now with snarky, twitchy fingers ready at the keyboard, staffers need to be on top of this.
Apologies to everyone for messing up the roman numerals in the title. In my defense, I attended free community college. (On the Navy’s dime, but still.)
Any GOP candidate should have a foul-mouthed rapper on their campaign team. And an anti-big-government punk rock band. I am available.
Yes of course, we will honor your wishes and cease from using your head banging accordion music, though this harms our electoral prospects deeply. It’s always lefties that do this because the same emotion that inspires and instructs their music does so their politics.
I asked a campaign specialist today if the candidates paid for an ASCAP/BMI license and was told they usually rely on the venues to cover that. They’re probably skirting the legality of this to begin with.
so that’s what that is! the problem with a lot of commonly played pieces of classical music is i can’t easily look them up to see what it is.
Moby had the same reaction. He said he found the irony amusing.
ASCAP & BMI license fees are paid by the venues, not the users of the venues. They generally carry a blanket license that covers all music played at the venue.
The problem comes when music is synced to video (as EJ is probably well aware – being a video pro). A separate sync license must be obtained from the music publisher/owner and from the owner of the recorded master (assuming a commercial recording is being played).
So, if music is played at a live political event, it is covered by ASCAP/BMI licenses. If the event is broadcast (other than simply being covered by the news media), a sync license & a recorded master license may in order.
All that said, everybody knows that Liberals are the cool kids and Conservatives are the nerds. (That is practically Holy Writ so far as the media is concerned.) When Conservatives use hip music in their campaigns, they should not be surprised when they are mocked and derided by the cool kids. That is our lot in life.
The Dropkick Murphys have every right to complain about Walker’s use of their song. I obviously don’t agree with their politics, but I do like their music. If I had a popular song, (which I don’t), I wouldn’t be happy if the Clinton Campaign used it in during its campaign stops. I wouldn’t tweet about how much I hate her, but I would tell Hillary that I was flattered but still not going to vote for her. The Murphys are unapologetically pro-union, so it only makes sense that they hate Walker.
Floppy, never heard of this iggy