The Rolling Stones and Philosophy_ It's Just a Thought Away - Luke Dick [102]
My parents, as I mentioned, had no such fear. They lived the sexual revolution, detested the psychology of racism, and they weren’t afraid to bring racist tendencies to consciousness when they were operating subliminally, but divisively. Prejudices against rock and roll, legal or otherwise, in Arkansas contained the external deposit of a moral history rife with a deep psychology concerning sexuality, a psychology of racism, and fear of integration and miscegenation. The Rolling Stones have sympathy for the devil, but the devil was just a projection of white southern fear and repressed libidinal urges. These projections, according to my parents and so many others of the 1960s protest generation, are the truer sin—even if we predict that transgressing them will have grave consequences—even if those projections have become law. But, seeing how much indeterminacy is in the law, we cannot always predict how “de judge he gonna judge,” or even if the defendant, as in Richards’s case, will end up being the one pounding the gavel.
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How Come You’re So Wrong, My Sweet Neo Con?
JOSEPH J. FOY
One of the best tracks on 2005’s A Bigger Bang is the overtly political “Sweet Neo Con.” Critical of the policies and political climate during the presidential administration of George W. Bush, as well as US foreign and domestic politics and the rampant corruption and cronyism of corporatist politics, “Sweet Neo Con” breaks from the more poetic and personal lyrics on the rest of the album. Jagger’s lyrics are not subtle. They are an unconcealed indictment along the lines of “You call yourself a Christian / I think that you’re a hypocrite / You say you are a patriot / I think that you’re a crock of shit.” As Jagger told Newsweek’s Lorraine Ali, “It is direct.” Then, impersonating Keith Richards, he claimed, “It’s really not metaphorical.”43
The Rolling Stones have always had an anti-establishment aura. That’s why Richards and fans of the band chided Jagger for accepting the knighthood honor for “services to music” from Prince Charles. But The Stones only rarely engage in direct political expression. “Sweet Neo Con,” however, is a rock anthem that inserted The Stones directly into politics. Although some praised the politics of the song, others thought the band should have remained apolitical.
On the left, filmmaker Michael Moore and journalist and commentator Bill Moyers felt the song was a welcome change for the band and for the political dialogue in the United States. On the right, people like conservative blogger Matt Drudge argued that the “Bush-bashing” song was nothing more than a way for the band to deflect geriatric jokes and pander to young audiences.
Both sides, though, get it wrong. Ultimately, “Sweet Neo Con” actually crystallizes the band’s politics across the years and the role The Stones have played in defining the public sphere.
No Place for a Street Fighting Man?
For many casual listeners, the only thing The Rolling Stones seem to have in common with politics is the familiar strain, “You can’t always get what you want.” There were hints of revolutionary strains in songs like “Street Fighting Man,” inspired by an anti-war rally at the US Embassy in London in 1968. But for the most part The Stones seemed to preach a message of solitary disaffection. “Hey you, get off of my cloud.”
Despite being formed in 1962, and coming of age during a time of tremendous political change and social upheaval in London and America (The Stones being heavily influenced by American blues musicians like Muddy Waters—a track from whom they got the inspiration for the name of the band—and early rock’n’roll artists like Chuck Berry), they never seemed to embrace the all too common role of becoming celebrity spokesmen for political activism. While John Lennon was trying to rally Americans to end the war in Vietnam (“War is over, if you want it”), and President Richard Nixon was trying to have him deported,