Music and politics

First,let me say that I respect anyones thoughts or beliefs on politics.This is a free country(for the most part)one can choose to voice their opinion any way they want.Second,you do not have to listen to anyone's views, you can always turn off the media or not buy tickets or recordings.Most of the artists that include this type of behavior are well known so, don't support them if you this bothers you. Personally, I do not care for the political banter at a concert so I do not attend shows by artists that do this,my choice. I got blindsided by this at a Jackson Browne show several years ago.I felt totally ripped off,he will never see any of my money again,also my choice.Remember,everyone has a right to convey their message and everyone has a right to not listen to it.

USSR used to have problems with some purely instrumental stuff. Oh those subversive violins and oboes, always causing problems and stirring things up! Or was it the violas? Sort them out in the Gulag!

Ah yes Onhhwy61, you really are something. You have NO idea who you are talking to or what you are saying. You can try that sensationalist, race-bating crap all you want with someone else but it isn't gonna fly with me. I lived, ate, cried and breathed music as a former professional musician with my bandmates who were my best friends and like family - three of whom were Hispanic, one of whom was Albanian and two of whom were black and we saw it all in the 60s and 70s.

The "black" man that you childishly, naively and erroneously insinuate inconvenienced me by acting upon his principles also chose to ply his craft for me and all his other disgusting white fans (as YOU would characterize them) who made him a multi-millionaire. We had NO problem with him acting upon his principles - but suppose in your all-knowing wisdom you can explain to me how cancelling a concert for all of his loyal fans, who did NOT necessarily vote for the bill the artist protested or did nothing other than happen to live in a state where ONE governor did something the artist didn't like, was the "right" thing to do to those fans? With that logic, I am sure you are the type of person that would punish an innocent son if the other son lied to you and then somehow justify it. And don't give me some lame excuse that he brought the issue to our attention that way. An artist that popular, unlike you or me, has plenty of clout and a massive public platform available with the media and his attendant publicity to get his point across in ways other than cancelling a concert.

Get over yourself. If this artist were white, would you have made the same unsubstantiated comment? Maybe, maybe not. Regardless, IMHO, ANY artist, white, black or otherwise that takes our his/her private feelings over a public act to the sole detriment of his/her loyal fans is a hypocrite in my book and always will be.

Rhetorically speaking, are foriegn bands/singers protected by our First Amendment? Should they be?

Entrope

I used to roadie for The Clash in 1982. I would expect nothing less from seeing that band in their day using onstage banter to explain their political positions adjacent to a song. That is what made that music so inspiring and relevant to me. And "Washington Bullets" and "Straight to Hell" still seems fresh and relevant to me today as it was 27 years ago.

I respect current politically motivated artists like Jackson Browne, Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, Bright Eyes, Rancid and Green Day (and a cast of other bands) who choose to use the stage to FREELY express their total views on subjects they believe in. I have no problem paying $100 for a total experience, songs and banter. In the end, music works the best when it invokes a black and white reaction around an issue--anything grey is boring and is the color of so much disposable music made today. I will take bands of conviction any day. People in Tehran will not be playing Lady Gaga's Pokerface at their revolution, but I am sure Sam Cooke's "A change is gonna come" and Bob Dylan's "The Times are a changing" would not be out of place or time in context to today's events. A lot of this music will hold up against the test of time.