Rage Against the Machine...

[noodleplugerine]

They should do some nice songs about goats and old motor cars and they'd sell more records to Grannies.Grannies are a huge untapped market and get in quick before their fuel bills go up too much. It didn't do Val Doonican any harm.

That's a great idea. How about:

Let's say goodbye with a mutherfu*kin smile, dear,
Just for a while, dear, we must part, urgggh.
Don't let the parting upset you,
I'll not forget you, sweetheart.
We'll mutherfu*kin meet again, don't know where, don't know when, urgggh,
But I know we'll meet again, some mutherfu*kin sunny day.
Keep smiling through, just like you always do,
'Til the blue skies drive the dark clouds far away, urgggh.

I think it would work rather well.

That's pretty damn good :D

[AndyR]

I love this forum...  :lol:

I'd been studiously ignoring this thread because I know nothing whatsoeverabout RATM - and nothing I've just read makes me feel I might like to change that!! - but it's been a most entertaining read.

The "Trees" discussion was most interesting to me, btw. I only recently discovered that Peart was into Ayn Rand, and it does put a different perspective on stuff like Trees. I read Rand's Atlas Shrugged 10-15 years ago - it was utterly life changing for me, and in many ways I still live by what I learnt when reading it.

I reckon Philly Q's right in his reading of the last four lines:

Now there's no more oak oppression,
For they passed a noble law,
And the trees are all kept equal
By hatchet, axe, and saw.

But if it is from Rand, I suspect there is also an amused irony in there as well - it's not just that there's no more oak oppression, ALL the trees are hacked now, any tree that reaches too high is hacked, including the maples that passed the law (or who caused the law to be passed). But maybe I heard all that because I'd also read Ayn Rand?

The idea of "creating a level playing field" by cutting off the legs of those who can run fastest is abhorrent to the ideas put across by Ayn Rand.

There's a whole bunch of other stuff in her writings that I don't understand, and some of it seems to undermine the main thing I learnt: "don't believe stuff that other people tell you without thinking for yourself"!!

She seems to have been against idealogies - religious, political, wotever - that demand a "leap of faith" in answer to justifiable questions about the validity of the assertions that they make. But it seems to me that people who pick up her ideas and try to explain them are in danger of falling into the same trap!

I understand that she is regarded as part of "commie-hating 50s US right-wingery", and maybe she was, but for me it doesn't undermine the central idea I received from her: "don't accept the cr@p they feed you, listen, and think, for yourself"

And funnily enough, this seems relevant to the original topic (whichever side of the argument you're on) :D

[Ratrod]

This is a great thread. I'm trying not to go into the discussion as I can get heated when it comes to politics.

All I can say is that I like RATM's lyrics and they meant every word at that time.

I read an interview with Tom Morello and I agreed with alot he said. He knows his polics and laws. Unfortunately he doesn't understand economics as well as law and politics. That's more my expertise so I can't agree with the man about everything.

I too would like to see a world without injustice and poverty.

I don't know if it's true that RATM gave money to some militia. If they did, that would be wrong IMO. That militia will buy weapons for that money and they will kill people with those weapons.

RATM performed at Pink Pop this year. I was looking forward to see the TV coverage but Zach didn't want it to be filmed. Probably because of copyrights and royalties and such. That doesn't sound very socialistic to me.

[lulusg]

It would be interesting Ratrod to find out from the guy himself. Then again we have been deceived before by goverment, religion, etc...a common trait no?