Musician Lefty Death, and Other Lameness

George Michael, pop “musician,” has turned into a deep political thinker. An interview in the UK’s Mirror, a publication which bills itself as “Newspaper of the Year” and Michael as Britain’s “most gifted contemporary songwriter,” has an interview where Georgie where he explains his latest single, “Shoot the Dog.” The song is a satire on Tony Blair’s relationship with George Bush and the war on terrorism, with Blair portrayed as Bush’s Poodle. The song features such insightful lyrics as:

Nine nine nine gettin'' jiggy
People did you see that fire in the city?
It's like we''re fresh out of democratic,
Gotta get yourself a little
something semi-automatic yeah...

I did happen to see that fire actually, and I was a bit put off by it. However, what does the adjective democratic mean when used as a noun? As for arming yourself, Hurray!

The Ayatollah''s gettin'' bombed yeah,
See Sergeant Bilko having fun again,
Good puppy, good puppy
Rollin' on over for The Man....

When did we start bombing Iran, and why didn’t anybody tell me about it? I would’ve made popcorn…

I believe, I believe what the old man said
Though I know that there''s no lord above
I believe in me, I believe in you
And you know I believe in love
I believe in truth though I lie a lot
I feel the pain from the push and shove
No matter what you put me through
I''ll still believe in love
And I say

Now, I know that hot man-on-man action can be a little rough at times, but does it really leave you this incoherent. I mean, what the fuck are you singing about here Georgie? Sure, I’m taking chunks out of the lyrics, but read the whole thing. Even for insipid pop music, they’re awful. He’s just mad because America wouldn’t let him give handjobs to random men in a public restroom. Poor baby.

Michael’s hatred for the war on terrorism, however, brings me to my larger point: the seemingly inevitable turn of inconsequential has-been musicians and artists into rabid leftists. Why is it that musicians and artists, who so overwhelming espouse their beliefs in individualism, are such fervent Collectivists when it comes to politics? It’s been a general rule in my life that the higher number of body piercings a person has, the more they expect me to subsidize their dumb-asses.

Leftist activism is but the final step to irrelevancy for a performer. The more a person’s talent (or just their popularity) wanes, the less they produce, and the more it becomes solely of interest to their hardcore fans. Then the new music becomes a lowly trickle, and the only press the artist gets is when they espouse their loopy political beliefs for CNN. Eddie Veder of Pearl Jam was, with the ever-irritating Phil Donohue, Ralph Nader’s big media supporter. Krist Novoselic, Nirvana’s former bassist who hasn’t produced any music of worth since Kurt Kobain emptied a shotgun into his own face, is an avowed Lenninist (when the Washington State Libertarian Party had Novoselic giving a speech during their 2002 convention, I decided I would never, ever, become a big L libertarian).

These are just the examples I can think of off the top of my head. Aside from Ted Nugent, I’m hard-pressed to think of a name of a pop or rock star who wasn’t somewhere to the left of Che Guevara, and I’m not even talking about the greatest leftist wanker rock band of all time, Rage Against the Machine. What makes these brave soldiers against the oppresive fascist right-wingers attach themselves to an ideology which calls for the destruction of Individual freedoms they say they care so much about. Well, they are hypocrites, and, like our boy Georgie, seem to be historically illiterate.

But by stating their opposition to the government, or big business, they try to hold onto that youthful rebellion, and the accompanying hipness, that once propelled them to fame. They are destined to fail, as no one, and I mean no one, wants to hear a pudgy thirty eight year old multimillionaire sing about smoking pot and sticking it to the man.

**UPDATE**
Damian Penny has a similiar, if more concise and less drunken, article on Michael's "Political" song

 

Posted by Captain Mojo at July 02, 2002 12:20 AM