Two posts in a day? Julia *must* be bored.

Naw, only joking. Prompted by this post over at Intrepid Classroom, I’ll be (from now on) posting any “homework” assignments on this blog simply because I find the HTML coding on comments almost *nonexistent* and posting links straight into text annoys me to the point where I actually want to close the browser.

(And just as a random thought: how many people buy CDs and import them onto their iTunes library? To me, there's just something nice about having a CD in hand... I only buy songs off iTunes in full CDs, and that's only when I can't get my hands on a physical copy where I live.)

And I have the perfect set of lyrics just begging to be used. Say hello to Foo Fighter's "The Pretender"!

This section really seems to identify with the issues surrounding both past, present, and future issues with the media and exactly how much power they have over us. Although they may not have the ultimate goal for national (or maybe even global) control and domination, they still have a very large percentage of the poopulation under their wing so much that we start to believe everything that they say (such as the recent reports that Amy Winehouse was splitting from her hubby, Blaaaaaaake Incarcerated or other stories like that) and that the public is slowly becoming more and more obsessed with stopping their children from being kidnapped (presumably concerned through the almost obsessive coverage of the Madeleine McCann abduction), seeing the "horrors" of the world (from seeing them themselves on the news about epidemics or starvation) and other general things that they alledgedly shouldn't have to worry about: childhood obseity, the war and the politics, the November 2008 election.

I personally find the debates and the election buzz fascinating -- why, only last night I was up until almost two o'clock in the morning watching a documentary covering all of Hillary Clinton's life as part of a sort of 'make an informed decision' from CNN (and plus, I never knew that she isn't actually blonde -- I suppose the eyebrows should have given it away. That was the biggest shocker, LOL). I can't imagine what life would be like if I wasn't allowed access to all the resources where I learn the best lessons.

Scandals and secrets are constantly being uprooted and presented to the public. These secrets, whether they be a romance between a British singer and her manager's son for nine months while her husband is in prison (yes, it's another Amy Winehouse note, but that's all I can think of for the moment), and then to add on to it the fact that the new boyfriend wasn't such a teetotaler after pictures of him drinking heavily were uncovered, then at the other end of the spectrum we have Obama's preacher, Jeremiah Wright, and the footage of his controversial sermon, they are there and these hidden facts also seem to be a heavyweight on the reputation of both celebrities and more "respectible" (in many people's eyes) members of the community.

The chorus just seems like what we all want to say sometimes, whether we're upper class, or middle class, or low class, or upper-middle-low-upper-middle class. And why should social class even matter (sorry, I got my hands on a fascinating book [a.k.a encyclopedia] about European Social History from 1350 to 2000 which focused on Social Classes, Social Unrest, and Social Problems)?

What if we did say that we're not like the others and want to make a change? How would we handle that? With force and violence, which seems to be a popular option nowadays, with riots and protests and assassinations still quite common? Or would we try music, peaceful talking... or do we have to face the fact that that may not get us *anywhere*? It's questions to think about, anyway, even if we do or don't have to answers to them.

Some other albums/bands that I reccomend checking out if you want to see some more "politial" or worldly crisis songs or songs: Within Temptation (especially the album The Heart Of Everything, in which Sharon del Adel [vocals] describes as being inspired and about war... I reccomened "Our Solemn Hour" to start with, or "The Howling"); Muse (start with "Time is Running Out" or "Hysteria"); and...

I know I'm going to lose some people when I mention one of the most well-known "emo" bands out there: My Chemical Romance. And I am sick of people calling them rotton emos who have nothing better to do than to slit their wrists and scream into microphones: if any one of these people could get past the guitar and drums and listen to the lyrics or the stories behind the songs, then maybe they could give them a chance. *cough* blame my friend Mary for this, she introduced them to me after I introduced them to her but lost interest and she became obsessed... it's a long short story. But MCR = my guilty pleasure in music. Plus, who can't love a band whose lyrics include "My cellmate's a killer/They made me do push-ups in track!"? *cough*

From their album Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, the song "The Ghost of You" in itself isn't really that political or meaningful for people who don't really care, but the video is fascinating. The slower parts of the song are filmed with a backdrop of a party for soliders on leave, presumably during WWII. During the chorus and the last, heavier part of the song, they switch to the landing on the beach on D-Day, of which the video really seems to tug on heartstrings with the lines "At the end of the world/Or the last thing I see/You are never coming home/Never coming home". If anyone is interested in seeing the video (there's a wonderful part with dancing + a wave... just watch, I can't do it justice), it can be found here.

And for a last fling of an artist and song, check out Vanessa Carlton's "Heroes and Theives" -- it's a wonderful song, however a different style from the ones I've listed already, and it's really a song that makes you think about who we label as a "hero" and who we label as a "theif" and whether there is really anything that much different about them anymore.

The first thing that comes to mind when someone poses the question “what musicians have had a profound effect on you politically?”, I almost immediately think of a statement made by Brandon Flowers, the lead singer of The Killers, directed at Green Day a couple of years back. He stated that he believed that the band, using the track American Idiot and the fact that they filmed the music videos for songs from their Bullet in a Bible CD in the United Kingdom as proof, was anti-American.

From Flowers: “I just thought it was really cheap," he explained. "To go to a place like England or Germany and sing that song – those kids aren’t taking it the same way that he meant it. And he [Billie Joe Armstrong] knew it.”

He then went on to say that their song and album of the same name, Sam’s Town, was a much better representation of America. Personally, I don’t really form opinions of countries and governments from songs, but their lyrics do leave rather interesting thoughts. Again, I prefer The Killers’ music, but that really has nothing to do with the almost “political” slant that Flowers had.

I actually think that they shouldn’t have been trying to “top” Green Day for America’s theme song or soundtrack. But, come to think of it, Green Day's portrayal of America isn't too far off the mark: the lyrics "Now everyone do the propaganda/And sing along to the age of paranoia" seem to tell the story of America over the time and through the wars, with propaganda posters flying left and right. Paranoia, over almost anything and everything from cotton wool kids to censorship, which I have spoken about extensively on this post, seems to be at an all-time high. Another line, "One nation controlled by the media", is also quite true (to an extent). According to the linked article about cotton wool kids, the suspicion is that the overuse and exploitation of the media has made people overly paranoid.

Basically, Flowers' claiming that American Idiot wasn't an accurate illustration of America was, while slightly innapropriate to be screaming "I don't wanna be an American idiot" to audiences in Europe and other countries, not a completely innacurate illustration of American society. If anything, Sam's Town seems to try to project a perfect image of America while slotting away the nastier bits.*

*These last two paragraphs are coming from someone who lived for years in America and now cannot wait to get her feet back on the country's soil, not an Anti-American. Just a disclaimer that I don't mean to offend and this is just an unbiased look at the country's status, whether it be historical or present-day, through music.

source.