Rage Against the Machine Awarded at the 39th Annual GRAMMY Awards

Quotes
"He should be a contender for this position should he abandon the supposed obedience to white liberal doctrine of nonviolence and embrace black nationalism; through counter-intelligence it should be possible to infiltrate potential troublemakers and neutralize them";
"Wake Up"; Rage Against the Machine, Rage Against the Machine, 1992, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony.

"I tune in with a bullet to shut down the devil sound; the program of Vietnow";
"Vietnow"; Rage Against the Machine, Evil Empire, 1996, Epic Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony.

"I cock back the sling to stone a settler, and breaks him off clean; call me the upsetter; here come the hands on the leashes, the cross, the capital, the pale families. . . . we got to take it to the 7th level, for their lies and my lives were never settled; come on; don't freeze when zero hour come";
"Roll Right"; Rage Against the Machine, Evil Empire, 1996, Epic Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony.

Article
      In 1997, Rage Against the Machine was awarded "Best Metal Performance" for the "Tire Me" track of its Evil Empire album. The band combines a heavy-metal rock sound with rap vocals. The racial breakdown of the group members is one black (Tom Morello), one Chicano (Zack de la Rocha), one white of Cuban descent (Timmy C.), and another white (Brad Wilk). The Chicano member writes most of the lyrics.

      On its prior album which came out in 1992 and which was self-titled Rage Against the Machine, it is laid out whom and what the group perceives to be the evil empire. On track three, "Take the Power Back," we are lectured that Eurocentric Americans must change because Eurocentric culture holds that other cultures are inferior, and as a result, people of the other cultures suffer plight in America. People "hang from" a Eurocentric "rope." Rage Against the Machine "see[s] right through the Red-White-and-Blue disguise." Violently racist Chicano rappers have picked up terms from blacks, such as from Malcolm X who referred to whites and the system by the term Uncle Sam. "Bam; here is the plan; motherfuck Uncle Sam," listeners are told by Zack de la Rocha, "we gotta take the power back. . . . like the motherfucking Weathermen." (Weathermen of the Weather Underground, the group of Marxist-Leninists and Communists, rioted, robbed banks, and bombed buildings during the late 60's and throughout the 1970's, and some of its zealots killed one guard and two police officers during the robbery of a Brinks armored car on October 20, 1981. In addition, the group and its splinter groups sought to spark a violent communistic revolution.) Thoughout their works, the musicians praise communistic symbolism and ideas.

      We find out how to "Know Your Enemy": "word is born; fight the war; fuck the norm; now I got no patience, so sick of complacence. . . . the mind of a revolutionary. . . . I know my enemies; they're the teachers who taught me, to fight me; compromise, conformity, assimilation, submission, ignorance, hypocrisy, brutality, the elite, all of which are American dreams." Zack de la Rocha describes America as "the land of chains."

      The track "Wake Up" outlines government conspiracies. Police officers, judges, and the "feds" keep people calm, says Rage Against the Machine, and "they went after King when he spoke out on Vietnam; he turned the power to the have-nots." Even though Malcolm X's assassin was a member of Nation of Islam and was black, many "gangsta" rappers put forth the accusation that powerful whites engineered his assassination, and Rage Against the Machine conforms: "they murdered X and tried to blame it on Islam." The band is "standing with the fury that they had in '66. . . . [and] the rage built up inside of me; fist in the air in the land of hypocrisy. . . . bomb a left upon the fascists, yah, the several Federal men who pulled schemes." A plan for getting politicians into power is not written on the lyric sheet but is said near the song's end: "he should be a contender for this position should he abandon the supposed obedience to white liberal doctrine of nonviolence and embrace black nationalism; through counter-intelligence it should be possible to infiltrate potential troublemakers and neutralize them."

      In "Fistful of Steel," Rage Against the Machine makes claims about its influence: "vocals not to soothe but to ignite and put in flight my sense of 'militance'. . . . status, the elite, the enemy, the rival. . . . a .44 full of bullets, face full of pale. . . . a fistful of steel."

      It is not uncommon for black rappers to say that the US system is apartheid for blacks, and Rage Against the Machine says so in "Township Rebellion" while threatening whites: "rebel; rebel; and yell, 'cause our people still dwell in hell. . . . this is a stick-up, our freedom or your life; I wish I could be peaceful, but there can be no sequel. . . . freedom must be fundamental in Johannesburg or South Central. . . . we stand in the midst of the war. . . . gotta get wreck until our necks never swing on a rope, from here to the Cape of no Hope [Cape of Good Hope is below Cape Town]. . . . why stand on a silent platform; fight the war; fuck the norm."

      Rage Against the Machine says that they will "ignite" the "landlords and power whores. . . . and then watch them burn." ("Bombtrack.") "Some of those that were in Forces are the same that burn crosses," listeners are told, and additionally, listeners are told that they should not remain "under control." ("Killing in the Name.") The enemy, who is symbolized as a swastika, the feds, corporations, and the Flag, commit "mass mind rape" by using television to tell "all the lies" and to sell "all the products." ("Bullet in the Head.")

      The last track is dedicated, apparently, to Leonard Peltier, the American Indian Movement leader who waged, along with followers, a gun battle against federal agents on an Indian Reservation in South Dakota in 1975. Two agents were killed. Along with the Beastie Boys, a rap group made up of white Jews, Rage Against the Machine has performed in concerts designed to create large public demand for the release of Leonard Peltier (and also for that of Mumia Abu-Jamal). With their lyrics, Rage Against the Machine claims to draw "paintings of rebellion," and they attempt to rationalize their violent messages by saying that "they are sending us to early graves." ("Freedom.")

      The pamphlets inserted into the CD's give a long list of individuals who are called "comrades" and who include black rap groups Public Enemy and A Tribe Called Quest. Also listed is Parents for Rock and Rap, a group which cries out against censorship of violently racist black musicians, but completely ignores the outright banning of violently racist white musicians. Parents for Rock and Rap was founded by the mother of Rage Against the Machine member Tom Morello, and she has a history of being active in leftist movements. The list of those who inspired the band includes Coltrane, Chuck D, Gil Scott Heron, Los 4, Miles [Davis], Mohawk Nation, and Huey Newton.

      The cover of the 1996 Evil Empire album shows a symbol of the enemy as perceived by the musicians. The symbol shown is a young white male, possibly an adult, having blue eyes, a smile, and wearing a tightly-fitted superhero outfit complete with cape. Just below a big "e" on the young white male's chest, a banner condemns his look as that of an Evil Empire. The long pamphlets inserted into the CD's unfold to display many book covers, books which promote black nationalism, Marxist-Leninism, 1960's left-wing radicalism or extremism, anti-capitalist themes, communistic revolution, and guerilla warfare.

      As on their first album, Rage Against the Machine continues sending out brown identity and black identity lyrics along with the violent messages. On the first track, they make a point that their music is "on the one, Maya, Mexica," as they make their historical grievance. Titled "The People of the Sun," the musicians say that the song is written for such people, and they declare that since 1516 a "vulture" placed "borders and boots" on top of "the people of the sun" and made them live in a "toxic metropolis." However, listeners are told that "the people of the sun" will "get offensive like Tet" and that such people will reclaim their "spirit of Cuahtemoc." (Cuauhtemoc was the last Aztec emperor.) The "vulture" tried to steal their names, we are told, but now "the people of the sun" have found guns.

      The second track begins with the musicians saying: "this microphone explodes, shattering the molds." Like every track on the album, there is violent imagery on the second track.

      On the third track a musician says the following about his narration: "I'm a truth addict." He gives "truth" cryptically: "new cages and scapegoats undressed and blessed by the Lord, the same devil that ran around in Managua with a sword; check the new style that Ollie found; I tune in with a bullet to shut down the devil sound; the program of Vietnow. . . . transmissions whipping our backs; coming down like bats from Stacey Koon."

      On the seventh track, the musicians take a few lines to indicate that drugs and the drug war are a problem. The track is called "Down Rodeo," and "rodeo" is pronounced as it is for Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills--with stress on the second syllable and with that syllable being drawn out as a long "a." About the people the musicians claim to speak for, the musicians say that "we hungry but them belly full," and "so now I'm rolling down Rodeo with a shotgun; these people ain't seen a brown-skinned man since their grandparents bought one." "They" are going to "send us camping like they did my man, Fred Hampton." (Fred Hampton was a Black Panther who was shot and killed by police in his Chicago apartment during a raid in 1969, and, under speculation that the police did not fire in self-defense, an investigation into the raid showed that the police fired almost all the shots at the scene, some 80 shots as compared to the Panther's 1 shot fired.)

      It is common in violently racist rap music for musicians to brag about their perceived ability to make great music or to influence listeners. Rage Against the Machine musicians do so on several tracks here. In "Down Rodeo," they say that they "funk the track" and that their "verbs fly." Twice in "Down Rodeo", it is indicated that change cannot be achieved through voting. The band says they are not satisfied just riding around in low-riders, but they want the "machines" used to make the cars, and so "with a room full of armed pawns . . . off the kings out the West Side at dawn." Because Zack de La Rocha is from East Los Angeles and still lives in Los Angeles, a reasonable interpretation of his use of the words "West Side," is that he means the West Side of Los Angeles, an area which is predominantly white.

      A few lines of track eight mention an environmental issue. Although "maize was all we needed to sustain," say the musicians, landowners harmed "golden" lands with pesticides in order to grow crops like grapes which profited the "bourgeois." "It's hard to breathe with Wilson's hand around" the throat, they say. (In 1996 Pete Wilson was in the middle of his second term as Governor of California.) With the "war tape booming," the musicians are going to take care of business like the Cisco Kid. (The Cisco Kid was a bandido character in TV shows from 1939 to 1945, and in his starring role of the 1994 comedic remake, a film called The Cisco Kid, Cheech Marin calls the US the "Gringo States of America.")

      On track nine the musicians claim to have an effect on their enemies as follows: "flip this capital eclipse, the vocal tone has got them sweating they own apocalypse." Not only do "IMF shifts" bury life, they say, but shareholders at corporations such as, GE, NBC, Disney, and ABC, are trying to cover up the "truth." Those who play "markets" are "vultures." The enemy is also called "the slave driver," "them devils," and "killers." The consequence is that "Mexico burns."

      Track ten issues forth the following: "I cock back the sling to stone a settler, and breaks him off clean; call me the upsetter; here come the hands on the leashes, the cross, the capital, the pale families. . . . bomb with the left and don't miss; with the sickest 'stilo' I spark fear in the pigs." Not on the lyric sheet but said at the song's end is the following: "we got to take it to the 7th level, for their lies and my lives were never settled; come on; don't freeze when zero hour come." Rappers often use the words "7th level" to refer to the Biblical Seventh Seal.

      On the last track, number eleven, it is indicated that society promotes half truths making it like "Dachau" here. The musicians say the following: "I'm cell locked in the doctrines of the right; enslaved by dogma." The significance of 1516, the date which was given on the opening track as the time when the "vulture" came, is revealed fuller on the last track: "five centuries of penitentiary, so let the guilty hang."

      Rage Against the Machine credits, inside the CD pamphlets, some violently racist black or Latino rappers who put out violent racism to one degree or another, and specifically some such credited were Chuck D, Funk Doobiest, Speech of Arrested Development, and Ice-T. Also credited as "comrades" are Los Angeles radio station KPFK and the Popular Resource Center of Los Angeles of which both are forums for black nationalism and brown nationalism and for violent racism directed at whites. The long list of credits includes praise and mailing addresses for organizations, of whom some that support revolutionary movements and whose leaders endorse communistic ideology: Refuse and Resist (New York), Leonard Peltier and Leonard Peltier Defense Committee (Lawrence KS), International Concerned Friends and Family of Mumia Abu-Jamal (Philadelphia PA), Parents for Rock and Rap, Revolution Books, Committee to Support the Revolution in Peru, National Committee for Democracy in Mexico, and Ejercito Zapatista Liberacion Nacional (EZLN). Also mentioned for support is the militant Marxist group called Anti-Nazi League.

References
Rage Against the Machine, Rage Against the Machine, 1992, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony.
Evil Empire, Rage Against the Machine, 1996, Epic Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony.

The interpretation of the track "Freedom" comes from Rolling Stone magazine (3-10-94, page 19) and Billboard magazine (3-23-96).

Posted at http://home.att.net/~phosphor on June 30, 1999.
Last editing was posted: 11-22-99.
Updates: 8-13-99: link to info about books whose covers were shown on 1996 pamphlets.

The above article is not a complete summary of Rage Against the Machine's connections to violently racist music, and some interested readers may want to research and expose more of it.

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