COMEDY, performers tell us, is harder than drama. One reason may be that grimness and weight come more naturally than lightness. To achieve the sour gloom of the dramatic performer, one need only take oneself seriously, which is both easy to do and psychologically gratifying. Take yourself seriously and inside you’ll be purring with satisfaction.
Indeed, in our minds’ eyes, we easily see ourselves as Marlon Brandos, but only with great effort or inspiration do we see ourselves as Marx Brothers.
The Beastie Boys burst onto the musical scene in the mid ’80s loaded with such inspiration. Their Brooklyn burlesque shocked by embracing adolescent vulgarity without hesitation or self-consciousness. It was music for 14-year-olds that seemed to have been made by 14-year-olds–that is, 14-year-olds raised on screwball comedy and dirty jokes. “Man, living at home is such a drag”–the Beasties complained on their hugely successful debut album–“Now your mom threw away your best porno mag.”
A heavy dose of raunch, beats so pounding they’d loosen your fillings, rhymes so obvious they were shameless, and a vast musical vocabulary pressed into service via sampling: These were the main elements of the Beastie brand of rap as it barreled past the cheesy lustfulness of tight-pants rock and the morose pondering of new wave to claim ownership of young American ears. The music was simply more fun than anything else around, and it remained so, even as the Beasties matured, developing to where they didn’t have to rely on borrowed riffs–a dependency that continues to compromise much of the rest of rap and hip hop.
But now the Boys have decided to be men, serious and outspoken. For years, they’ve had their pet causes, most prominently freedom in Tibet (as well as the freedom of convicted cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal). But in the wake of September 11, an even darker awareness has come to them. They have taken up the antiwar cause. And, as you may already know, they’ve turned out a protest song.
To put their latest track in context, the Boys post a handful of comments on their website. “A war in Iraq will not resolve our problems,” says Adam Yauch (aka MCA), perhaps not realizing that the death of Saddam Hussein and the toppling of his regime will almost certainly lead to a reduction in our Saddam-related problems. “If we are truly striving for safety,” he continues, “we need to build friendships, not try to bully the rest of the world.”
This suggests war has resulted from insufficient friendliness on the part of the United States. (Now, I don’t want you to flinch. Our critics can be our best friends sometimes, so let’s consider what Mr. Yauch has to say.) The Beastie Boy is certainly right that we have been quite bellicose of late.
How is it that we haven’t found a way to make nice with the Baath regime after twelve years of pointless U.N. interventions and violated resolutions? After the mincemeat Saddam has made of inspections, after the plot to assassinate the first George Bush, after decades of Iraq’s pursuing weapons of mass destruction, after decades of the regime torturing, raping, and executing Saddam’s opponents, after years in which Iraq has only shown its cooperative spirit to terrorist organizations? How is it that we, the United States, have not overcome these little obstacles? Clearly, we are at fault. There should be a charm school for any nation that displays such antisocial behavior. Thank you for your comments, Mr. Yauch.
The beastly protest song–“In A World Gone Mad,” it’s called–is the Beastie Boys taking themselves seriously, despite a long and hilarious run that would recommend they do otherwise. Available via free download on their website, it has all the chest-beating of a Beastie classic without any of the redeeming lightness. But not only is it heavy, it is dumb. And worst of all, the protest track is musically banal, its squeaky sound and nervous rhythms a step backwards for these bold musicians.
Not that “In a World Gone Mad” doesn’t offer anything new. In it, our rappers, who once routinely sang about the joys of packing heat, say it’s “Due time we fight the non-violent fight.” The theme of increasing national security through playing well with others is picked up in the first verse, as the Beasties address the president: “You and Saddam should kick it like back in the day / with the cocaine and the Courvoisier / But you build more bombs as you get more bold / As your mid-life crisis war unfolds.” Courvoisier? The Beastie Boys used to invent cliches; they should be above such sloppy seconds.
Another thing: George Bush is having a midlife crisis? It just doesn’t make sense. Could there in fact be a man more confident of his purpose and less tormented than our current president? This is hardly a disputed point. In fact, it may be Bush’s utter lack of self-doubt that his detractors hate most about him.
“In a World Gone Mad” also compares Bush to the main character in Ben Stiller’s movie “Zoolander,” but the dull particulars need not concern us.
Stardumb Hypothesis Number 8: One problem with political music is that songs rarely lend themselves to the dialectic of argument; another problem is that those musicians who are likely to make political music are basically incapable of argument.
Stardumb Hypothesis Number 9: Musicians these days seem to retire to politics the way politicians retire to law firms and consulting gigs. And, surely, it is a form of retirement. The majority of musicians racing to enlist in the antiwar cause are past their prime, some of them long past. Beastie Boys. David Byrne, the onetime frontman of the Talking Heads. Michael Stipe of the once great REM. How is it that after running out of things to say these musicians won’t shut up?
Barbrometer: Three and a half Barbra Streisands
Grader’s Comment: As political statement, the Beastie lyrics deliver nothing more than your typical protest sign, hastily scribbled and without a convincing grasp of reality. Nor do they effectively ridicule anything specific about George Bush or the American effort. In fact their pathetic eagerness to wound Bush without knowing the first thing about him, along with their refusal to say a single bad thing about Saddam suggests the Beastie Boys have, despite their objections, written an anti-Bush, pro-Saddam song.
Their time would have been better spent thinking up goofy new disguises for their next video.
Postscript: Speaking of “due time to fight the non-violent fight,” is there anything funnier than peace slogans translated into the language of thug? No doubt much of the hip-hop outreach efforts by antiwar activists founder because of this exact cultural barrier. For example, David Byrne, one of the people behind Musicians United to Win Without War, takes pride in the fact that rapper Jay Z has signed up with his organization. Byrne told a reporter that he thinks seeing a guy like Z doing peace propaganda catches people off guard, which it does, before making them laugh. Consider the well-informed Jay Z as he gives people the low-down in his MTV antiwar public service announcement. The entire transcript reads: “These powerful men, they control the media, so I don’t really, understand, um, what we’re fightin’ for. All I know is, in war, like, everyone loses.”
No, Mr. Z, just the losing side.
Post-postscript: As the finishing touches are placed on this Stardumb, two related stories are making the rounds. One, Eddie Vedder–the ineloquent, dunderhead lead-singer of Pearl Jam–went before an audience in Denver this week with a mask of Bush’s face on the end of a stick, which he proceeded to slam against the stage.
Earlier in the concert he’d assured fans that he supported our troops. Hmm. What is it about destroying an effigy of our commander in chief that might have led people to think otherwise?
Reportedly, dozens of fans walked out of the concert as a result, one of them telling the Denver Rocky Mountain News that the anti-Bush display was worse than anything the Dixie Chicks did. Which is entirely true.
In the other story making the rounds, Senator John Kerry (our first politician!) qualifies for honorary mention in the Stardumb roll by telling voters in New Hampshire: “What we need now is not just a change of regime in Saddam Hussein, but we need a regime change in the United States.” The comment was part of a longer complaint in which he accused Bush of short-circuiting diplomatic efforts to resolve the Iraq problem, thus causing a “breach of trust” with diplomats and world leaders.
How inappropriate to be pissing on the president at the height of war. Moreover, how revolting that Kerry would equate Saddam and Bush, the Baath regime and the current occupants of the White House, the aims of a foreign war with his hope to become the next president, and so on.
Also, it seems entirely possible that John Kerry doesn’t know the meaning of the word regime–he must think it means administration. If, by chance, John Kerry does know the meaning of the word regime, it’s a wonder that, given his views, he holds any elective office under our constitutional regime.
David Skinner is an assistant managing editor at The Weekly Standard.
