Amerika

Steven Tyler of heavy rock band Aerosmith is in the news today after demanding that Donald Trump stop using one of the band’s songs during Trump campaign rallies. While some might think that news, the underlying truth is that Tyler wants to assert his rights to license the song and allowing anyone to use it for free threatens that. The more interesting story is that Tyler is a Republican who has socialized with Trump in the past.

What kind of man can be both an androgynous glam rocker and a Republican? Probably there is a common root to both: he dislikes our society as it is, and thinks it needs a wake-up call from brutal realism. Let us look at some Aerosmith lyrics, particularly the song “Nobody’s Fault”:

Lord I must be dreamin’
What else could this be
Everybody’s screamin’
Runnin’ for the sea

Holy lands are sinkin’
Birds take to the sky
The prophets all are stinkin’ drunk
I know the reason why

Eyes are full of desire
Mind is so ill at ease
Everything is on fire
Shit piled up to the knees

Out of rhyme or reason
Everyone’s to blame
Children of the season
Don’t be lame

Sorry
You’re so sorry
Don’t be sorry

Man has known
And now he’s blown it
Upside down
And hell’s the only sound
We did an awful job
And now they say
It’s nobody’s fault

Old San Andreas
Seven years ago
Shove it up their Richters
Red lines stop and go

Noblemen of courage
Listen with their ears
Spoke but how discouragin’
When no one really hears

One of these days you’ll be sorry
Too many houses on the stilt
Three million years or just a story
Four on the floor up to the hilt

Out of rhyme or reason
Everyone’s to blame
Children of the season
Don’t be lame

Sorry
You’re so sorry
Don’t be sorry

Man has known
And now he’s blown it
Upside down
And hell’s the only sound
We did an awful job
And now we’re just a little too late

Eyes are full of desire
Mind is so ill at ease
Everything is on fire
Shit piled up in debris

California showtime
Five o’clock’s the news
Said everybody’s concubine
Was prone to take a snooze

Sorry
You’re so sorry
Don’t be sorry

Man has known
And now he’s blown it
Upside down
And hell’s the only sound
We did an awful job
And now we’re just a little too late

Rock ‘n’ roll has a few of these songs that we might call apocalyptic. They describe a situation beyond repair: mass insanity, rule by the corrupt, environmental collapse, ignoring of the wise, and all of it fueled by the desperate need to be self-important by the herd.

“Nobody’s Fault” in particular is useful in that regard. It describes a situation that is no one’s fault, but is everyone’s responsibility. A more Republican doctrine would be hard to find. It also refers to “Noblemen” being ignored by the crowd in its rush for self-importance and pretense.

While the wise among us caution against reading too much into rock lyrics, which are mostly gibberish chosen for its ability to rhyme and match a beat by near-schizophrenic drama cases, occasionally the more thoughtful bands will slip in a bit of actual opinion if only to see if they can sneak it past their dope-addled, drama-crazed and self-deluding fans.

Contrast this to the Ragnarok-theme mythic apocalypse song from Bathory, “Twilight of the Gods”:

There is a serpent in every Eden
Slick as grease and cold as ice
There is a lie in every meaning
Rest assured to fool you twice

In this age of utter madness
We maintain we are in control
And ending life before deliverance
While countries are both bought and sold

Holy writtings hokus-pokus
Blaze of glory and crucifix
Prepried costly credit salvations
TV-preachers and dirty tricks

Don’t trust nobody
It will cost you much too much
Beware of the dagger
It caress you at first touch
O, all small creatures
It is the twilight if the gods

When the foundations to our existence
Begins to crumble one by one
And legislations protects its breakers
And he who was wrong but paid the most won

Even the gods of countless religions
Holds no powers against this tide
Of degeneration because we have now found
That there is no thrones up there in the sky

Run from this fire
It will burn your very soul
Its flames reaching higher
Comed this far there is no hold
O, all small creatures
It is the twilight if the gods

(Twilight of the gods
Twilight of the gods
Twilight of the gods
Twilight of the gods)

The same elements are here: mass insanity through pretense of individualism, denial of ancient and prevalent wisdom, corrupt leaders and a population that has become corrupt and wants to be misled.

Slayer gives us another example, with “South of Heaven”:

An unforeseen future nestled somewhere in time.
Unsuspecting victims no warnings, no signs.
Judgment day the second coming arrives.
Before you see the light you must die.

Forgotten children, conform a new faith,
Avidity and lust controlled by hate.
The never-ending search for your shattered sanity,
Souls of damnation in their own reality.

Chaos rampant,
An age of distrust.
Confrontations.
Impulsive habitat.

Bastard sons begat your cunting daughters,
Promiscuous mothers with your incestuous fathers.
Ingrate souls condemned for all eternity,
Obtained by immoral observance a domineering deity.

Chaos rampant,
An age of distrust.
Confrontations.
Impulsive sabbath.

On and on, south of heaven
On and on, south of heaven
On and on, south of heaven
On and on, south of heaven

The root of all evil is the heart of a black soul.
A force that has lived all eternity.
The never ending search for a truth never told.
The loss of all hope and your dignity.

Chaos rampant,
An age of distrust.
Confrontations.
Impulsive habitat.

On and on, south of heaven

Souls of damnation… in their own reality? No clearer diagnosis of the apocalypse can be found that this: individuals, damning themselves by denial of common sense reality, exist in their own reality — a human substitute for understanding life itself, including nature and any gods or demons that may lurk at its periphery.

All of these apocalypse songs tell us the same thing. The force that propels rock and roll, which is mass populism or public opinion, is also the source of our doom. Without guidance, human individuals withdraw into their own reality consisting of greed and pretentious dreams, and then society sinks into corruption because no one is paying attention to the consequences of our actions. No one is accountable; no one takes the reins to steer us toward sanity. It is nobody’s fault, but together we will burn.

Tags: apocalypse, bathory, mythos, rock 'n' roll, slayer, steven tyler