There are exactly three bands whose music consistently puts a great big smile on my face. The first two are the Beatles and R.E.M. The third, for reasons I am completely at a loss to explain, is Rage Against the Machine. I was reminded of this while hearing ‘The Battle of Los Angeles’ today in my car. It obviously makes little sense because a) RATM doesn’t sound remotely similar to either R.E.M or the Beatles and b) you’d be hard-pressed to describe RATM’s music as epiphanous. Yet I have experienced multiple epiphanies (men can get those) hearing their four studio albums, a legacy the same size as that of the Velvet Underground, and perhaps in years to come, as influential (for good bands too, not the thousands of horrendous rap-rock acts they inadvertently spawned).
Rage Against the Machine is great agit-prop, but I like them for other reasons I consider more pertinent. For starters, they’re a great band, unlike most of their unworthy predecessors. Zach De La Rocha is not just a great mc, he’s a great vocalist. He doesn’t just shout, he shouts in ways that are unique and varied. He yells, he screams, he hisses, he growls. He is in that select group of singers – Dylan is the best example I can think of offhand - who can convey the mood of a song through the tone of their voice. Sometimes it’s a stray word, like “Warning!” from ‘Born as ghosts’ or the “Hey’s” from ‘Sleep now in the fire’. How big a leap from John Lennon raggedly shouting "Well shake it up baaaby nooww” to De La Rocha screaming “Fuck you I won’t do as you tell me”? A lot closer than you think…
Chuck D is the obvious (and acknowledged) influence as far as his rapping style is concerned, but De La Rocha’s voice is more mobile. No singer in history has ever sounded so urgent, so convinced of his material. He sounds transported, and that becomes transporting for the listener. "This is the new sound, just like the old sound" I hear him say as I write these lines. Not exactly a new sentiment, even Billy Joel’s said something similar. But then he says it again. Then he goes “Look at the news now…over the over the over the BURNING GROUND” and I don’t know why, but I find myself shouting with him.
The sonic universe that RATM’s fiery words inhabit could best be described as apocalyptic - rather like the words themselves. Alternating between the weirdly haunting and the crunchingly loud, they are, to use their own wonderful phrase, calm like a bomb. The chief architect of this sound is the still underrated Tom Morrello. He’s a true futurist - his guitar approximates the sound of a turntable, a siren, a buzzsaw, a human voice. He’s also a throwback - to players like George Harrison and Robbie Robertson, who played as much and for as long as it served the purpose of the song, and not a second more. No matter how loud he gets, Morello is never messy and he never overplays. He creates textures with his guitar that would be the envy of entire bands. ‘Voice of the voiceless’ shimmers before it boils over, ‘Calm like a bomb’ sounds like police cars chasing you. By melding metal, grunge, scratchy hip-hop and various shades of noise, he created a sound that would come to be associated with him alone, because other guitarists didn’t have it in them to play it.
Morrello’s brilliance has a spill-over effect. RATM’s excellent rhythm section - Brad Wilk on drums and YKtim on bass - often gets overlooked. This makes them ripe for comparisons with another taleneted duo, Led Zepplin’s John Bonham and John Paul Jones, who faced similar charismatic-lead-singer-and-pathbreaking-guitarist-get-all-the-attention problems. But RATM would never have been quite the band it was if Wilk and YK were not up to the challenge. Rap-rock as a format was almost without precedent when they started out. By playing the way they did, supporting their idiosyncratic singer and their crazy scientist guitarist every step of the way, they helped create a template, the bedrock of the sound which would come to define rap-metal, nu-rock and alternative metal. But no one could play it quite like they did, in terms of both subtlety and swinging for the fence.
I could go on and on - I already may have - but I’ll stop here. Those of you who’ve already heard RATM know what I’m trying to convey and are probably praying that I stop talking so you can put on ‘Renegades of Funk’. Those of you reading this who haven’t heard them…well, if you’re a serious fan of rock music, you have no business not hearing them. Barring Radiohead, they are the most important post-grunge rock band. They credit themselves as ‘guilty parties’ on their album sleeves. They are uncompromising and fierce in everything they do. And, for some unfathomable reason, they make me smile.
Rage Against the Machine is great agit-prop, but I like them for other reasons I consider more pertinent. For starters, they’re a great band, unlike most of their unworthy predecessors. Zach De La Rocha is not just a great mc, he’s a great vocalist. He doesn’t just shout, he shouts in ways that are unique and varied. He yells, he screams, he hisses, he growls. He is in that select group of singers – Dylan is the best example I can think of offhand - who can convey the mood of a song through the tone of their voice. Sometimes it’s a stray word, like “Warning!” from ‘Born as ghosts’ or the “Hey’s” from ‘Sleep now in the fire’. How big a leap from John Lennon raggedly shouting "Well shake it up baaaby nooww” to De La Rocha screaming “Fuck you I won’t do as you tell me”? A lot closer than you think…
Chuck D is the obvious (and acknowledged) influence as far as his rapping style is concerned, but De La Rocha’s voice is more mobile. No singer in history has ever sounded so urgent, so convinced of his material. He sounds transported, and that becomes transporting for the listener. "This is the new sound, just like the old sound" I hear him say as I write these lines. Not exactly a new sentiment, even Billy Joel’s said something similar. But then he says it again. Then he goes “Look at the news now…over the over the over the BURNING GROUND” and I don’t know why, but I find myself shouting with him.
The sonic universe that RATM’s fiery words inhabit could best be described as apocalyptic - rather like the words themselves. Alternating between the weirdly haunting and the crunchingly loud, they are, to use their own wonderful phrase, calm like a bomb. The chief architect of this sound is the still underrated Tom Morrello. He’s a true futurist - his guitar approximates the sound of a turntable, a siren, a buzzsaw, a human voice. He’s also a throwback - to players like George Harrison and Robbie Robertson, who played as much and for as long as it served the purpose of the song, and not a second more. No matter how loud he gets, Morello is never messy and he never overplays. He creates textures with his guitar that would be the envy of entire bands. ‘Voice of the voiceless’ shimmers before it boils over, ‘Calm like a bomb’ sounds like police cars chasing you. By melding metal, grunge, scratchy hip-hop and various shades of noise, he created a sound that would come to be associated with him alone, because other guitarists didn’t have it in them to play it.
Morrello’s brilliance has a spill-over effect. RATM’s excellent rhythm section - Brad Wilk on drums and YKtim on bass - often gets overlooked. This makes them ripe for comparisons with another taleneted duo, Led Zepplin’s John Bonham and John Paul Jones, who faced similar charismatic-lead-singer-and-pathbreaking-guitarist-get-all-the-attention problems. But RATM would never have been quite the band it was if Wilk and YK were not up to the challenge. Rap-rock as a format was almost without precedent when they started out. By playing the way they did, supporting their idiosyncratic singer and their crazy scientist guitarist every step of the way, they helped create a template, the bedrock of the sound which would come to define rap-metal, nu-rock and alternative metal. But no one could play it quite like they did, in terms of both subtlety and swinging for the fence.
I could go on and on - I already may have - but I’ll stop here. Those of you who’ve already heard RATM know what I’m trying to convey and are probably praying that I stop talking so you can put on ‘Renegades of Funk’. Those of you reading this who haven’t heard them…well, if you’re a serious fan of rock music, you have no business not hearing them. Barring Radiohead, they are the most important post-grunge rock band. They credit themselves as ‘guilty parties’ on their album sleeves. They are uncompromising and fierce in everything they do. And, for some unfathomable reason, they make me smile.
6 comments:
Finally. vindication for Rage. Thank u for this. Most people just don't take RATM as seriously as they should. :)
oh and uh.. i think RATMs been around since 92, which is almost pre grunge, come to think of it...
Yes, you're right. 1992 was their first album release, which was the year when grunge broke ('93 being the year when it took over the planet). But it could be said they were given their due only after people stopped obsessing about grunge.
Faith No More did what Rage did, before Rage did it. And they were more interesting, although less given to getting themselves arrested in public, which probably explains all this outpouring of admiration for what is a good, but derivative band.
The world is an unfair place etc, but give credit where it's due.
Anonymous: I must confess, the only Faith No More I've heard is their cover of 'Easy'. Will check out their other stuff. Am curious - its the first time I've heard anyone besides Anthrax Fans calling RATM derivative.
I agree with Anon 1. Faith No More is far superior and Mike Patton is a demigod. Check out his other endeavours if you haven't already: Mr. Bungle, Fantomas and Tomahawk.
Re FNM, what tracks would you suggest hearing?
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