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Culture War Roundup for the week of January 22, 2024

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Music is a shitty vehicle for political ideology and I thank the heavens there isn’t more of it. But, there has been some recent politically-conscious music. Have you seen the MGMT Little Dark Age memes? These were all over the place. From the lyrics: “Policemen swear to God, love seeping from their guns | I know my friends and I would probably turn and run | If you get out of bed, come find us heading for the bridge | Bring a stone, all the rage, my little dark age”. Vampire Weekend”s Unbearably White is gorgeous and quite political:

Discussing the track with The Sunday Times before its release, Koenig commented that "infighting among white people about who is marginally more or less white is not particularly interesting", and that the song partially explores that.[1] The phrase "unbearably white" had previously been used as a criticism of the band, in reference to their race

I don’t really care about black culture all too much but I’d bet many would tell you that today is the peak of black influence, with rap becoming truly global in a way that jazz only grazed.

You mention the Beatles, but they weren’t political as much as naive about the world (imagine).

Isn't Imagine just literally pro-communism? I agree that it's a naive perspective, but it's also very much a political one.

FWIW, that wasn't the Beatles, that was a Lennon solo project Ono collaboration.