Conservative rock songs

Back in late 2002 or early 2003, with the invasion of Iraq imminent, South Park ran an episode where the town folks were divided among the rock music people and the country music people. The former were liberal anti war progressive gay loving cheese eating surrender monkeys. The latter represented the conservative patriotic moral values redneck burger eating warmongers. In the South Park world, conservatives did not rock and roll, and country lovers supported the war. Of course in the real world there is a Texan country band that opposes the war. And now it turns out that conservatives too listen to rock music. National Review has recently compiled a list of top 50 conservative rock songs. Here are the top 10.

1. Won’t Get Fooled Again — The Who

Meet the new boss / Same as the old boss

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. And what can be more conservative?

2. Taxman — The Beatles

George Harrison tells you: Now my advice for those who die / Declare the pennies on your eyes.

3. Sympathy for the Devil — The Rolling Stones

The Devil inspired Pontius Pilate, that coup in St Petersburg and the Blitzkrieg, and he will tell you that: Every cop is a criminal / And all the sinners saints.

4. Sweet Home Alabama — Lynyrd Skynyrd

Big wheels keep on turning, and those Neil Young hating Southern men keep voting for GOP.

5. Wouldn’t It Be Nice — The Beach Boys

We could be married / And then we’d be happy

6. Gloria — U2

Well we know that Bono is Christian.

7. Revolution — The Beatles

This is the version where if you talk about destruction, John Lennon wants to be counted out.

8. Bodies — The Sex Pistols

It’s not an animal / It’s an abortion

9. Don’t Tread on Me — Metallica

So be it / Threaten no more / To secure peace is to prepare for war, or as Thomas Jefferson said, ‘The price of freedom is eternal vigilance’.

10. 20th Century Man — The Kinks

I was born in a welfare state / Ruled by bureaucracy / Controlled by civil servants / And people dressed in grey / Got no privacy got no liberty / ’Cause the 20th-century people / Took it all away from me

The full list is here. The only one to make to an A-A-A list is Sympathy for the Devil, not the least because of its reference to Bombay.

Hat tip: Marginal Revolution.