Boulton and Sharp discuss the role of popular music in the context of post-9/11 U.S. politics. Popular music also played a role in the 2016 presidential election. Discuss an example of how popular music — a song, a performer, a musical genre, an event — influenced national political discourse in 2016.
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Sia’s used her single “The Greatest”, which was released in September, both to show solidarity to the LGBTQ community in the wake of the Orlando shooting, and to show support for Hillary Clinton in the election season of 2016.
In the music video for “The Greatest”, Sia used subtle visual cues (which were later explained in the media) to show that the song was dedicated to the victims of the shooting in a gay nightclub in June. The video features 49 dancers to represent the 49 victims of the shooting, and all the dancers are children to highlight the fact that everyone who was killed was somebody’s child. The lead dancer paints rainbows on her face like battle paint, representing the strength of the LGBTQ community in the wake of the attack, which is echoed by the repeated lyrics, “Dont give up”, and “I’ve got stamina.” The video was intended to show solidarity with the LGBTQ community, which was threatened both by the attack, and later, by the prospect of Donald Trump as president.
Sia also used the song to support Hillary Clinton and mock Donald Trump during the election season. The chorus of the song contains the words “I’ve got stamina” over and over again. After Donald Trump questioned Clinton’s stamina in the first debate, Sia posted a video to instagram (where she has 1.6 million followers) which featured a montage of pictures of Hillary Clinton speaking and campaigning while the chorus of “The Greatest” played. Sia used a single song to influence political discourse in two ways: to support a threatened minority and to support a political candidate.
“Fuck Donald Trump, I like White folks, but I don’t like you.” the magical lyrics by YG, perfectly describes an aspect of how so many Black and Latino people felt about White people throughout the whole campaigning process. To answer the question of is this an appropriate song to play in Ross dining hall, ABSOLUTELY 100% YES. And to answer that question with another question: is is okay that I can still see the Confederate flag on this campus? Point is, everyone has shit they don’t like, why is it that when it comes to Black or Latino people voicing it that it becomes a problem?
YG is not a genius nor does he have good lines, or “bars”, but what I can say is that he is doing something that so many other rappers nowadays are afraid to do and that is get into politics! This is one of the reasons Black people have lost their voice in the political sphere, because the Black people, and other people of color, that are famous enough to get the message out even further contemplate their own careers instead of attempting to save and help their own people.
Bolton and Sharp agree that popular music played a large and impactful role in post-9/11 politics. In terms of this post-9/11 musical movement, Sharp writes, “The war in Iraq rekindled an American tradition of music activism arguably as intense as during the height of the Vietnam War” (Sharp, 207). I would argue that the 2016 election has and will in the coming months spark a revival of political movement through music, similar to that of post-9/11 and the war in Iraq.
Many Americans feel emotional, raw and confused, and we already see this being translated through popular music. For example, over break I watched the American Music Awards, where Green Day performed their new song, “Bang Bang.” During their AMA performance, they changed some of their lyrics, repeatedly chanting, “No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA.” The lyrics were both candid and unexpected, but were inspirational to me as a viewer and opened the door for wider American political discourse following the election. By taking advantage of their celebrity status, Green Day used their music to spark conversation and political action. I see this as the beginning of a trend in the coming months, if not longer, as Americans continue to grapple with overwhelming emotions following the outcome of the 2016 presidential election.
For further reading on Green Day’s AMA Performance: http://nypost.com/2016/11/20/green-day-berate-donald-trump-during-ama-performance/
Music just like other social media outlets is a place for celebrities to voice their opinions. This election I think one of the biggest songs that touched so many people was “FTD” by YG and the remix done by G-Eazy, Macklemore as well. On the day of the election as I was eating lunch in Ross dining hall, this exact song came on. Whether or not this is acceptable, is up for debate, but still I think that incident shows you just how powerful a song can speak to people and be used as a tool to influence elections. This song calls out Trump for just about everything in the book, and is also catchy as well; best of both worlds. The thing I was genuinely surprised to see this election was the lack of musicians making songs or a song that supported Hillary that could get people singing/talking about her. I will never forget Obama’s first election, when the song, “Yes We Can” came out and had so many prominent people backing Barack in this video and I truly think this helped alot. I believe the reason Hillary didn’t have a song that backed her was because that people didn’t exactly want to endorse Hillary but rather just hated Trump. Both of their unfavorabilities were very high among the general population; but at the same time, I’m surprised that artists didn’t jump into this election to back Hillary and give her a good boost just like Obama in ’08. I think the fact that people didn’t think it was going to be an even close race affected the artists in not producing a song.
For this response, I chose to look at the influence of hip hop in the 2016 election. I first heard reporting about this with NPR’s piece, “Politics with a Backbeat.” In the episode, a FiveThirtyEight writer used RapGenius (an online lyrics catalog) to gather the mentions of both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump throughout time. For decades, hip hop surrounding Donald Trump simply referenced his wealth. In 2016 however, a large number of songs were released directly opposing him. YG’s “FDT” (F— Donald Trump) was the most popular, becoming somewhat of an anthem against Trump. In the world of hip hop, rappers continually insulted Trump, yet few were willing to outwardly support Clinton. This feeling of negativity towards Trump and apathy towards Clinton seemed to parallel much of the popular sentiment among democrats.
In 2008, the response was much different. Instead of negative music, hip hop was dramatically supporting Barack Obama. Many of the most prominent artists from Jay-Z to Nas wrote songs expressing their enthusiasm. The divide between Obama and Clinton’s response may be due both to race, and their political stances throughout time. In 2008, people saw Obama as representing the people, whereas Clinton’s career made her less genuine sounding. It should be noted that in other genres, especially pop, artists came out overwhelmingly in favor of Clinton. It is also unclear whether support from the hip hop community would have helped her campaign. In 2008, some saw aggressive lyrics from hip hop artists hurting Obama, as people would associate that with him. While it is hard to quantify the effect hip hop has on the election, it is clear that the music represented a problem with the Clinton campaign: people had very strong opinions against Trump, but little genuine belief in Hillary Clinton.