I realize I have gone on about Epitaph records for much longer than it warranted.
And right now I am past caring.
What interests me now is a philosophical question: what happens when you don’t treat people with sufficient respect?
In the 1600s the new King Of Germany tried to break the back of the Catholic Church’s stanglehold on Germany and the Pope excommunicated him and the entire German people.
The people of Germany, the SERFS of Germany would accept poverty, subsistence, slavery, but they would not accept the concept their immortal soul, the place where all this stuff was paid back, was going to hell. The KING OF GERMANY WAITED OUTSIDE THE VATICAN TO BEG FOR FORGIVENESS.
My point is the same as my point in Iran: people would rather strave to death than feel disrespected, belittled, less than worthy.
At the heart of rock lies the same lesson. Rock (by rock I mean pop music) has spent it’s entire existent demanding to be heard, demanding respect. I do mean, Aretha Franklins “Respect” and Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come”. But also, earlier, Chuck Berry’s “Almost Grown” and a step sideways, Presley’s Sun Sessions.
Jump 20 years and listen to the Sex Pistols “No dogsbody”.
Jump another and listen to Diamond Rings.
There is an insistence from slavery, to poverty, to gay rights: Don’t Disrespect Me.
This is the one of the secrets of rock, it is its hidden meaning, not sex but rock. A refusal to bend in the face of power.
