Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

You passed on an opportunity to be offended? What are you even doing here?

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

“But what about the lurkers?”

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

The willow is too close to the house.

American History and Black History can not be separated.

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, it’s door #2)

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

I’m more christian than these people and i’m an atheist.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

Let’s show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

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131Comments

  1. 1.

    Roger Moore

    I don’t see why a song about a war we lost has to be unpatriotic. The Star Spangled Banner- the verses that are officially the national anthem, at least- is about hanging tough and keeping up the fight even when things look bleak. It seems to me that requires far more real patriotism than saying “America, fuck yeah!” when we’re doing well.

  11. 11.

    jayjaybear

    If we’re making nominations, I think Bernstein and Sondheim’s “America” from West Side Story, for all that it’s a flighty Broadway tune, encompasses the whole somewhat confusing welter of opinions about this country. You have the enthusiastic, optimistic America-lovers (who do eventually win out) and the folks who are wounded by this country’s racism and class differences arguing it out in song. PERFECT!

  12. 12.

    Germy Shoemangler

    Only in America was a Top 30 hit for Jay and the Americans in 1963 (UA 626). The song was originally written for the Drifters as the follow-up to “On Broadway” by Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller, Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, However, it was Jay and the Americans that had the hit.

    Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller wrote countless hits together, including “Jailhouse Rock,” “Hound Dog,” “Love Potion Number Nine,” “Yakety Yak,” “Charlie Brown,” “Poison Ivy,” “Kansas City,” “I’m A Woman,” and “Searchin’.” Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil too were very successful with hits like “Blame It On The Bossa Nova,” “We Gotta Get Out Of This Place,” “He’s Sure The Boy I Love,” and “(You’re My) Soul And Inspiration.”

    But on a couple of occasions, all four writers wrote together for The Drifters. The first result of this stellar writer combination was “On Broadway,” the second was “Only In America.” “We thought Barry and Cynthia’s song was good,” says Leiber. “But it was too straight a protest song. I thought it needed to be a bit more playful and comic…” “…and a lot more ironic,” added Mike.

    But why, if the song was written for the Drifters, did Jay & the Americans have the hit? Quite simply, in the early 1960s the American public was not ready for a black group to sing so blatantly about social conditions. The Drifters’ version wasn’t released because in the social/political climate of the era, it was believed that The Drifters performing a song like “Only In America” would spark unwanted controversy.

    In 1963, The civil rights movement was growing.. Before the year was out, Martin Luther King would lead a massive march on Washington and make his famous “I Have A Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial; George Wallace would be standing in the doorway of the University of Alabama trying to keep black students out; and JFK would be assassinated in Dallas. It was in this climate that Only in America was written, with the intent of delivering a message about the contemporary life of black America. An original verse was: “Only in America/Land of opportunity/ Can they save a seat in the back of the bus just for me./ Only in America/Where they preach the Golden Rule/Will they start to march when my kids want to go to school.”

    When Leiber and Stoller took the Drifters’ recording to Atlantic for their nod of approval, the reaction wasn’t exactly what they were expecting. “Jerry Wexler looked at us and said, ‘Are you guys nuts? They’ll lynch us!'” recalls Leiber. Jerry Wexler: “I thought it absurd for a black man to be singing about this country being this ‘land of opportunity’ at that time in our history.” “You have to remember, this was 1963,” Stoller points out. “Black Power was just around the corner.”

    Fearing the record would never get played, Atlantic Records rejected the song and asked Leiber and Stoller for a new lyric. Disappointed, Leiber and Stoller reluctantly toned down the lyric to meet with the label’s wishes. But when the Drifters sang the new lyric, the song became pure irony. Mike Stoller felt it would make a strong ironic statement. Only in America would be more effective if a black artist sang about what was obviously not going on. Nevertheless, Atlantic rejected it once again.

    Rather than leave Only in America unreleased, Leiber and Stoller played their instrumental track for Jay and the Americans. They liked the song, as did their label United Artists. The label bought the master from Atlantic, and using the original master of “Only In America,” Leiber and Stoller replaced The Drifters’ vocals with the voices of Jay Black, Sandy Yaguda, Kenny Vance, and Howie Kane. The squeaky-clean, extremely white Only in America was released on August 17, 1963. It became a sizable hit for Jay & the Americans, peaking at #25 during the week of September 28, 1963. The writers, however, were terribly disappointed. “I bumped into Barry Mann,” says Leiber. “He said, ‘Hey man, how could you do that to our song?’ I said, ‘Atlantic was never going to release The Drifters’ version, so we changed it from a powerful protest into patriotic pap.'” Because of the lyric changes and the fact that a white group sang it, its original message had been effectively negated. Sung by Jay, it was void of any irony at all. The whole point was lost. It was written about blacks to be sung by blacks. Sung by a white group, it was just a song: In the land of opportunity a poor boy can grow up to be President.

    Only In America – Version by the Drifters

  16. 16.

    joel hanes

    From a poem by Wendell Berry

    Denounce the government and embrace the flag
    Hope to live in that free republic for which it stands

  18. 18.

    Lihtox

    @Roger Moore: I like the fact that the Star-Spangled Banner (or at least the first verse) isn’t triumphant. I wish our foreign policy and our patriotism were as humble and reflective.
    “Say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave over the land of the free and the home of the brave?” Well, does it? Is it still the land of the free and the home of the brave?

  21. 21.

    Villago Delenda Est

    I’m fine with the Star Spangled Banner. But this country may have once been the “home of the brave” but over the last 35 or so years it’s pretty obvious it no longer is.

  25. 25.

    JGabriel

    @raven: Seconded. A pretty great Simon & Garfunkel tune.

    Speaking of Paul Simon, another oddly patriotic song is:

    Rene and Georgette Magritte
    With their dog after the war
    Were strolling down Christopher Street
    When they stopped in a men’s store
    With all of the mannequins dressed in the style
    That brought tears to their immigrant eyes
    Just like the Penguins, the Moonglows
    The Orioles, and the Five Satins
    The easy stream of laughter
    Flowing through the air
    Rene and Georgette Magritte
    With their dog apres la guerre

  26. 26.

    Amir Khalid

    Interesting choices. Let me just note that Amazing Grace was written by an Englishman, and The Pogues are a Celtic punk band from London.

  28. 28.

    Chris

    I really love “America” in West Side Story. Great combo of “here’s why it sucks” and “here’s why it rocks.”

  32. 32.

    JGabriel

    @Lihtox:

    Is it still the land of the free and the home of the brave?

    Given that we have one of – if not the – highest incarceration rates in the world, I’d say it’s pretty clear we’re no longer the land of the free.

    And given the way conservatives freak out about pretty much everything, I guess land of the brave is looking pretty iffy too.

  34. 34.

    soonergrunt (mobile)

    @Yatsuno: they can’t afford that at all. Going to have to cut it back, probably to something Angela Merkel finds acceptable.
    I understand nobody is currently using “Die Horst Wessel-Leid”.

  37. 37.

    Randy P

    I don’t mind the Star Spangled Banner. I’m happy to stand for it and sing along.

    But I’ve always been fond of the UU hymn to the Finlandia tune (composed by Sibelius), as an antidote to all that exceptionalism that we’re always being hammered with.

    This is my song, O God of all the nations,
    a song of peace for lands afar and mine;
    this is my home, the country where my heart is;
    here are my hopes, my dreams, my holy shrine:
    but other hearts in other lands are beating
    with hopes and dreams as true and high as mine.

    My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean,
    and sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine;
    but other lands have sunlight too, and clover,
    and skies are everywhere as blue as mine:
    O hear my song, thou God of all the nations,
    a song of peace for their land and for mine.

  44. 44.

    JGabriel

    This one feels oddly patriotic too, in the way that the narrator still seems to maintain hope despite soul-deadening industrialization and consumerism.

    Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountians) – Arcade Fire

    They heard me singing and they told me to stop
    Quit these pretentious things and just punch the clock
    These days my life, I feel it has no purpose
    But late at night the feelings swim to the surface

    ‘Cause on the surface the city lights shine
    They’re calling at me, come and find your kind
    Sometimes I wonder if the world’s so small
    That we can never get away from the sprawl

    Living in the sprawl
    Dead shopping malls rise like mountains beyond mountains
    And there’s no end in sight
    I need the darkness, someone please cut the lights

  49. 49.

    hamletta

    I’m from Maryland, so I’m required to love “The Star-Spangled Banner.” I live about 20 minutes from Fredneck, where everything’s named “Key.”

  50. 50.

    Brachiator

    The US national anthem doesn’t meet feel patriotic at all. It was about a war the United States lost.

    It’s not really about war. It’s about hanging tough and persevering when odds and circumstances are against you. Given the bombast and victory guzzling in many songs and anthems, there is a remarkable amount of humility here.

    But aside from that, I like Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land,”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxiMrvDbq3s

    and, of course, James Brown, Living In America. Bombast and Funk.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5BL4RNFr58

    ETA: I’m seeing that great minds think alike!

  51. 51.

    hamletta

    My town’s parade and picnic got rain delayed till tomorrow. So bummed. I missed it last year. And we’re auditioning a potential new choir director, so I have to go to church tomorrow.

  55. 55.

    Tree With Water

    I’ve long thought our national anthem should be A Hard Rains A-Gonna Fall. Best of all, it’s a fun song!

    “..Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son?
    Oh, what did you see, my darling young one?
    I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it
    I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it
    I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin’
    I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin’
    I saw a white ladder all covered with water
    I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken
    I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children
    And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
    And it’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall..”.

  57. 57.

    Keith G

    The Star-Spangled Banner is actually a unique piece of music to use as an anthem.

    The verse we sing lasts about a minute. It tells a compact and complete, self-enclosed narrative about one important night in our early history.

    Other anthems tend to drone on as lists of platitudes and do not tell a story.

    Additional bonus points are earned by the SSB because the first verse does not mention God….yet.

  60. 60.

    M. Bouffant

    “Love of country” is bullshit. One can no more “love” an immaterial entity like a country or nation-state than one could love Hobby Lobby, Apple or any other corporate shitpile.

  61. 61.

    The Gray Adder

    @dino:
    The war in question:

    Date June 18, 1812 – February 18, 1815
    (2 years and 8 months)
    Location Eastern and Central North America, Atlantic and Pacific
    Result

    Status quo ante bellum

    Military stalemate
    Defeat of Tecumseh’s Confederacy

    Note that Great Britain was still the military superpower it was the first time we fought, and yet we held our own when they should have kicked our asses.

    More importantly…

    “In the United States, late victories over invading British armies at the battles of Plattsburg, Baltimore (inspiring their national anthem, ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’) and New Orleans produced a sense of euphoria over a ‘second war of independence’ against Britain.[5][6] The Federalist Party had strongly opposed the war effort and prevented New England from providing much in the way of soldiers and troops; it now virtually collapsed. The war ended on a high note for Americans, bringing an ‘Era of Good Feelings’ in which partisan animosity nearly vanished in the face of strengthened U.S. nationalism.”

  64. 64.

    raven

    @Steppan: This was not Hendrix but, given that it was the 1998 Music City Bowl between Bama and the Hokies, the reaction was really strong. As soon as Carlton started I looked at my wife and said “these people are going to go nuts. They did

    Jazz musician Larry Carlton performed the traditional pre-game playing of the national anthem, but his rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner did not meet with the crowd’s approval, and he was booed.[9

  72. 72.

    Davis X. Machina

    @raven:
    @efgoldman

    “Our Town” has been the first thing I’ve moved onto every MP3 player I’ve ever owned…

    Peter Ross’ overnight program on WBUR — or WCRB, can’t recall now — used to open with it once a week.

  73. 73.

    shell

    Was reading this weekend’s Doonesbury and it involves his ex, the performance artist, J.J. She’s talking about setting up a hospice-cam and that she’s going to ‘die live.’ What gives? Is this character terminally ill? What id I miss?

  76. 76.

    Brachiator

    @The Gray Adder:

    Note that Great Britain was still the military superpower it was the first time we fought, and yet we held our own when they should have kicked our asses.

    They burnt the White House to the ground and damaged the Capitol and many other buildings in Washington, D.C., and easily wreaked havoc wherever they wanted. To the Brits, the war was a minor irritant. The larger issue was Europe and the wars with Napoleon. In terms of world events, the War of 1812 was trivial.

    On top of all this, the US had tried to invade Canada, foolishly believing that Canadians were just aching to become part of the US. Instead, we only succeeding in encouraging Canadian nationalism.

    It is a bit of a mystery why Britain settled for the status quo (in a deal reached in 1814) instead of being more punitive.

    By the way, there is a good BBC History podcast on the War of 1812, which can be played or downloaded. Worth a listen. The historian interviewed is biased in favor of Britain, and downplays the American effort. And the way the historian, Andrew Lambert, disparages James Madison as an insignificant figure, is amazing.

    http://www.historyextra.com/podcast/war-independence

  79. 79.

    Aleta

    @Aleta:
    They leave out a verse:
    Must I go bound while you go free
    Must I love a man who doesn’t love me
    Must I be born with so little art
    As to love a man who’ll break my heart

    And a verse is added:
    The seagulls wheel, they turn and dive
    the mountains stand beside the sea
    This world we know turns round and round
    And all for them, and you and me
    (prob written by P. Seeger)

  80. 80.

    Tree With Water

    @raven: I love it when entertainers perform the anthem and provoke angry reactions. Remember Roseanne Barr’s performance? Her’s is my all time favorite. I forget what club invited her, but they certainly knew she was a comedian. And she delivered. Which is why I rushed to her defense when the club “apologized” for it, as though they had expected a reverent Marian Anderson at the Lincoln Memorial moment, and had instead been double-crossed… it’s a dog of an anthem, anyway, and my favorite version of it will always be the one that’s over and done with in the fastest time.

  81. 81.

    PaulW

    We didn’t lose the War of 1812. We tied.

    The real winners of that war were the Canadians, who developed a sense of national pride all their own.

    The British didn’t care much for it, because they were too busy fighting Napoleon (both times). They don’t even teach it in their classrooms (one diplomat visiting during WWII was stunned to find out British troops burned the White House during this war).

    The only real losers were the Native tribes, who were trying to stop the Euro-Americans from spreading across to the West.

  85. 85.

    Tokyokie

    @Tree With Water: As I recall, it was the San Diego Padres, and there was some connection between the team’s management and Roseanne’s agent. She knew damn well she didn’t have the vocal range to do it properly, but she gave the crowd a show all the same.

  89. 89.

    TheMightyTrowel

    I’m staying in a very Turkish neighborhoods in east berlin for my two month fellowship here and my 4th July evening music is Turkish dance music from the bat on the corner. Surprisingly jazzy and fun!

  91. 91.

    Cacti

    @Brachiator:

    It is a bit of a mystery why Britain settled for the status quo (in a deal reached in 1814) instead of being more punitive.

    Because the Brits were in no position to extract punitive concessions in 1814. They’d been repulsed at Baltimore and Plattsburgh and routed at New Orleans.

    Their strategic goal of keeping an alliance with Tecumseh’s Confederacy as a hedge against future US westward expansion was also ended when Tecumseh was killed and his forces scattered at the Battle of the Thames.

    Calling the War of 1812 a loss was fairly ignorant by DougJ. What exactly had the country lost at the war’s end?

    The only real losers of that war were the Native tribes of the western territories.

  93. 93.

    gelfling545

    @Amir Khalid: I was told that the text of Amazing Grace was written by an Englishman who had engaged in the slave trade after he saw the error of his ways & repented. Don’t know if this is true.

  94. 94.

    Brachiator

    @Cacti:

    Because the Brits were in no position to extract punitive concessions in 1814. They’d been repulsed at Baltimore and Plattsburgh and routed at New Orleans.

    The Battle of New Orleans was inconsequential, except to American feelings of pride. The Treaty of Ghent, ending the war, had been signed on December 24, 1814, but the news had not reached the US.

    And note that while the US sent heavyweights like John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay to the treaty negotiations, the Brits only sent minor officials closely controlled by London superiors.

    Ironically, after the abdication on Napoleon in 1814, many in the British public wanted larger war with the US. But privateers, more than US resistance, caused problems with British trade and merchants in Liverpool and Bristol wanted a return to economic good times.

    Their strategic goal of keeping an alliance with Tecumseh’s Confederacy as a hedge against future US westward expansion was also ended when Tecumseh was killed and his forces scattered at the Battle of the Thames.

    Yep. The Duke of Wellington, who refused to fight in America, pointed out that British policy would not gain Britain any territory in America. And the goal of using Native Americans to block US expansion was spiteful, but did not serve any British strategic goals.

    Americans got to feel good that they had come away from a battle with Britain with honor and some victories. The British largely didn’t give a rat’s ass. Dealing with Napoleon and Europe was more important to their long term interests.

  97. 97.

    joel hanes

    @TheMightyTrowel:

    I’m staying in a very Turkish neighborhoods in east berlin

    By damn, I miss the shaslik and paprika-drenched brathanchen from the little Turkish gastarbeiter-owned restaurant down the street from the barracks in Furth.

    (please pardon the missing ulauts; in a hurry)

  98. 98.

    Mike J

    @efgoldman:

    now does it every year before an early-season Pawsox game.

    Not any more. Aren’t they moving a few miles down the road? The Provsox?

  101. 101.

    Mnemosyne (tablet)

    @efgoldman:

    Dick Dale’s very American surf music is heavily influenced by the Lebanese music Dale grew up hearing in his family (they were Lebanese immigrants). So it’s very possible for something to be both strongly influenced by another country’s music and very American.

  102. 102.

    Geoduck

    As has been mentioned, the biggest problem with the SSB is not its content, but that it’s so hard to sing properly. If you’re picking something that will be sung by The Masses, go as simple as you can tune-wise.

    And it’s probably small of me, but whenever the latest eruption of stupidity blurts out of the South, I have to go listen to this song again:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-dzCt2xeSo

  106. 106.

    Brachiator

    @Mnemosyne (tablet):

    It’s possible for the outcome of a war to mean more to one side than it does to the other. Just sayin’.

    The War of 1812 is one of the best examples of this, and also a refutation of the lame cliche that history is written by the victors. The British, the Canadians, the US, and Native Americans all have different views of the war. But anyone who sees it as an American victory is barking up the wrong tree.

    Dick Dale’s very American surf music is heavily influenced by the Lebanese music Dale grew up hearing in his family (they were Lebanese immigrants). So it’s very possible for something to be both strongly influenced by another country’s music and very American.

    Didn’t know that Dale was Lebanese. But isn’t all “American” music essentially a blending and reconsideration of various sources?

    Dale’s “Surfing Drums” samples (or steals) the African American Bo Diddley riff and adds guitar and saxophone and drums to become its own thing.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqXb1A6ScJU

    It’s kinda like adding the lyrics of the Star Spangled Banner to the music written for a British men’s social club.

  107. 107.

    Mike G

    @Geoduck:

    My grandma loved to tell a story of when she was on a bus tour through Europe with a large group of American seniors. They were staying at a hotel in Germany someplace and the house band thought they’d impress the visitors by playing what old-timey American tunes they knew. Most of the songs turned out to be Southern – “Dixie”, “Rockytop”, “Old Folks at Home”, etc. and the Southerners present were cheering and enjoying it very much. Then the band struck up “Marching Through Georgia”, and the Southerners’ mood changed very suddenly :-)

  109. 109.

    Mnemosyne (tablet)

    @Brachiator:

    I think it’s fair to say that Americans viewed the War of 1812 as an American victory. That doesn’t mean the other sides are obligated to agree.

    There was a great documentary series on PBS about 20 years ago called “Rock and roll: An Unruly History” that talked about a lot of the sources for rock music, which is where I heard Dale tell his story about the roots of surf music. I think someone found it on YouTube at some point.

    Another tidbit from the same show: Blondie started out at a reggae band and then got “discoized.” Listen to “Heart of Glass” and you can hear the reggae rhythms in it, sped up for disco.

  111. 111.

    Mustang Bobby

    Aaron Copland’s score for The Red Pony and Our Town make me feel patriotic, along with Woody Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land” because they celebrate the variety of the land, not our military accomplishments.

    For national anthems, I gotta go with “O Canada” for singability, even though it does talk about “True patriot love in all thy sons command….” So there were no patriotic women? They’ve tried to update the lyrics, but it hasn’t happened yet. It’s not jingoistic and it’s got a good beat.

  112. 112.

    Davis X. Machina

    @efgoldman: Twern’t I. Didn’t — couldn’t — serve.

    My nascent CG career ended — I was aiming at the Academy — with the magic words “How many diopters?”

  113. 113.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Keith G:This x100.

    J. Patrick’s Pub, my”Cheers”–the Irish bar “where everybody knew my name”–stood no more than half a mile from Fort McHenry. (Sadly, with the untimely passing of its eponymous publican is now transmogrified into a more respectable but less cozy establishment.)

    And I grew up only a couple of miles from North Point & the site of the crucial land action of that incident, where the Maryalnd militia repelled the force landed by the British fleet to take the town & killed its commander, Major-General Robert Ross.

    About 30 years ago, in Philadelphia for a conference on military logistics, our small delegation of LogE’s ran into a similar group of Bundeswehr officers, who were puzzled by the lyrics. We were happy to explain & flesh out the story.

    And just FTR, the Supreme Being makes a cameo appearance in the fourth & last stanza of the poem, which begins with the sentiment that IMHO fully justifies keeping it as the national anthem:

    Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
    Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!

  116. 116.

    joel hanes

    @efgoldman:

    We’ve had this conversation before;
    I’m ten years after your friend, and almost as many years before Omnes.
    Omnes was an officer; I was a draftee; our experiences somewhat divergent.

    William O’Darby Kaserne, Furth May 1973 – May 1975
    Commo Platoon, HHB, 1 Bn 94 FA
    (self-propelled, tac-nuke capable 8-inch howitzers)
    I spent over a quarter of those two years at the Grafenwoehr field training facility,
    and another month on Reforger IV, and two additional months aggregate
    living in tents and doing 4-on, 4-off company-strength armed guard duty at our ammo site.

    Then I spent the last six months of my hitch at
    AFRC Chiemsee, near Rosenheim, just north of the alps on the Munich-Berchtesgaden autobahn,
    teaching sailing to military personnel and dependents.

  117. 117.

    WaterGirl

    @efgoldman: I had the very same thought about both the “post photos of your pets” thread and this “patriotic songs” thread.

    John Cole was the author of the first one; DougJ was the author of this one.

    Kudos to both for perfect threads for this day.

  118. 118.

    BobS

    @AliceBlue: A few years ago I attended a concert where John Hiatt, Guy Clark, Joe Ely, & Lyle Lovett shared the billing and the stage. Their final encore (of several) featured all four performers trading all the verses of This Land Is Your Land with the entire audience standing and singing — the parts we could remember, that is. It was a great feeling.@Petorado: Two excellent choices, although I’m partial to Dave Alvin’s version(s) of his song, alone and with The Blasters, the Guilty Men & Women, etc. Promised Land by Chuck Berry & Fortunate Son by CCR/John Fogerty also belong on a 4th of July playlist.

  124. 124.

    bad Jim

    Right now I’m listening to Charles Ives’ second symphony. Certainly not a candidate for an anthem, and very reminiscent of the then recent civil war, but the final mashup of “Columbia, Gem of the Ocean” is always great. A hearty second to everyone who voted for his variations on “America”; I heard that earlier.

    How can anyone who’s heard Dvorak’s 9th symphony, or the American Quartet, claim that he was using Czech themes? I’m fairly confident that “Turkey in the Straw” and “Swing Low Sweet Chariot” are American. More to the point, Dvorak stated that he was weaving together bits of our folk music to show Americans what they ought to do.

    My favorite piece of patriotic music is “The Stars and Stripes Forever” with the traditional words:

    Be kind to your web-footed friends, for a duck may be somebody’s mother.
    She lives at the edge of a swamp
    Where the weather is very very damp.
    Now you may think that this is the end, and it is, but then I’m a liar,
    We’re going to sing it again, and this time we’re going to sing it even higher.

  125. 125.

    John M. Burt

    The Internationale.
    Hey, how can I not feel patriotic about lyrics like,

    All people are created equal
    With rights to life and liberty
    The state must be the people’s servant
    That they might be safe and free
    And if the state should shirk its duty
    The people then must stand
    Their right’s to alter or abolish it
    And remake it by their hand

    That is as close to a literal translation as any I have ever seen, and it serves to show how two of the strongest streams of Liberalism are not so far apart after all.

  126. 126.

    chuck

    The words to the SSB always make me think of the Palestinians in Gaza getting bombed. It’s long been inappropriate for the American Empire.

  127. 127.

    mclaren

    <blo@Roger Moore:

    I don’t see why a song about a war we lost has to be unpatriotic.

    Fuck YEAH! AMERICA! NUMBER ONE!!!! EVEN WHEN WE SCREW UP AND LOSE!!!!!!

    Not only did America lose that war, the British burned down our seat of government. And America was so cheap we didn’t have the money to rebuild it from scratch, so we repainted it. White. Which is why it’s now called “The White House.”

    Yeah, that’s a real sign of being Number One.

    Nitbrain.

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