Portland State University PDXScholar Young Historians Conference Young Historians Conference 2012 Apr 26th, 9:00 AM - 10:15 AM Parental Advisory Explicit Lyrics: A Case Study of Music Censorship and Suppression in America Nathaniel T. Belcik Lakeridge High School Follow this and additional works at: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/younghistorians Part of the Critical and Cultural Studies Commons Let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Belcik, Nathaniel T., "Parental Advisory Explicit Lyrics: A Case Study of Music Censorship and Suppression in America" (2012). Young Historians Conference. 10. https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/younghistorians/2012/oralpres/10 This Event is brought to you for free and open access. It has been accepted for inclusion in Young Historians Conference by an authorized administrator of PDXScholar. Please contact us if we can make this document more accessible: [email protected]. PARENTAL ADVISORY EXPLICIT LYRICS: A CASE STUDY OF MUSIC CENSORSHIP AND SUPPRESSION IN AMERICA, 1980-1989 Nathaniel T. Belcik Karen E. Hoppes History 201: History of the United States Portland State University June 10th, 2012 2 PARENTAL ADVISORY: EXPLICIT LYRICS THE PMRC AND MUSIC CENSORSHIP IN AMERICA: 1980-1989 The story of music censorship in America is a long one. The first documented instance of music censorship was after the Civil War. Pro-southern songs were banned during Reconstruction because the US government thought that they would stir up revolution and pro- Southern feelings.1 After that, the menace was jazz, whose swinging beat was thought to be corrupting to white youth. The efforts to suppress jazz were mainly local and limited to city governments wanting to ban young people from going to jazz shows.2 When rock n’ roll became popular in the 1950s, and Elvis became famous nationwide, music censorship started becoming a national issue. Elvis was famously filmed from the waist up during his appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1958.3 Parents were worried about what their children were listening to, and as the counterculture of the 1960s developed and Rock music became a dominant force in American culture, the so-called Establishment was worried. Parents and church leaders organized demonstrations against the “evils” of popular music, but their efforts yielded little success. In the 1970s their efforts died down, but as the 1980s rolled around, the opposition to rock music became more organized and powerful. 1Eric Nuzum, Parental Advisory: Music Censorship in America (New York: HarperCollins Publishing Inc., 2001), 211. 2 Ibid., 5. 3 Ibid., 220. 3 The stylistic changes that were happening in rock music, and the emergence of the Christian Right with the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, set the stage for the debate over popular music and its effect on American society. The debate that had been festering for many years, exploded; soon a media firestorm began and an organization was started that had a big effect on the music scene in America. In the early 1980s, rock music was changing. Heavy metal rock broke into the mainstream and became a popular musical style. Heavy metal, an extreme subgenre of rock music, features loud, distorted guitars, pounding bass, anthemic or gruff vocals, and powerful drumming. The first heavy metal album was released in 1969 by the British band Black Sabbath, but there had been albums before that were considered proto-metal. Heavy metal regularly uses the tritone, a musical interval that was banned in the Middle Ages because it was considered to be “the devil in music.” Lyrical themes in heavy metal include violence, sex, rebellion, death, fantasy, and sociopolitical commentary. Heavy metal also has an intense subculture of fans, for many of them the metal subculture is a lifestyle. The metal subculture is primarily made up of white, blue-collar, males and they expect metal performers to be authentic and loyal to the subculture. “Metalheads,” as they were known, primarily dressed in jeans, t-shirts with band logos, and many wore a denim jacket with band patches. When heavy metal became a popular musical style, and the metal subculture began to grow, many people became concerned. By the early 1980s, bands such as Van Halen and Judas Priest had major followings in America. Van Halen became popular by becoming the pioneers of a new style of heavy metal known as “hair metal.” Hair metal combined pop sensibilities with metal riffs. It was a popular style of music in the 1980s and was commercially successful, with many albums going platinum. The lyrical content of most hair metal songs was about partying, girls, and drugs. One critic 4 wrote that all Van Halen sung about was “sex, partying, and cars.”4 As hair metal became popular, a lot of teenagers started listening to other types of metal and soon heavy metal became one of the most popular musical styles in America. Many metal bands had platinum records and heavy metal videos were played constantly on MTV. The popularity of heavy metal also led to increased notoriety from parents and religious leaders. In the 1980s, religious leaders and parents became concerned about the growing popularity of heavy metal. Across the nation, churches organized record burnings as a way to protest the growing style of music. One student at a Florida school run by Southern Baptists described a record burning in 1982: One Thursday we were taken to where a man gave a sermon on the evils that were assaulting our youth. He spoke mainly about rock music. After several minutes of whipping the crowd into a frenzy, he said we should ‘purge’ our lives of this evil, just as he was about to do. He then began to hold up record albums, say a few things about each one-either a line from the lyrics or a statement of condemnation-and break it, throwing the album into a raging fire… Many albums later, he held up the Pat Benatar single ‘Hell is for Children.’ He said, ‘This song openly promotes devil-worship among our youth!’ He had lied about many records, but this was the worst. We started shouting things like ‘that’s bullshit!’ and ‘you never even read the lyrics!’ Without a moment’s hesitation he said, ‘See how the Devil despises His work! His evil is deeply ingrained. Don’t be surprised if your children are as intolerant!’ One of the old men beside him asked, ‘Are they possessed!’ I couldn’t hear what he replied. The crowd went wild.5 Stories like this were typical during the early-to-mid-1980s as more people became concerned about popular music. Many books came out about the dangers of rock music and churches began preaching about the evils of the music. By 1985, enough parents had begun to 4http://www.classicvanhalen.com/albums_1984.shtml, 5-28-12. 5 Deena Weinstein, Heavy Metal: A Cultural Sociology (New York: Lexington Books, 1991), 248. 5 raise concerns about the lyrical content of rock and metal music and soon the greatest music suppression effort was being organized. One day in 1984, Tipper Gore, the wife of then US Senator Al Gore, had returned from the mall with a record by Prince entitled “Purple Rain.” She had purchased the record for her oldest daughter, who was eleven at the time. The record was a soundtrack to an R-rated movie and when Tipper and her daughter sat and listened to the record they noticed some things that they did not like. There were graphic depictions of sex acts on the album and immediately Tipper decided to act. Instead of taking responsibility for not checking the lyrics to make sure they were appropriate before buying her daughter the soundtrack to an R-rated movie, Tipper decided to blame the record industry for releasing “Purple Rain” without any warning about the lyrical content of it. “Millions of Americans were buying ‘Purple Rain’ with no idea what to expect. Thousands of parents were giving the album to their children—many even younger than my daughter.”6 Tipper started watching MTV and watched Van Halen’s “Hot for Teacher” music video, along with others, and was appalled. “The images frightened my children; they frightened me! The graphic sex and the violence was too much for us to handle.”7 Tipper, and her friend Susan Baker, the wife of then Treasury Secretary James Baker, decided to form an organization to advocate for the labeling of musical records that they found offensive. Gore, Baker, and their friends Pam Howar and Sally Nevius, formed the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC), a tax-exempt nonprofit organization, and began to expand their membership. Eight other wives of influential politicians and businessman joined and 6 Nuzum, 13. 7 Ibid., 13-14. 6 immediately sprang into action.8 They sent out press releases and released a list called the “Filthy Fifteen,”9 which were songs they found particularly objectionable. One of their first actions was pooling about two thousand names from their respective Christmas card lists and having a meeting. The speaker at the meeting was Jeff Ling, a former musician turned pastor. He railed against Rock music and denounced it as sinful and blasphemous. The only media attention the PMRC received was a brief mention in the Washington Post, but that was soon to change.10 The PMRC wanted media attention and they got it. Once the PMRC began their media campaign they began to attract a lot of publicity. The controversy was all over the country; newspapers and TV shows could not get enough coverage. The PMRC sent a letter to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) calling for the recording industry to “exercise voluntary self-restraint perhaps by developing guidelines and/or a rating system, similar to that of the movie industry.”11 But, the PMRC did not want to stop all sex and violence, only sex and violence that could be purchased or seen by teenagers.