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Rage Against the Machine

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Rage Against the Machine
File:Ratmband.jpg
Left to right: Brad Wilk, Zack de la Rocha, Tim Commerford, Tom Morello
Background information
Years active1992–2000
MembersZack de la Rocha - vocals
Tom Morello - guitar
Tim Commerford - bass
Brad Wilk - drums

Rage Against the Machine, also known as Rage or RATM, was an American rock / rapcore band noted both for their diligent political conscience and for their pioneering blend of rock music and rap music which over time would come to be known variously as Rock, Rap Rock or Rap Metal (Both known under Rapcore), Hard Rock, Funk Metal and Alternative Rock or Alternative Metal — as well as their vocal militant leftist beliefs. At the point of their break-up in 2000, Rage Against the Machine had been one of the most popular political hard rock bands of all time, and certainly of the 1990s. Three-fourths of the band are now members of Audioslave, featuring former Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell.

Widely regarded as the definitive originators of their genre, Rage drew inspiration from early metallic instrumentation to create an almost totally new style of music. The coalescence of rhyming styles and vocals along with their sound, especially Tom Morello's guitar techniques, made RATM difficult to confine to any one particular musical genre, compelling a new classification.

History

File:RATM1.jpg
The photo cover of Rage's self-titled release from 1992. Thích Quảng Đức, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk, burns himself to death in Saigon in 1963. Thích was protesting the oppression of Buddhists led by U.S.-installed Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem's administration.

Formation

The duo of Zack de la Rocha and Tim Commerford teamed up in 1990 with Tom Morello and Brad Wilk to form a band. Their name was derived from the song "Rage Against the Machine" by de la Rocha's former group, Inside Out. Shortly after forming, they gave their first public performance in a living room in Orange County, California and self-produced a 12-song cassette which already included songs like "Bullet in the Head" [1]. Several record labels expressed interest and they eventually signed with Epic Records. Morello said, "Epic agreed to everything we asked--and they've followed through... we never saw a [ideological] conflict as long as we maintained creative control."

Their debut album, the self-titled Rage Against the Machine was released in late 1992. To promote the album and its core message of social justice and equality, the band went on tour, playing at Lollapalooza II and as support for Suicidal Tendencies in Europe.

Mainstream success

Their second album, Evil Empire entered Billboard Top 200 chart at number one in 1996. Two tracks on that album later won Grammy awards. A live video, also titled Rage Against the Machine followed in 1997. The following release, The Battle of Los Angeles also debuted at number one in 1999, selling 450,000 copies the first week and then going double-platinum.

Renegades, released shortly after the band's dissolution, was a 2000 collection of covers by bands as diverse as Devo, Cypress Hill, Minor Threat, MC5 and even Bob Dylan. The following year saw the release of another live video, The Battle of Mexico City.

A bootleg album of live and rare material fittingly titled Live & Rare from 1997, was followed up by a proper live release, Live at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in 2003, an edited recording of their last shows, September 12 and 13, 2000 at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles. It was accompanied with an expanded DVD release of the concerts.

Political Beliefs

RATM burned the American Flag at the 1999 woodstock festival.

Integral to their identity as a band, the group voiced far left viewpoints highly critical of the domestic and foreign policies of the U.S. Throughout its existence, RATM participated in political protests to advocate these beliefs, including an infamous performance outside the 2000 Democratic National Convention and a performance on Wall Street earlier that same year. In the case of the latter, on January 26th, 2000, filming of their music video "Sleep Now in the Fire" — directed by Michael Moore — shut down the New York Stock Exchange. The NYSE locked its doors midday in response to fears of crowds gathering to watch the filming. Footage of enthusiastic Wall Street employees headbanging to Rage's music was later used in the completed "Sleep Now In The Fire" video.

File:Lollapaloozaratm.jpg
Rage Against the Machine protesting Parents Music Resource Center.

At a Lollapalooza appearance in 1993 in Philadelphia, the band stood onstage naked with duct-tape on their mouths and the letters "PMRC" painted on their chests for 15 minutes in protest against censorship by the Parents Music Resource Center. The only sound emitted was audio feedback from Morello and Commerford's guitars.

The band primarily saw its music as a vehicle for social activism. Tom Morello, in a February 1997 interview with Guitar World, said,

America touts itself as the land of the free, but the number one freedom that you and I have is the freedom to enter into a subservient role in the workplace. Once you exercise this freedom you've lost all control over what you do, what is produced, and how it is produced. And in the end, the product doesn't belong to you. The only way you can avoid bosses and jobs is if you don't care about making a living. Which leads to the second freedom: the freedom to starve.

Meanwhile, detractors on the Radical Left pointed out the tension between voicing committment to leftist causes while being signed to Epic Records, a subsidiary of media conglomerate Sony Records. In response, Morello pointed out,

When you live in a capitalistic society, the currency of the dissemination of information goes through capitalistic channels. Would Noam Chomsky object to his works being sold at Barnes & Noble? No, because that's where people buy their books. We're not interested in preaching to just the converted. It's great to play abandoned squats run by anarchists, but it's also great to be able to reach people with a revolutionary message, people from Granada Hills to Stuttgart.

Some controversial stands taken by the group include tireless advocacy for the releases of former Black Panther death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal and life-sentenced political activist Leonard Peltier. The band were also supporters of the Zapatistas, especially de la Rocha, who has taken several trips to the Mexican state of Chiapas to aid their efforts, and whose travels were soon documented, in part, in one of the band's concert videos.

The song Bulls on Parade was performed on Saturday Night Live in April of 1996. Their two-song performance was cut to one song when the band attempted to hang inverted American flags from their amplifiers, a protest to having presidential candidate Steve Forbes as guest host on the program that night.

Break-up

Renegades, RATM's last studio album.

On October 18, 2000, de la Rocha released the following statement :

I feel that it is now necessary to leave Rage because our decision-making process has completely failed. It is no longer meeting the aspirations of all four of us collectively as a band, and from my perspective, has undermined our artistic and political ideal. I am extremely proud of our work, both as activists and musicians, as well as indebted and grateful to every person who has expressed solidarity and shared this incredible experience with us.

After the group's breakup, Morello, Wilk, and Commerford teamed up with ex-Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell to form Audioslave. The first Audioslave single, "Cochise", was released in early November 2002, and the first album followed to mainly positive reviews. Their second album Out of Exile debuted at the number one position on the Billboard charts in 2005.

In September 2004, de la Rocha released a song called "We Want It All", produced by Trent Reznor, on the Songs and Artists that Inspired Fahrenheit 9/11 soundtrack. Tom Morello, credited as "The Nightwatchman," also contributed a song entitled "No One Left" to this compilation. He was also featured on the song "Act III Scene 2 (Shakespeare)" on Saul Williams' self-titled album.

According to a Spin magazine interview, de la Rocha has recorded several tracks with various artists, among them Reprazent and DJ Shadow intended for a solo album. In 2003 a song called "March of Death" that he recorded with DJ Shadow was released in protest of the war on Iraq.

  • RATM is referred to in the song "Flagpole Sitta" by Harvey Danger. The line states "I want to publish zines / and rage against machines".
  • Zach de la Rocha is a frequent "guest star" on the internet comic Flem, where he often appears any time one of the characters says the word "Testify", and destroys everything in sight. This has become something of a popular internet meme.
  • In the Simpsons episode titled "The Heartbroke Kid", Bart says he "raged against the machine" after destroying school vending machines.
  • In the movie The Matrix, the last scene ends with the song 'Wake Up', from the Rage Against the Machine album.

Discography

Albums

Singles

Live Albums

File:RATM - live.jpg
RATM were known for their energetic live shows.

Music Videos

  • "Killing in the Name"
  • "Bombtrack"
  • "Freedom"
  • "Bullet in the Head"
  • "People of the Sun"
  • "Bulls on Parade"
  • "No Shelter"
  • "Guerrilla Radio"
  • "Sleep Now in the Fire", 2000, directed by Michael Moore.
  • "Testify", 2000, directed by Michael Moore.
  • "Renegades of Funk"
  • "How I Could Just Kill a Man"

DVDs

Contains footage of concerts in Irvine, CA, at the Rock Am Ring Festival 1996, and at the Pink Pop Festival 1994. It also features music videos for five Rage songs from their first two albums. Also contains a poem by Zack de la Rocha entitled "Memory of the Dead" and the song, "The Ghost of Tom Joad".

  • Revolution USA, 1999

This unauthorized DVD contains the biographies of the band members and interviews with Tom Morello and music journalists, but does not contain any live video clips, nor actual Rage Against the Machine music.

Rage's first concert in Mexico. Features songs from Rage's first three albums and a cover of "Zapata's Blood".

RATM's last performance at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles, CA on September 13, 2000. It features long-time friends B-Real and Sen Dog for a cover of Cypress Hill's "How I Could Just Kill A Man". The DVD also contains the music videos "Bombtrack" (previously unreleased) and "How I Could Just Kill A Man" (by way of a career spanning video and photo montage,) footage from the band's free Democratic National Convention concert on August 14th, 2000, as well as two bonus concert performances of "People of the Sun" and "Know Your Enemy".

Awards

  • Best Metal Performance - "Tire Me" (Grammy)
  • Best Hard Rock Performance - "Guerrilla Radio" (Grammy)

Official

Other

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