#41: Rage Against The Machine — Rage Against The Machine (1992)
Los Angeles, CA — Epic Records
As the second entry in our parallel explorations into the territory of rap/rock adjacency, what we have here is Rage Against The Machine’s self-titled debut album. Do I even need to introduce these guys? Okay, okay: Zach de la Rocha on the mic, Tom Morello on the guitar, Brad Wilk on the drumkit, and last but not least Tim Commerford on an especially stanky, funky, nasty bass. What we have here, folks, is an absolute door-buster, a pants-shittingly hard tour of force of a debut album, both in the metaphorical sense — it would be RATM’s entry into one of the most impeccable runs I’m aware of, with four absolute all-timer albums — and in the literal one — this record doesn’t fuck around, but rather whips you right across the cheeks with some of the dirtiest, nastiest, moistest basslines, grooves and vocals ever coinceived by mankind from the get-go.
Now, even if I usually like to keep the comparisons to a reasonable minimum when doing these reviews, it’s pretty much inevitable to compare this to Body Count’s debut, which we’ve seen but a few weeks ago. This, however, sounds light-years ahead on pretty much all fronts: cohesion, aesthetics, having a sense of direction, overall performance, you name it. Where to begin? Differently from BC’s okay-ish-to-mediocre instrumentation, the playing here is pretty much impeccable as far as their concept goes. It’s not too full of frills and pyrotechnics, but also not really barebones either; it sounds good, clean enough but with some residual grit that gives it just enough complimentary bite; and the playing is very much on point, solid and independent identity-wise, with a wide array of references: punk rock, hardcore metal, a little bit of funk, and, of course, hip-hop.
Speaking of which, it would be great to address their specific approach of rap-rock fusion. Differently from what our old friends over at Body Count and Run-D.M.C. were doing, it doesn’t really feel like an awkward, shoehorny jamming together of a little bit of this and a little bit of that, but rather a well thought-out combination of specific elements into a transitory third thing, a proper dialectic fusion so to speak; I will say that this is the first album that I’ve heard, chronologically speaking, to really successfully merge, and not just clumsily mash metal and hip-hop together. Rap flows and verses meld into hardcore punk choruses and hooks almost seamlessly, due equally to vocal and instrumental technique — though I will admit that a couple of the most overtly hiphoppy tracks also came off as somewhat goofy in some aspects to me, such as Take The Power Back and Know Your Enemy. There is significantly more focus on choruses and hooks than in verses, even though there are a couple or so tracks dedicated to somewhat more verbose rhymes and bars.
Zach’s delivery and voice sounds particularly Beastie Boys-like, with a somewhat Public Enemy-ish approach to flowing and a good helping of punky anger and shouting to really glue it all together, and the instrumentation in general, while firmly rooted in its punk/metal origins, doesn’t shy away from embracing different influences on its sound, notoriously so the positively exaggerated funk conveyed by Commerford’s bass playing, as well as a few somewhat psych-ish guitar moments and just some great grooving overall, constant and solid but rarely samey.
Something about this album that just simply cannot be ignored are the overt, unabashed political tones present in in, starting with the cover art, which is based on a photograph of vietnamese monk Thích Quảng Đức committing self-immolation as a form of protest against the abuses commited by the U.S. puppet state of South Vietnam. Pretty much every verse, hook and line in here is positively drenched in revolutionary ideals, with references to socialist concepts, and, most of all, angry, explosive, emotionally raw but still articulate calls to action against oppression, and I want to say that these guys absolutely know their politics: it’s not just some vague sense of revolt, but rather perfectly articulate, well-developed references and lines of thought, and while Zach still hadn’t reached the level of borderline compulsive name-dropping he eventually would, it is already there in some level. He constantly transitions between cryptic, recursive lines and accusative, in-your-face stuff pretty easily, and his writing doesn’t really feel like it’s in the line of rap properly, even though the influence is there: it is fairly intricate, but in a somewhat loose, meandering, while still focused, manner.
At the time of its release, Rage received almost universal acclaim for its solid, decisive sound, consistent discourse and succesfull accord between highbrow concepts and philosophy and straightforward, blunt calls to action. The band would later go on to release some more successful albums in the 90s, as well as some various other projects during the aughts, such as Prophets of Rage, a supergroup composed of basically RATM, minus Zach, plus Chuck D from Public Enemy and B-Real from Cypress Hill. I could go on and on about why this album is so good for many more paragraphs, but honestly I’d just be repeating myself at this point, so I’ll just leave it here, with renewed certainty that this really is one of the most ass-belting albums ever made, and I’m very glad that I got to really take a delve into it.
Favorite tracks
Killing In The Name: quite simply one of the greatest, hardest, realest songs ever made in the history of mankind, and that’s that. The sheer amount of different grooves, switch-ups and breakdowns are a thing to behold, and you just can’t help but bop to the rhythm. There are no real verses in this one, being a rather chorus-and-hook centric one, and the quickly changing sections almost feel like edging sometimes, creating this nigh-impeccable essay on cheek whooping that most definitely stand the test of time for many more decades to come. “Now you’re under control, and now you do what they told ya/ Those who died are justified/ For wearing the badge, they’re the chosen whites”
Wake Up: the definitions of a riff ass riff if I’ve ever seen one, this one wants to make you shit your pants right from the get go with the dissonant, somewhat doom-metal-ish chords, complete with a gratuitous but very welcome soulful, proggy section towards the end and hands down incredible lyrics, even considering how high of a bar the rest of the album sets. “Cause blood still flows in the gutter/ I’m like taking photos, mad boy kicks open the shutter/ Set the groove, then stick and move like I was Cassius/ Rep the “Stutter Step” then bomb a left upon the fascists/ Yeah, several federal men/ Who pulled schemes on the dream and put it to an end/ You better beware the retribution with mind war/ 20/20 visions and murals with metaphors”
Township Rebellion: it feels like this one kind of throws most structural conventions out of the window, which feels like a risky gamble but definitely works for me in this case. They take their whole “small distinct sections in quick succession” thing, turn it up to eleven and throw in a generous helping of mad grooves, fast, broken flows and intriguing, sometimes straight-up confusing lyrics to top it all off. Somewhat of an underrated B-side gem in my opinion, even though I do feel like it overstays its welcome for a little bit there at the tail end. “Gotta get wreck ’til our necks never swing on a rope/ From here to the cape of no hope/ Now freedom must be fundamental/ In Johannesburg, or South Central/ On the mic ’cause someone should tell ‘em/ To kick in the township rebellion”
