SONG REVIEWS
An Honest Critique
Listening to and trying to understand the writers of songs I really want to dislike
Before you do anything, please listen to this song first.
Creatively and acoustically speaking, it was a heartfelt song. The vocal dynamics convey the emotions clearly….
You ever hear a song and you get so frustrated that you just want to let out a loud “Oh, for fuck’s sake”! and throw your phone, but then you realize you’re out in public or at work?
This critique will be one of those songs.
The song is “Rich Men North of Richmond”.
I’m going to do my best to give this song a fair shake. My knee-jerk reaction is just to tear into it and rip on it but this time I want to come from a place of empathy. The writer of this song is either not really informed or is and wants to cash in on the uninformed demographic who see how fucked up their world is but can’t really put a finger on the reasons why they are struggling to put food on the table and living paycheck to paycheck. The value of their dollar is shrinking and the gap between super wealthy and homelessness is ever widening with precious little in between.
My first listening of this song, it screams of “White Grievance”.
What do I mean by that?
Basically, it means that the problems being brought up in this song have been mentioned over and over by the Black community in songs, movies, and now recently with social media posts that went largely ignored. No one cared that members of the Black community couldn’t get good-paying jobs to feed their families. No one seemed to care and when issues were brought up, the White community usually responded with either disdain, flippancy, or “If you don’t like it here, leave”.
Right off, in the first verse, he complains about “working all day for bullshit pay…”
My first question is…what does this have to do with the “Rich men North of Richmond”?
Why is it their problem?
Oh, by the way, he’s referring to politicians in Washington D.C.
Is he expecting them to help?
Is he expecting them to help him?
I’m what way?
Every time a Democrat talks of introducing legislation to either
- Raise the minimum wage
- Force corporations to pay a living wage
- Encourage people to unionize
Almost immediately, they are accused by people like Oliver Anthony of being socialist communists who want to destroy the economy. Immediately they shout them down. Immediately, they go to social media to spread the latest harebrained conspiracy theory some other idiot just as stupid as they are made up.
Pick a lane.
You want help or don’t you?
If you want help from Washington, you’ll need to stop electing and sending chucklefucks that work against your interests.
Also, why are you blaming the politicians in Washington? Why aren’t you blaming your employer? Doesn’t the employer bear any responsibility for paying fair wages?
Conspiracy Theories
Here’s a gem that just leaped out at me:
wanna have total control. Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do
I wanna throw something.
As long as you aren’t committing crimes, nobody gives a shit what you say and do, Oliver!
You’re not that special and you’re not that important.
This canard has been floating around for decades. This evil cabal in Washington wants total control of everything. They accused Obama of that back in 2004–05. People lost their damned minds when he got elected. These unhinged lunatics actually thought he was a secret Muslim put in power who wanted to take control of the country to destroy it.
They took a shit on the very people that set out to help them in the first place. I recently did an article on Joe the Plumber.
He’s the type of person that would have benefited from policies put forth by Democrats.
Joe died from pancreatic cancer. Wouldn’t it have been great if we had Universal Healthcare?
Wouldn’t it be great to go to a doctor and not have your healthcare options decided by and dictated by insurance corporations?
But instead, they decided to go reactionary instead of listening to facts and learning. The right-wing conservative policy has consequences.
Democrats tried.
Obama Tried.
Hillary Clinton tried.
It wasn’t for lack of trying.
Low pay and high taxes
Cause your dollar ain’t shit and it’s taxed to no end
Sounds like your pay didn’t go up with the cost of living. Who’s fault is that, exactly? This is what happens when you give billion-dollar corporations and companies carte-Blanche to do whatever the fuck they want, and charge whatever they want. That’s what’s called greed-flation. Corporations used the pandemic as an excuse to artificially inflate their prices of goods and services, raked in millions in increased quarterly profits, and then bragged about it on Zoom calls in their quarterly meetings.
I don’t hear you singing about that.
Taxed to no end?
You know who isn’t being taxed to no end and is legally allowed to hide their wealth from taxation? That would be the top 1% also known as the billionaire class. The fact that billionaires even exist is an obscenity and an indictment against our economic system, but that’s beside the point.
I don’t hear you singing about that.
Welfare Queen trope
I’m going to skip the MAGA Qanon reference and focus on this steaming pile of shit.
Lord, we got folks in the street, ain’t got nothin’ to eat, and the obese milkin’ welfare
Uh-oh
This abounds like socialism. Since when did Right Wing White America give a good goddamn about the homeless living in the streets? What exactly do you expect to be done about them?
Give them free food and a home? We have plenty of empty houses sitting around. You think we should do that?
Governor Gavin Newsome of California has made multiple proposals on how to deal with this crisis, what did we hear from you?
“SOCIALIST!!!”
“LIB-TARD!!!!”
“COMMUNIST!!!”
So which is it, Oliver?
We all scream for socialism
Is it good to lend a hand to the people “living on the street with nothing to eat” or are you just gonna bitch and moan about your taxes being used for the homeless?
Pick a lane, Oliver.
Maybe we should tax the billionaire class more to help pay for these programs that would help. Sound good to you, Ollie?
I really want to scream.
I really do.
Black America has been screaming about these issues for well over one hundred years.
From Frederick Douglas to Ida B. Wells to Langston Hughes, to Martin Luther King Jr. to Malcolm X to James Baldwin, to Maya Angelou….Hell…every other rap and hip-hop artist on the goddamned music charts.
And what did White America do?
How did White America respond?
I think you know where I’m going with this.
Maybe the problem isn’t “North of Richmond”
Maybe the problem is right there in Richmond. Hell, maybe the problem is right there where you live, Oliver.
How about taking some personal responsibility for your plight?
So now, White grievance comes to the forefront in the form of a song and now you’re bitching about the very thing you and your father and his father had a hand in creating. White America voted for the very policies that are crushing it into the ground. White America voted for the limited ineffectual government we have today. White America voted in favor of giving more power to corporations and Wall-street and now you’re complaining about the high cost of living and the low pay.
This is what “Trickle-down economics” looks like. This is what Reaganomics looks like.
Welcome to the consequences of your own actions.
I hope I didn’t come across too strong for you and thank you for indulging me and my Honeylu rants.
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“Rich Men North Of Richmond”
I’ve been sellin’ my soul, workin’ all day
Overtime hours for bullshit pay
So I can sit out here and waste my life away
Drag back home and drown my troubles away
It’s a damn shame what the world’s gotten to
For people like me and people like you
Wish I could just wake up and it not be true
But it is, oh, it is
Livin’ in the new world
With an old soul
These rich men north of Richmond
Lord knows they all just wanna have total control
Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do
And they don’t think you know, but I know that you do
’Cause your dollar ain’t shit and it’s taxed to no end
’Cause of rich men north of Richmond
I wish politicians would look out for miners
And not just minors on an island somewhere
Lord, we got folks in the street, ain’t got nothin’ to eat
And the obese milkin’ welfare
Well, God, if you’re 5-foot-3 and you’re 300 pounds
Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds
Young men are puttin’ themselves six feet in the ground
’Cause all this damn country does is keep on kickin’ them down
Lord, it’s a damn shame what the world’s gotten to
For people like me and people like you
Wish I could just wake up and it not be true
But it is, oh, it is
Livin’ in the new world
With an old soul
These rich men north of Richmond
Lord knows they all just wanna have total control
Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do
And they don’t think you know, but I know that you do
’Cause your dollar ain’t shit and it’s taxed to no end
’Cause of rich men north of Richmond
I’ve been sellin’ my soul, workin’ all-day
Overtime hours for bullshit pay
