To Curse or Not to Curse?
The story of the vicious battle between musicians and politicians
Al Gore is tucked away in the minds of countless Americans as a vice president who ran, lost by a narrow margin, and then faded into the obscurity of American politics only to emerge every few years as a gag in reruns of The Simpsons. His wife only furthers this sentiment.
Tipper who?
Unknown as she may be to the reader, one of Tipper Gore’s “crowning” achievements is a small little sticker that is plastered across countess album releases. From Kanye West to the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Taylor Swift, parents may recognize a little sticker screaming “PARENTAL ADVISORY: EXPLICIT CONTENT.”
The story goes that one night after being gifted Prince’s Purple Rain from her father, Tipper Gore and her 11-year-old daughter sat down to listen to the new Prince album. What would go on among many critics to be considered one of the best albums of the decade, Purple Rain has just been released, and the Gores are ready for it. Disaster strikes on track 5, however, when Prince ravenously spits out these lines: “I knew a girl named Nikki / I guess you could say she was a sex fiend / I met her in a hotel lobby / Masturbating with a magazine.”
As Tepper Gore remembers,
“The vulgar lyrics embarrassed both of us. At first, I was stunned, but then I got mad!”
Shortly after, Gore co-founded the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC), whose sole mission was to protect innocent children from the horrors of vulgar song lyrics. The committee introduced a list of fifteen songs with objectional content becoming known as the “filthy fifteen.”
In addition to Prince, others such as Twisted Sister, Cyndi Lauper, and Madonna, ended up on the list due to their various references to sex or drugs. Needless to say, musicians were going to do anything but keep silent.
In the United States, popular music has consistently featured some form of opposition from overly imposing moral groups. In the ’60s, The Beatles were scrutinized by many Christians following John Lennon’s famous assertion that they “were more popular than Jesus.” More recently, artists such as Lil Nas X and Sam Smith have come under fire by similar groups for sexually provocative dances or, in the words of a critic, “psychotic wickedness.”
The ’80 though, was a unique time for pop culture, specifically music. MTV made its grand debut in 1981, reaching multiple zeniths in the following decade through hits such as the music video for Michael Jackson’s thriller. The rise of cassettes in the early ’80s and steadily increasing CD sales towards the end of the decade also made it easier than ever for a consumer to listen to their favorite artist on demand. Of course, with the great new powers granted by the gods of Silicon Valley came the responsibility to protect children’s innocence. Or so thought worried parents across the United States.
The ’80s were rife with fears about communism, drugs, and Aids among other economic worries. One of these scares that plagued families across the nation was the “Satanic Panic.” Supposedly there were a series of occult rituals happening across the United States with the purpose of abusing children, a theory that was corroborated by news sources like NBC and 20/20.
Games like Dungeons and Dragons were roped into this panic along with the other major culprit at the time: music. While there were a few metal bands in Europe that featured explicit satanic imagery, a vast majority of rock and pop music had no mention of it whatsoever.
Aided partly by the nationwide fear of parents, anything remotely objectionable was lumped into a satanic category, even when not specifically occult. While not all parents went so far as to claim that music during the ’80s was “of Satan,” there was growing concern over children’s morals and whether music would corrupt them. This fear of satanism, combined with the new Prince album and the “filthy fifteen” songs, all created a perfect cocktail of evidence.
The PMRC convened within the presence of the U.S. Senate in September of 1985, hearing a case against “porn rock,” despite many major record labels agreeing to put explicit stickers on music releases.
More than anything, the hearing was a way for so-called moral crusaders of the time to prevail against the evils of Satanists and sex — addicts, whose goal was to corrupt the youth of children through music. Three fiery critics rose from this conflict, who weren’t willing to let these mothers have the final say. Jazz guitarist Frank Zappa, country singer John Denver, and Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider were present to respond to the claims against the music industry.
The PMRC launched attacks linking violent murders to heavy metal bands, while psychologists testified that music was linked to increased rates of violence. Denver’s testimony fought back against government-imposed censorship of music, where Snider defended his band’s lyrical content as innocent, going so far as to insist the only person having dirty thoughts was Tipper herself. Zappa’s testimony was by far the harshest attack of the three.
He went after the other pressing matter; overbearing mothers trying to legislate morality.
“Is the basic issue morality? Is it mental health? Is it an issue at all? The PMRC has created a lot of confusion with improper comparisons between song lyrics, videos, record packaging, radio broadcasting, and live performances.”
Zappa fiercely went after the issue of censorship of music. It was one one thing for record labels to mark an album as explicit or to produce a “clean” version to bolster sales (something that eventually happened throughout the ’90s and 2000’s). It was another, much graver matter to completely restrict an artist’s freedom of speech in order to protect a small subset of children.
In many ways, Zappa’s sentiments echoed throughout the music world for the coming decade. Metal bands like Judas Priest issued direct responses to Gore, such as their 1986 song “Parental Guidance,” which featured a chorus that screams, “We don’t need no, no, no, no / parental guidance here.” Upcoming hip hop acts such as N.W.A. proudly flaunted the explicit stickers tacked onto their debut, Straight Outta Compton, with their sneering attitude towards anybody and everybody.
Perhaps no artist demonstrated the extent of the protest better than Rage Against the Machine at a music festival in 1993. Instead of playing their set, they stepped out onto the stage nude with the letters PMRC on their chests and their mouths duct taped.
Two decades earlier, writer Kurt Vonnegut was in the crosshairs of school boards for his novel Slaughterhouse Five’s inclusion of sexual scenes. His response to students wasn’t one of regret but rather encouragement.
“What I had to say to you, moreover, would not take long, to wit: Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what’s inside you, to make your soul grow.”
The real lesson that can be learned from the PMRC debacle is that no matter the moral legislation hurled at a creator, it’s the authenticity, the creativity, and the genuine heart the artist pours into their artwork that any governing authority can’t strip.
The staunch refusal of musical acts to back down or change style proved effective in the ’90s when the often crude lyrics of hip-hop made it one of the most popular genres of the decade. More importantly, it proved that when a painter has a portrait they want to share with an audience — they’ll find a way to do it in the midst of opposition.
