RATM: A 'Victory'?

Anyone on Facebook will probably be aware that there has been a recent internet campaign to make Rage Against The Machine’s song Killing In The Name Of Christmas number one. It was less about creating awareness for a band that had its heyday in the 1990’s and more about an amplified ‘Fuck You!’ to the X Factor. The whole point was to deny the winner of this year’s competition the Christmas number one spot. And it worked. It has become the first download only Christmas number one.

I didn’t participate for two reasons. One, I don’t really like RATM and two, I had an exact multiple of ten in my bank account and so downloading a song for £1.70 or however much it is would have meant that I couldn’t withdraw an extra tenner from the ATM.

It also struck me as being a little bit petty. I haven’t been concerned with the charts since I was about twelve and very much enjoyed Bob the Builder getting to number one. But I can appreciate the sentiment behind it. The X Factor is irritating and it does flood the charts with tedious, manufactured crap but, as I said, I don’t really give a fig about the charts. I used to give a fig about the mediocre music being released and people making money from it, but then I realised that there is still decent music out there. Either way when I started getting invited to join the Facebook group I decided I had better things to do and politely declined.

When I found out that it had actually worked I thought it was pretty funny, but that was it. As with many other things that I don’t really think are that big a deal it made front page news. Commentators were full of praise for the ‘young people who had the guts to stand up the popular culture that’s been spoon fed to them’. Few people seem to have noticed that both RATM and X Factor winner Joe McElderry are on the same record label to the profits from both are going to the same people. And joining a Facebook group while downloading a song from iTunes isn’t exactly a taxing way to make a stand.

I’ll make a confession here. When I heard that the campaign had been successful it made me a bit happy. I Tweeted (because I am a technologically minded personage of the times) that I was chuffed with the ‘people power’. I still am, a bit, but I don’t think we should fool ourselves into thinking that the yoof of today really care. There’s something depressing to see that they would rally around a campaign to unseat the X Factor but not to help Palestinian refugees or victims of AIDS or child abuse. And they won’t protest. They’ll just join a Facebook group and give Apple a few pence.

That, and a great deal of those who joined will have joined because their mates talked them into it or because it is, in certain circles, far cooler to like RATM than the X Factor. This isn’t really a victory for anyone. People will, by and large, still listen and buy the music they like and think ‘sod it’ to everyone else. I'm still of the opinion that young people are not as socially aware as they should be and they don’t care about things that, I think, they should care about.

This isn’t entirely the fault of the X Factor, although here are those who like to pretend that it is. The X Factor is just a TV programme that people will watch and if they like the music they will buy it. Apathy is not a problem that has easy answers nor can it be solved easily. But, really, is that what we should spend Christmas worrying about? Go and eat turkey and get drunk.

Peace and Love and Snow and Christmas Booze x

P.S. No ranting next week. I'm down south bonding with relatives.