30. May 2014
Tom Morello Is 50?!
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| (Photo: Facebook) |
Hey, The GTC would like to hail Harlem’s son of rock, Thomas Baptiste Morello, on his 50th, that’s right, 50th birthday.
You know all the deets on his stellar career with the crucial, critical, righteous and influential Rage Against The Machine. A band that’s name alone conjures up the angle the group was going to take us. And all of the collaborations and contributions you’ve made to the art of sounds over the years.
We also love your growing (and understandable) bromance with The Boss, “It was an emotional night at the Mohegan Sun Arena, as Bruce Springsteen emptied the vault and the tank last night to close out the American leg of the High Hopes tour, and a 26-month run since the release of Wrecking Ball. As has been the case with this leg of the tour, the song selection covered a tremendous amount of ground, providing multiple story lines in the show.” We can feel it man.
Your activism and ability to align other notable names for your thoughts and causes is now legendary. Good on ya mate.Get involved and say something is always a grand way of thinking.
All great things in themselves but it’s your birthday and since you’re one of the more intelligent (perhaps controversial, some may say) outspoken rockers out and about, we thought we’d help celebrate your special day with some of the words that have spilled freely from your lips over the years.
Freedom?
“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.”
Playing With Bruce
“No, I was a latecomer. I grew up on metal and then punk and then hip-hop, and I didn’t really get it until, it was probably ’86 or ’87. When I first thought there might be something there for me, it was the Amnesty International tour, there was a live special from Buenos Aires, and I watched that because I was a big fan of Peter Gabriel and was surprised that someone named Bruce Springsteen was headlining the event. It was an epic show, and I realized the depth and the power — it was smart and it was moving and it was stadium-rocking, and I got the ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town’ cassette the next day and realized I was in for a treat digging into the catalog. That record and ‘Nebraska’ were my two favorite records. It really spoke to my Midwestern existential ennui, you know? It felt like, ‘That guy understands, man. Shit’s not right.’
What About Those Chicago Cubs?
“The Cubs got a lot of problems, let me tell ya. We got 99 problems but Sammy Sosa ain’t one. We haven’t had a world championship in 106 years, so we gotta work on that first.”
The Weight Of Folk
“Then about 12 years ago it dawned on me that folk music – the music of Woody Guthrie and Phil Ochs, early Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Pete Seeger – could be as heavy as anything that comes through a Marshall stack. The combination of three chords and the right lyrical couplet can be as heavy as anything in the Metallica catalogue.”
Responsibility
“A musician’s or artist’s responsibility is a simple one, and that is, through your music to tell the truth,”
We’ve not even fully dipped our toes into the vast sea of your truths but just enough to wet the appetite for thought(s) on, this, your 50th. Happy Birthday Tom Morello!
We need more candles..