If a tyranny bans a song, you want to believe the song will be a tower of power, a cry for freedom, a scream of defiance or a gob of spit in the face of God. Unfortunately, China’s latest pop song blacklist puts paid to that idea.
In its supposed quest to bring “order” to the Internet music market, China has created a list of 100 songs that are now banned in that country. (Well, if history’s any guide, it’s less a quest for market order than for orthodoxy.) And man are they awful.
These songs, according to the country’s farcical Ministry of Culture, “harm the security of state culture (and) must be cleaned up and regulated under the law.”
As with most Chinese government bans, this one is a grab bag of objections, including the eye-rollingly obvious accusation of “poor taste and vulgar content.”
The full list is mostly in Chinese. (Here’s a machine translated version.)
Among the threats to “state culture” listed are two songs by imperialist running dog Katy Perry, “E.T.” (featuring Kanye West) and “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)”; Britney Spears’ cover of Madonna’s “Burning Up”; the Backstreet Boys’ (wait, what?) “I Want It That Way”; and six by Lady Gaga, including “Americano” and “Bloody Mary.”
Other counter-revolutionary lackeys of colonial industrial capitalism include Beyonce and Simple Plan.
Perhaps some of the banned Chinese artists bring a bit more political power to their pop punch. (Anyone familiar with Chinese pop music, do tell.) They include Yoga Lin, Mei, Hsiao and Jue Yan.
In the end, though, maybe a few songs about shoes and boobs are more dangerous to humorless tyrannies than any amount of sloganeering.
Britney photo from Sam Lavi | devil’s music graphic from Whiskey Bent
