“Winner takes all”?
If ABBA does that, well, you can't. The Swedish supergroup has demanded that Donald Trump stop using their music at his rallies, and has even warned that campaign footage featuring ABBA's music is being used in public. “Delete immediately” From the Internet.
But don’t we create art to transcend ourselves? To create something that speaks to people across the barriers of time, space, culture, and of course ideology?
ABBA is the latest musical group to complain about being featured on President Trump's mega MAGA mix.
The Foo Fighters recently slammed the campaign for using “My Hero” at a recent rally in support of the former president, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (The Trump campaign says it had permission).
These artists include Celine Dion, The Beatles, Elton John, Queen, Phil Collins, Sinead O'Connor's estate, Adele, R.E.M., and The Rolling Stones.
I wish you the best.
The US allows political campaigns to obtain political organisation licenses through the performance rights organisation Broadcast Music Corp., which collects royalties from artists and hosts a vast catalogue of over 20 million songs. Artists’ grounds for refusing to grant such licenses due to political disagreements are dubious at best.
But some musicians have managed to get away with it: On September 3rd, a judge ruled in favor of the Isaac Hayes Foundation and issued a preliminary injunction blocking Donald Trump from performing. Sam & Dave's classic song “Hold On I'm Coming” (co-written by Hayes) and other songs by Hayes, although older videos featuring the song may remain.
Hayes' son, Isaac Hayes III, hailed the ruling as “an opportunity for other artists to come forward who don't want their music used by Donald Trump or other political parties.”
Bruce Springsteen took a more stealthy approach: Instead of taking legal action against Trump's use of “Born in the USA,” Springsteen openly flaunted his support for Hillary Clinton in 2016, resulting in his songs being booed at Trump rallies and virtually unplayable among MAGA crowds.
Other bands, such as Foo Fighters, have taken the approach of donating royalties from their BMI shows to President Trump's rival, Kamala Harris.
This head-on approach of artists boycotting politicians and public figures they dislike can easily backfire. After years of making melodramatic, high-minded statements about Trump's morally questionable use of “Rockin' in the Free World,” Neil Young finally sued Trump in August 2020. He quietly dropped the lawsuit three months later, suggesting he was probably more interested in public bluster than in defending his music.
In 2022, Young infamously responded to Joe Rogan's deal with Spotify. They removed all of his music from the site. Young's renewed media praise has left him balancing his concerns about Rogan's COVID-19 “misinformation” campaign with his desire to continue raking in his substantial royalty income.
He put his catalog back on Spotify this spring, but acted as if the hypocritical virtue signalling never happened.
Of course, artists like Young are fighting a losing battle: Artists have always struggled with fans interpreting their songs “wrongly” — “Born in the USA,” for example, has been used as a patriotic anthem for 30 years.
The digital age has only exacerbated this trend – today we can enjoy a song without knowing (or caring to know) anything about the person who wrote it – so it's understandable that artists might be worried about this decline in status.
But don’t we create art to transcend ourselves? To create something that speaks to people across the barriers of time, space, culture, and of course ideology?
If you've written an undeniably great song that people on all political affiliations can't resist, congratulations. You've done your job, and maybe helped our divided country find a little common ground. There are worse ways to make a living.
