Who, Stones & Beatles top rock list

It might seem odd, but songs from the Who, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones are on top of a survey of conservative-themed rock music. The list was published in the conservative magazine National Review, which named "Won't Get Fooled Again" by the Who Number One and said, "The conservative movement is full of disillusioned revolutionaries -- this could be their theme song, an oath that swears off naive idealism once and for all." John J. Miller, who wrote the article, told the New York Times that "Won't Get Fooled Again" "is in my view a counterrevolutionary song. It's the notion that revolutions are often failures, like the French Revolution leading to Napoleon. The song is skeptical about revolutionary idealism in the end, and that's a very conservative idea."

Perhaps not surprisingly, songwriter Pete Townshend disagrees with that explanation. On his official petetownshend.co.uk website, the Who leader wrote, "Of course the song has no party-allied political message at all. It is not precisely a song that decries revolution -- it suggests that we will indeed fight in the streets -- but that revolution, like all action can have results we cannot predict. Don't expect to see what you expect to see. Expect nothing and you might gain everything. The song was meant to let politicians and revolutionaries alike know that what lay in the centre of my life was not for sale, and could not be co-opted into any obvious cause."

Coming in behind the Who is "Taxman" by the Beatles and "Sympathy For The Devil" by the Rolling Stones, which the magazine explained by saying, "The devil is a tempter who leans hard on moral relativism -- he will try to make you think that 'every cop is a criminal / And all the sinners saints.' What's more, he is the sinister inspiration for the cruelties of Bolshevism: 'I stuck around St. Petersburg / When I saw it was a time for a change / Killed the czar and his ministers / Anastasia screamed in vain.'"

Miller said, "Any claim that rock is fundamentally revolutionary is just kind of silly. It's so mainstream that it puts (liberals) in the position of saying that at no time has there ever been a rock song that expressed a sentiment that conservatives can appreciate. And that's just silly. In fact, here are 50 of them."

The Top 10 Conservative Rock Songs (according to National Review):
1. "Won't Get Fooled Again," The Who
2. "Taxman," the Beatles
3. "Sympathy For The Devil," the Rolling Stones
4. "Sweet Home Alabama," Lynyrd Skynyrd -- "A tribute to the region of America that liberals love to loathe, taking a shot at Neil Young's Canadian arrogance along the way."
5. "Wouldn't It Be Nice," the Beach Boys -- "Pro-abstinence and pro-marriage."
6. "Gloria," U2 -- Just because a rock song is about faith doesn't mean that it's conservative. But what about a rock song that's about faith and whose chorus is in Latin? That's beautifully reactionary."
7. "Revolution," the Beatles -- "Communism isn't even cool: 'If you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao / You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow.' (Someone tell the Che Guevara crowd.)"
8. "Bodies," the Sex Pistols -- "Violent and vulgar, but also a searing anti-abortion anthem by the quintessential punk band."
9. "Don't Tread on Me," by Metallica -- "A head-banging tribute to the doctrine of peace through strength, written in response to the first Gulf War."
10. "20th Century Man," the Kinks

Artists who also made the list include the Pretenders, for "My City Was Gone"; the Eagles, for "Get Over It"; the Clash, for "Rock The Casbah"; David Bowie, for "Heroes"; Rush, for "Red Barchetta"; Led Zeppelin, for "The Battle Of Evermore"; Aerosmith, for "Janie's Got A Gun"; John Mellencamp, for "Small Town"; Blue Oyster Cult, for "Godzilla"; Creedence Clearwater Revival, for "Who'll Stop The Rain"; the Band, for "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down"; and Sammy Hagar, for "I Can't Drive 55."

The complete list is available at nationalreview.com.