Music and candidates: an uneasy alliance

Missteps are understandable. Candidates and handlers are fumbling their way through the untamed frontier territory of iPod Nation, a confusing geography where remix culture, sampling, shuffles and playlists rule the day and context is often absent. In a prepackaged, portable, drive-thru culture, is it any wonder that they go for the microwave meal instead of baking from scratch?

"These songs are a quick and easy substitute to establish a connection between candidates and voters," says Sean Wilentz, a leading presidential historian and scholar of American musical traditions.

"This music is everywhere," Wilentz says. "And if you can choose the right song that can capture a bit of your message and a bit of your essence, you're going to choose it."

The key word is "essence" — particularly the essence of the American working class, whose approval and credibility candidates covet.

Clinton, for example: Her quest to appeal to her base can only be strengthened if it perceives her as an "American girl, raised on promises" who "used to daydream in a small town." (No matter that "American Girl" also contains the lyrics, "Take it easy, baby — make it last all night.")

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It's not that different from, say, a beer ad. It's about comfort and familiarity, about whispering to a voter, hey — you've had life experiences while listening to this song, and I'm associating myself with it, so I must understand your daily trials, right?

But finding common ground is growing more difficult.

"The good old 20th-century model of everyone feeding from the same cultural trough, that doesn't work in 2008," says Robert Thompson, director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University. Today, he says, "You pull songs out when you need them, some work, some don't, and then you move on."

Not if they're Tom Scholz's songs you don't. The man behind the band Boston spoke up sharply earlier this year when Republican Mike Huckabee used the group's 1970s anthem "More Than A Feeling" during at least one campaign event. The response from Scholz: Cease and desist.

"Huckabee was at the extreme opposite of everything I stood for or believed in," Scholz says. "I don't want to use the term unpresidential ... but somehow you expect these people to be a cut above all of that. It does seem odd to me that they are willingly and in some cases deceptively connecting themselves with some form of pop culture."

Scholz notwithstanding, the whole thing is about politicians reaching out with plaintive palms to create more than a feeling about their candidacies; they want to connect with all your yesterdays.

"If you play a song that has been part of culture for the last 20 years, it's not just those few words, it also brings up a little bit of trust and kind of the good-time vibe of the old days," says Levi Kujala, drummer for the Bozeman, Mont., band The Clintons.

Though band members don't necessarily endorse the candidate whose name they share, they created a different kind of campaign tune with the self-explanatory love song "Hey, Hill (If You Ever Dump Bill)."

"You look at people like Hillary. And she's gotta be a dork, you know?" says Kujala, laughing. "I don't think it's possible that she could be as cool and hip as the people she's going after by using that kind of music."

Not that candidates don't try and try again. McCain did, to mixed results.

Abba's "Take a Chance on Me"? Nope. "We played it a couple times," McCain says, "and it's my understanding they went berserk." The theme from "Rocky"? Turns out the head of MGM, a McCain backer, gave the go-ahead but didn't own the rights. "And the people they sold it to said `ERRRK!'" McCain says.

In recent months, the McCain folks have been favoring "Johnny B. Goode," a Chuck Berry rock 'n' roll classic from a half-century ago covered by dozens of musicians from Peter Tosh to Phish, Elton John to Judas Priest. Its energetic guitar licks make it a perfect rallying song, and its chorus — "Go, Johnny, go" — fits just right.

But with all the careful calibration of musical moods in 2008's election-year arena, the decision to focus on "Johnny" emerged from one of the most common political motivations of all: pragmatism.

"I think," McCain quips, "it might be because it's the only one that hasn't complained about us using it."

Picking the president: The candidates Click to visit that candidate's MSNBC page or click the XML symbol for an RSS feed. John McCain                Barack Obama

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