Killing in the Name
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| “Killing in the Name” | |||||
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| Single by Rage Against the Machine from the album Rage Against the Machine |
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| Format | CD, 7", 12", cassette | ||||
| Genre | Rap metal Alternative metal |
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| Length | 5 min 14 s | ||||
| Label | epic | ||||
| Producer | Garth "GGGarth" Richardson, Rage Against the Machine | ||||
| Rage Against the Machine singles chronology | |||||
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"Killing in the Name" (often misnamed, due to the lyrics, as "Killing in the Name Of") was the first single released by Rage Against the Machine from their self-titled album, and is arguably the band's signature song. On 31 August 1999, it was reissued together with one previously unreleased track, "Darkness of Greed" the track "Clear the Lane" originally released on a white only pressing at the time of first release on the b-side to 'killing in the name'. The album's cover pictured Thích Quảng Đức, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk, burning himself to death in Saigon in 1963 in protest of the murder of Buddhists by Prime Minister Ngô Đình Diệm's regime.
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[edit] Live performances
Zack de la Rocha sometimes changes the lyrics in the second verse from "Some of those that work forces are the same that burn crosses" to "Some of those that burn crosses are the same that hold office" when playing live. It is also sometimes changed to "Some of those that work forces are the same that burn churches".
[edit] Critical reception
"Killing in the Name" was placed at number 89 on "100 Greatest Guitar Solos", a poll made by Guitar World. Q magazine placed "Killing in the Name" at number 24 in its list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Tracks and at number 99 in its list of the 100 greatest songs ever.[citation needed]
The song earned its notoriety in the United Kingdom when its BBC Radio 1 DJ, Bruno Brookes, played the uncensored version of the song on his Top 40 countdown, leading to 138 complaints.[1] This moment of infamy has since been consistently referenced by numerous British rock media.
[edit] Other appearances
The band Audioslave, which incorporated all but one member of Rage Against the Machine, played the song at multiple shows."Killing in the Name" is featured on fictional alternative rock station Radio X, in the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas[2] and is used as a bumper song on The Jim Rome Show.
A note-for-note cover version of "Killing in the Name" is a playable song in the Guitar Hero II video game for PlayStation 2 and Xbox 360, as a part of the main song list. It is found in the fifth song tier, Return of the Shred, in the PS2 version and in the sixth tier, Relentless Riffs, in the Xbox 360 version. However the song's lyrics are altered to remove the expletives, replacing the sentence repeated over 15 times "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me!" with "You're under control, I won't do what you tell me!, and the word "Motherfucker!" near the end is replaced with "Under control!".[3][4]
La Maison Tellier made an acoustic cover of "Killing in the Name" that possessed a distinctive folk sound.
In July 2007 a remix of this song by SebastiAn (miscredited as a Mr. Oizo remix) was Zane Lowe's "Hottest Record in the World" on his show on BBC Radio 1.[5] Comedian Bill Hicks played the song at the end of his shows toward the end of his life.
The song was featured in the movie Step Up 2 during the final dance scene.
The Apples, a funk band from Tel Aviv, Israel released a cover on a 7" vinyl on Freestyle Records.
In 2004, radio and television commentator Glenn Beck used instrumental sections of the song as an open for his radio show.
[edit] Music video
The video was released in 1993. This clip was filmed entirely in a small venue. The uncensored version of the video clip was banned on MTV for such a long period of time that the video's existence was in doubt until its release on the self-titled video.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- Official Website
- Axis of Justice Tom Morello and Serj Tankian's Activist Website "Axis Of Justice"
- Vietnow.org Rage Against The Machine news resource and forum
- Killing in the Name at Allmusic
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