Don’t Want No Black Messiah

1,275 words

Any tight-knit and cohesive community needs a common culture to help bind it. For us on the Alt-Right, much of this is racial and therefore political. What do most of us have in common? Well, the three biggees are that we are white, we are race-realists, and we would like to solve our current host of troubles with a white ethnostate. 

Beyond this, however, things may begin to fray. What non-political aspects of culture do we share? Works of literature, for sure. Classical music, definitely. Movies? Possibly. Pop music? Well, probably not as much.

Many of us may enjoy pop music, but often for reasons irrelevant to our racial and political ties. This is because pop music is designed to be consumed by as many as people as possible and is either steeped in black music or is black music. In such a negrophilic environment, I would imagine that whites would not dare write songs reflecting their racial identities. Not in America or Britain, at the very least. Sure, we have “conservative” pop stars such as Ted Nugent, Aerosmith, and Kid Rock. Guns n’ Roses once used a derogatory epithet to describe black people. Morrissey is still out there opposing immigration to the UK and saying politically incorrect things. Many country acts, such as the late Merle Haggard, may be proud, or at least not ashamed, of their white heritage.

But that’s not the same as writing songs that explicitly deal with racial issues from a perspective that is sympathetic to the Alt-Right.

I can think of one song that does. It’s “Black Messiah” by the Kinks. It was released in 1978 on the album Misfits and it is so overtly race-realist that I am shocked that it could ever appear on a record by a recording artist so mainstream and popular. This song is quite relevant to the Alt-Right today, and I believe that everyone on the Alt-Right should at least be aware of it and appreciate its astute racial messaging.

It starts with a defensive plea:

Everybody got the right to speak their mind
So don’t shoot me for saying mine

Note the high stakes here. Songwriter Ray Davies is telling us that someone might shoot him for speaking his mind. Recently a conservative speaker on the fringes of the Alt-Right had a talk cancelled at UCLA because of a bomb threat. So, relevant, yes.

The song continues:

Everybody talk about racial equality
Everybody talk about equal rights
But if I told you that God was black…
What would you think of that?
I bet you wouldn’t believe it.

In the Age of Obama and his mulatto kleptocracy, I can believe it.

There’s a self-made prophet living right next to me
He says the Black Messiah’s gonna come and set the whole world free
He looked at me with his evil eye
And he prophesied.
And he really believed it.

He said a Black Messiah
Is gonna set the word on fire.
And he no lie-a
Cause he has truly heard the word.

By calling this prophet ‘self-made’ and referring to his ‘evil eye,’ clearly we are not supposed to take him very seriously. Now, here’s the kicker in which our narrator identifies as white and shares his (completely different) side of the story:

Everybody talk about racial equality
But I’m the only honkie living on all black street
They knock me down
Cause they brown
And I’m white
Like you wouldn’t believe it.

I’m sure a white liberal wouldn’t believe it. It seems our narrator is speaking to a white liberal, trying to tell him how things really are: that blacks are racist and violent and tend to target white people with their crimes.

Then we have this:

Everybody talk about racial equality
Everybody talk about equal rights
But white’s white and black’s black.
And that’s that.

So what is this supposed to mean? It means that blacks and whites are different and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Not education. Not social engineering. Not public welfare. Not affirmative action. Absolutely nothing. “And that’s that.”

Later in the song, Mr. Davies doubles down on this race business:

But white’s white and black’s black.
And that’s that.

And that’s the way you should leave it.

Yes! I agree. We should leave it. The fact that racial differences are real is a big reason why blacks belong in their countries, and whites in theirs. Good on ya, Ray. Why weren’t any social justice warriors picketing your shows back in 1978? It’s not like they weren’t listening. Perhaps “Black Messiah” just went under everyone’s radar. As solid a record as Misfits is, it only had one minor hit. “Black Messiah” was released as a single and failed to chart. The Kinks were several years past their classic period in 1978. They had just signed with Arista Records and were trying their hand at album-oriented arena-rock which was all the rage in the late 1970s. At this point in their career they were tailoring their music to young kids and were trying to sell as many records as they could. Why they included such a race-realist song on Misfits is anyone’s guess.

After disavowing the idea of a black messiah committing ecumenical arson (“Don’t want to Black Messiah/To come at set the world on fire”), Mr. Davies ends the song with a plea for everyone to “live with a little less hate” and a reprise of his opening request to not be murdered for speaking his mind.

Now, what song in the pop music canon is more explicitly in line with Alt-Right? What were the three things we all have in common which we outlined above?

We’re white. Check.

We believe in race-realism. Check.

We want our own ethnostate. Check.

“Black Messiah” has it all. But it’s not just the lyrics that makes this song so relevant. It’s the music as well. It is a catchy, if somewhat indolent, reggae number. Yes, reggae. So this here is a step in a new direction for 1978. Sure, its chosen genre sets the song apart from the trends of the day and keeps it from being dated. More importantly, it uses black music to be critical of black people from a race-realist perspective. It would be like Eric Clapton writing a blues number about how black people can’t help but steal and have illegitimate children. That would be pretty shocking, wouldn’t it? Only “Black Messiah” is even more so given that the Kinks weren’t exactly known for reggae.

But there’s more. Incredibly, as if to double down on its negrophobia, the song then slides effortlessly, seamlessly, into Dixieland jazz. A whole horn section in glorious improvisation. What pop song goes from reggae to Dixieland and back again? It is truly one of the most delightful and surprising moments in all of pop music. Ray Davies could have written this song about his Aunt Minnie’s buttermilk biscuits, and this transition alone would still have made the song marvelous. But the fact that he skewers blacks with a second (and technically much more demanding) genre of their music speaks worlds for what he thinks of a black messiah. It’s like he’s going into enemy territory, fighting them on their own terms, and winning. “Black Messiah” inspires me every time I hear it.

Full disclosure: I love the Kinks. At their best, you could not find a pop group more technically imaginative and lyrically astute. But “Black Messiah” is suis generis, even for them. And it is all the more remarkable since it is song for the Alt-Right written thirty-five years before there even was an Alt-Right.

We should make it ours.