10 Most Insane Controversies In Rock And Roll Music

At the start of the '80s, some officials down in Washington were convinced that the music scene had started to get a little too dirty. For as many star studded bands were making names for themselves as rock stars, there were "heathens" like Motley Crue and Prince that were making something a lot more gritty, focusing on songs about murder and even (*gasp*) sexual acts. Things needed to be cleaned up, and we were in for the one of the most hilarious censorship campaigns with the PMRC.

Looking to ban records that were considered to be too vulgar, there were many trials going on trying to stifle artists from talking about off color topics. These musicians weren't going to go quietly though, and everyone from Frank Zappa to Twisted Sister's Dee Snider went down to these hearings to represent their music. You can tell that some of these officials weren't prepared for this either, being taken aback that these metal singers could be so well spoken when in the courtroom.

Though the PMRC managed to get their wish by having a parental advisory sticker be put on records that were considered too profane, this made for one of the biggest backfires in the history of censorship. By censoring these albums, you're just giving kids even more of an incentive to seek the record out and find out what their parents didn't want them to hear. They may have wanted to clean everything up, but putting these stickers on records probably sold more albums that any promotional campaign ever could.