10 Perfect Rock And Roll Protest Songs

Any list like this could have easily used every single song in the Clash songbook. For as tuneful as their songs could be, the chemistry between Joe Strummer and Mick Jones made for some of the catchiest political songs in rock and roll, pairing a track like White Riot up against something as danceable as Rudie Can't Fail. The '80s had arrived though, and Rock the Casbah was the first time they made a political song that the entire world could groove to.

Inspired partly by a Middle Eastern king looking to ban rock and roll, this song was meant to be more of a pastiche of the kind of underground listening parties that would go on around the time, keeping the real rock and roll in secret and partying your cares away under the cover of darkness. Even though 'Rock the Casbah' might be the key line of the song, the line 'sharif don't like it' goes beyond just the Middle Eastern ban, having a few parallels to what was going on half a world away with the PMRC, looking to ban songs that certain people of power found either too disturbing or not suitable to be played on the radio.

For all of the anger in this song though, it might be one of the more goofy songs that the Clash would ever write, with Strummer in particular giving one of the wildest vocal performances of his career throughout the verses. You can try to censor this music all you want, but rock and roll was meant for the outsiders, and they were never going to give this up without a fight.