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From album
Rage Against the Machine
Rage Against the Machine · 2012 · Track 7
Details
Duración6:03
ÁlbumRage Against the Machine
Año2012
ISRCUSSM11205438
Fun facts
Rage Against the Machine has a song called Wake Up that appears on their first album, also called Rage Against the Machine. It was never released as a single, but live it is the last one before the encore. Instead of the original vocal part, which used a real memo from J. Edgar Hoover, sometimes a speech by Zack de la Rocha talking about today's issues is used. The song is also in the movie The Matrix, in the final scene.
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The story behind
Rage Against the Machine released Wake Up in 1992, as part of their first album. The song did not come out as a single, but it's always played at the end of concerts, before the encore. Instead of the memo from J. Edgar Hoover, Zack de la Rocha speaks about current issues. In the version of the film The Matrix, they replaced it with a speech about the current situation.
The lyrics focus on the racism of the US government and the FBI's counterintelligence programs. It uses a real memo from Hoover, where he suggests how to attack the black movement. It mentions figures like Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., and says the government killed them. At the end, it repeats a phrase from King: "How long, not long because what you reap is what you sow".
Live, Zack changes the text for speeches about what's happening now. In 2007, at Coachella, he spoke about how the United States launches wars for its own interests. He compared it to the Nuremberg trials, saying that if those laws were applied to the presidents, they would all be judged. The news caused controversy, and it was criticized on Fox News.