Twisted Sister – We’re Not Gonna Take It
#quotefromthe80s
You don't know us, you don't belong
We're not gonna take it
No, we ain't gonna take it
We're not gonna take it anymore
#TwistedSister #WeReNotGonnaTakeIt
If we want to talk about hair metal, we cannot do it without mentioning the absolute protagonists of this spectacular trend of heavy metal: Twisted Sister!
They are definitely not an emerging band when, on May 10, 1984, they release Stay Hungry, an album containing two pieces that will become iconic, thanks also to a couple of videoclips that look like tv serials: We’re Not Gonna Take It (which comes out in April, a couple of weeks before the album) and I want to Rock.
The band formed in 1973, as a result of guitarist Jay French’s disappointment for not being taken to Wicked Lester’s auditions, the nest where Kiss will soon be born. In 1976 Dee Snider joined the band, who over the years became the incredible frontman, but the band had to wait until 1982 in order to find a label (Secret Records) accepting to produce the songs; at the same time their look changes, starting with the grotesque hair metal that we remember in the aforementioned video clips.
It would take a book to talk exhaustively about We’re Not Gonna Take It, because this hit is full of references, not only musical. First, deliberately, in the text it is not clearly identified against whom the verses direct their attacks, but this is exactly the intimate power of the song, still today an all-purpose anthem, good for all causes.
As Dee Snider explains, this song can be addressed to parents, teachers, bosses, colleagues, all people around us: it was not important to define a specific subject. For this reason, according to Snider, the song had its own life in sporting events, in political demonstrations, in protests.
An absolute peculiarity is that the song borrows its melody from Adeste Fideles; as a further tribute, the Christmas lyrics are sung on the 2006 album A Twisted Christmas, on the notes of We’re Not Gonna Take It.
And now let’s see who recognizes the adult entering the room of the kid who’s listening to Twisted Sisters? Yes, the one who asks him ‘What are you want to do with your life?’ and who receives in response a devastating ‘I wanna rock!’
Of course it’s Mark Metcalf, the hateful militarist Neidermeyer from the cult movie Animal House. Now we just need to hear the song and therefore, as Twisted Sister said on the cover of an historic album “Play it loud, mutha!!!”.
Twisted Sister on Wikipedia
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