Street Fighting Man
Encyclopedia
"Street Fighting Man" is a song by English rock and roll
band The Rolling Stones
featured on their 1968
album Beggars Banquet
. Called the band's "most political song", Rolling Stone
ranked the song #295 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
' most politically inclined works to date. Jagger allegedly wrote it about Tariq Ali
after Jagger attended a March 1968 anti-war rally at London
's U.S. embassy, during which mounted police attempted to control a crowd of 25,000. He also found inspiration in the rising violence among student rioters on Paris
's Left Bank
, the precursor to May 1968.
On the writing, Jagger
said in a 1995 interview with Jann Wenner
in Rolling Stone
,
The song opens with a strummed acoustic
riff. In his review, Richie Unterberger
says of the song, "...it's a great track, gripping the listener immediately with its sudden, springy guitar chords and thundering, offbeat drums. That unsettling, urgent guitar rhythm is the mainstay of the verses. Mick Jagger's typically half-buried lyrics seem at casual listening like a call to revolution."
Unterberger continues, "Perhaps they were saying they wished they could be on the front lines, but were not in the right place at the right time; perhaps they were saying, as John Lennon
did in the Beatles
' "Revolution
", that they didn't want to be involved in violent confrontation. Or perhaps they were even declaring indifference to the tumult." Other writers' interpretations varied. In 1976, Roy Carr
assessed it as a "great summer street-corner rock anthem on the same echelon as 'Summer in the City
', 'Summertime Blues
', and 'Dancing in the Street
'." In 1979, Dave Marsh
wrote that it was the keynote of Beggars Banquet, "with its teasing admonition to do something and its refusal to admit that doing it will make any difference; as usual, the Stones were more correct, if also more faithless, philosophers than any of their peers."
performs the song's distinctive sitar
and also tamboura. Richards plays the song's acoustic guitars as well as bass, the latter being the only electric instrument on the track. Charlie Watts
performs drums while Nicky Hopkins
performs the song's piano which is most distinctly heard during the outro. Shehnai
is performed on the track by Dave Mason
. On the earlier, unreleased "Did Everybody Pay Their Dues" version, Rick Grech played a very prominent electric viola.
Watts said in 2003,
On the recording process itself, Richards remembered,
Bruce Springsteen
would comment in 1985, after including "Street Fighting Man" in the encores of some of his Born in the U.S.A. Tour
shows: "That one line, 'What can a poor boy do but sing in a rock and roll band?' is one of the greatest rock and roll lines of all time. ... [The song] has that edge-of-the-cliff thing when you hit it. And it's funny; it's got humor to it."
Jagger continues in the Rolling Stone interview when asked about the song's resonance thirty years on; "I don't know if it [has any]. I don't know whether we should really play it. I was persuaded to put it [on Voodoo Lounge Tour
] because it seemed to fit in, but I'm not sure if it really has any resonance for the present day. I don't really like it that much." Despite this, the song has been performed on a majority of the Stones' tours since its introduction to their canon of work.
On the song, Richards said, only a few years after recording the track in a famous 1971 Rolling Stone interview with Robert Greenfield
, that the song had been "interpreted thousands of different ways". He mentioned how Jagger went to the Grosvenor Square demonstrations in London and was even charged by the police, yet he ultimately claims, "it really is ambiguous as a song."
on August 31, 1968 in the US, "Street Fighting Man" was popular on release but was kept out of the Top 40 (reaching number 48) of the US charts in response to many radio stations refusal to play the song based on what were perceived as subversive lyrics. This attitude would be reinforced as the song was released within a week of the riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention
in Chicago. The single's B-side was album-mate "No Expectations
". For reasons unknown, the single did not see a release in the United Kingdom until 1970 (backed with "Surprise, Surprise
", previously unreleased in the UK).
The single's version of the song, released in mono with an additional vocal overdub on the choruses, is different from the Beggars Banquet album's stereo
version.
It has been included on the compilations albums
Through the Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2)
(album version), Hot Rocks 1964-1971
(album version), Singles Collection: The London Years
(single version) and Forty Licks
(album version). A staple at Rolling Stones live shows since the band's American Tour of 1969
, concert recordings of the song have been captured and released for the live albums Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!, Stripped
, and Live Licks
.
Rod Stewart
covered it on the debut solo album An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down
. Oasis
recorded a version that was released as the B-side to their 1998 single "All Around the World
". The song can be found on the fourth and last studio album by Rage Against the Machine
, titled Renegades. It appears on Mötley Crüe
's Red, White and Crüe
album as well as the Ramones
' 2002 re-release of Too Tough to Die
. The band Prima Donna
performed a live cover early in their career. The band Tesla
also covered this song on their covers album Real to Reel which can be found on the rare disk 2 track number 5. (You needed to attend a concert during the Reel to Reel tour to obtain this disk.)
Guitarist Pete Townshend
of The Who
has claimed that the staccato beat–rhythm structure of "Street Fighting Man" is the inspiration for "I'm Free" on Tommy
.
Dave Perkins & Lynn Nichols
covered the song in their side project "Passafist".
In 2009, the Australian rock band Sick Puppies
used the first 15 seconds of Rage Against The Machine's version for their single "Street Fighter (War)".
Radio personalities Opie and Anthony
use Rage Against the Machine's version as part of the opening theme for their show.
The song plays over the end credits of the film V for Vendetta
and during the documentary Sicko
.
It is also used in the film State of Grace
.
Wes Anderson
used the track in his 2009 stop-motion animated film Fantastic Mr. Fox
.
The Buffalo Sabres
of the National Hockey League have used the song as their unofficial theme song, taking the ice at home games as the song plays in the HSBC arena.
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
band The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English rock band, formed in London in April 1962 by Brian Jones , Ian Stewart , Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards . Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early line-up...
featured on their 1968
1968 in music
-Events:*January 4 – Guitarist Jimi Hendrix is jailed by Stockholm police, after trashing a hotel room during a drunken fist fight with bassist Noel Redding.*January 6 – Gibson Guitar Corporation patents its Gibson Flying V electric guitar design....
album Beggars Banquet
Beggars Banquet
- Personnel :The Rolling Stones* Mick Jagger – lead and backing vocals, harmonica on "Parachute Woman"* Keith Richards – acoustic and electric guitar, bass guitar on "Sympathy for the Devil" and "Street Fighting Man", backing vocals, lead vocals on opening of "Salt of the Earth"* Brian...
. Called the band's "most political song", Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
ranked the song #295 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
Inspiration
Originally titled and recorded as "Did Everyone Pay Their Dues?", containing the same music but very different lyrics, "Street Fighting Man" is known as one of Mick Jagger and Keith RichardsJagger/Richards
The songwriting partnership of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, known as Jagger/Richards , is a musical collaboration whose output has produced the majority of the catalogue of The Rolling Stones....
' most politically inclined works to date. Jagger allegedly wrote it about Tariq Ali
Tariq Ali
Tariq Ali , , is a British Pakistani military historian, novelist, journalist, filmmaker, public intellectual, political campaigner, activist, and commentator...
after Jagger attended a March 1968 anti-war rally at London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
's U.S. embassy, during which mounted police attempted to control a crowd of 25,000. He also found inspiration in the rising violence among student rioters on Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
's Left Bank
Rive Gauche
La Rive Gauche is the southern bank of the river Seine in Paris. Here the river flows roughly westward, cutting the city in two: looking downstream, the southern bank is to the left, and the northern bank is to the right....
, the precursor to May 1968.
On the writing, Jagger
Mick Jagger
Sir Michael Philip "Mick" Jagger is an English musician, singer and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist and a founding member of The Rolling Stones....
said in a 1995 interview with Jann Wenner
Jann Wenner
Jann Simon Wenner is the co-founder and publisher of the music and politics biweekly Rolling Stone, as well as the owner of Men's Journal and Us Weekly magazines.-Childhood:...
in Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
,
"Yeah, it was a direct inspiration, because by contrast, London was very quiet...It was a very strange time in France. But not only in France but also in America, because of the Vietnam WarVietnam WarThe Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
and these endless disruptions. ...I thought it was a very good thing at the time. There was all this violence going on. I mean, they almost toppled the government in France; DeGaulle went into this complete funk, as he had in the past, and he went and sort of locked himself in his house in the country. And so the government was almost inactive. And the French riot police were amazing."
The song opens with a strummed acoustic
Acoustic guitar
An acoustic guitar is a guitar that uses only an acoustic sound board. The air in this cavity resonates with the vibrational modes of the string and at low frequencies, which depend on the size of the box, the chamber acts like a Helmholtz resonator, increasing or decreasing the volume of the sound...
riff. In his review, Richie Unterberger
Richie Unterberger
Richie Unterberger is a US author and journalist whose focus is popular music and travel writing.-Life and writing:Having worked as a DJ at WXPN in Philadelphia, he started reviewing records for Op magazine in 1983...
says of the song, "...it's a great track, gripping the listener immediately with its sudden, springy guitar chords and thundering, offbeat drums. That unsettling, urgent guitar rhythm is the mainstay of the verses. Mick Jagger's typically half-buried lyrics seem at casual listening like a call to revolution."
Unterberger continues, "Perhaps they were saying they wished they could be on the front lines, but were not in the right place at the right time; perhaps they were saying, as John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
did in the Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
' "Revolution
Revolution (song)
"Revolution" is a song by The Beatles written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The Beatles released two distinct arrangements of the song in 1968: a hard rock version as the B-side of the single "Hey Jude", and a slower version titled "Revolution 1" on the eponymous album The Beatles...
", that they didn't want to be involved in violent confrontation. Or perhaps they were even declaring indifference to the tumult." Other writers' interpretations varied. In 1976, Roy Carr
Roy Carr
Roy Carr is an English music journalist. He joined the New Musical Express in the late 1960s and has edited NME, VOX and Melody Maker magazines...
assessed it as a "great summer street-corner rock anthem on the same echelon as 'Summer in the City
Summer in the City
"Summer in the City" is the title of a song recorded by The Lovin' Spoonful, written by Mark Sebastian and Steve Boone. It came from their album Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful and it reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1966...
', 'Summertime Blues
Summertime Blues
"Summertime Blues" is the title of a song co-written and recorded by American rockabilly artist Eddie Cochran. It was written in the late 1950s by Cochran and his manager Jerry Capehart. Originally a single B-side, it was released in August 1958 and peaked at number 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 on...
', and 'Dancing in the Street
Dancing in the Street
"Dancing in the Street" is a 1964 song first recorded by Martha and the Vandellas. It is one of Motown's signature songs and is the group's premier signature song.-Martha and the Vandellas original:...
'." In 1979, Dave Marsh
Dave Marsh
Dave Marsh is an American music critic, author, editor and radio talk show host. He was a formative editor of Creem magazine, has written for various publications such as Newsday, The Village Voice, and Rolling Stone, and has published numerous books about music and musicians, mostly focused on...
wrote that it was the keynote of Beggars Banquet, "with its teasing admonition to do something and its refusal to admit that doing it will make any difference; as usual, the Stones were more correct, if also more faithless, philosophers than any of their peers."
Recording
Recording on "Street Fighting Man" began at Olympic Sound Studios in March 1968 and continued into May and June later that year. With Jagger on lead vocals and both he and Richards on backing, Brian JonesBrian Jones
Lewis Brian Hopkins Jones , known as Brian Jones, was an English musician and a founding member of the Rolling Stones....
performs the song's distinctive sitar
Sitar
The 'Tablaman' is a plucked stringed instrument predominantly used in Hindustani classical music, where it has been ubiquitous since the Middle Ages...
and also tamboura. Richards plays the song's acoustic guitars as well as bass, the latter being the only electric instrument on the track. Charlie Watts
Charlie Watts
Charles Robert "Charlie" Watts is an English drummer, best known as a member of The Rolling Stones. He is also the leader of a jazz band, a record producer, commercial artist, and horse breeder.-Early life:...
performs drums while Nicky Hopkins
Nicky Hopkins
Nicholas Christian "Nicky" Hopkins was an English pianist and organist.He recorded and performed on noted British and American popular music recordings of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s as a session musician....
performs the song's piano which is most distinctly heard during the outro. Shehnai
Shehnai
The shehnai, shahnai, shenai or mangal vadya, is an aerophonic instrument, a double reed conical oboe, common in North India, West India and Pakistan, made out of wood, with a metal flare bell at the end...
is performed on the track by Dave Mason
Dave Mason
David Thomas "Dave" Mason is an English singer, songwriter, and guitarist from Worcester, who first found fame with the rock band Traffic...
. On the earlier, unreleased "Did Everybody Pay Their Dues" version, Rick Grech played a very prominent electric viola.
Watts said in 2003,
"'Street Fighting Man' was recorded on Keith's cassette with a 1930s toy drum kit called a London Jazz Kit Set, which I bought in an antiques shop, and which I've still got at home. It came in a little suitcase, and there were wire brackets you put the drums in; they were like small tambourines with no jangles... The snare drum was fantastic because it had a really thin skin with a snare right underneath, but only two strands of gut... Keith loved playing with the early cassette machines because they would overload, and when they overload they sounded fantastic, although you weren't meant to do that. We usually played in one of the bedrooms on tour. Keith would be sitting on a cushion playing a guitar and the tiny kit was a way of getting close to him. The drums were really loud compared to the acoustic guitar and the pitch of them would go right through the sound. You'd always have a great backbeat."
On the recording process itself, Richards remembered,
"The basic track of that was done on a mono cassette with very distorted overrecording, on a Phillips with no limiters. Brian is playing sitar, it twangs away. He's holding notes that wouldn't come through if you had a board, you wouldn't be able to fit it in. But on a cassette if you just move the people, it does. Cut in the studio and then put on a tape. Started putting percussion and bass on it. That was really an electronic track, up in the realms."
Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...
would comment in 1985, after including "Street Fighting Man" in the encores of some of his Born in the U.S.A. Tour
Born in the U.S.A. Tour
The Born in the U.S.A. Tour was the supporting concert tour of Bruce Springsteen's massively popular Born in the U.S.A. album. It was his longest and most successful tour to date. It featured a physically transformed Springsteen. After two years of bodybuilding, Springsteen had bulked up...
shows: "That one line, 'What can a poor boy do but sing in a rock and roll band?' is one of the greatest rock and roll lines of all time. ... [The song] has that edge-of-the-cliff thing when you hit it. And it's funny; it's got humor to it."
Jagger continues in the Rolling Stone interview when asked about the song's resonance thirty years on; "I don't know if it [has any]. I don't know whether we should really play it. I was persuaded to put it [on Voodoo Lounge Tour
Voodoo Lounge Tour
The Voodoo Lounge Tour was a worldwide concert tour by The Rolling Stones to promote their 1994 album Voodoo Lounge. This was their first tour without bassist Bill Wyman; he was replaced by Darryl Jones. The tour grossed $320 million, becoming the highest grossing tour of any artist at that time...
] because it seemed to fit in, but I'm not sure if it really has any resonance for the present day. I don't really like it that much." Despite this, the song has been performed on a majority of the Stones' tours since its introduction to their canon of work.
On the song, Richards said, only a few years after recording the track in a famous 1971 Rolling Stone interview with Robert Greenfield
Robert Greenfield
-Career:Greenfield began his career as a sports writer. He has published book reviews in New West magazine and The New York Times Book Review.From 1970 to 1972 Greenfield was employed as an associate editor with Rolling Stone magazine's London bureau...
, that the song had been "interpreted thousands of different ways". He mentioned how Jagger went to the Grosvenor Square demonstrations in London and was even charged by the police, yet he ultimately claims, "it really is ambiguous as a song."
Release
Released as Beggars Banquets lead singleSingle (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
on August 31, 1968 in the US, "Street Fighting Man" was popular on release but was kept out of the Top 40 (reaching number 48) of the US charts in response to many radio stations refusal to play the song based on what were perceived as subversive lyrics. This attitude would be reinforced as the song was released within a week of the riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention
1968 Democratic National Convention
The 1968 Democratic National Convention of the U.S. Democratic Party was held at the International Amphitheatre in Chicago, Illinois, from August 26 to August 29, 1968. Because Democratic President Lyndon Johnson had announced he would not seek a second term, the purpose of the convention was to...
in Chicago. The single's B-side was album-mate "No Expectations
No Expectations
"No Expectations" is a song by the British rock and roll band The Rolling Stones featured on their 1968 album Beggars Banquet. It was first released as the B-side of the "Street Fighting Man" single in August 1968...
". For reasons unknown, the single did not see a release in the United Kingdom until 1970 (backed with "Surprise, Surprise
The Rolling Stones, Now!
-Personnel:The Rolling Stones*Mick Jagger – lead vocals, harmonica, tambourine, and percussion*Keith Richards – guitar and backing vocals*Brian Jones – guitar and slide guitar, harmonica and backing vocals...
", previously unreleased in the UK).
The single's version of the song, released in mono with an additional vocal overdub on the choruses, is different from the Beggars Banquet album's stereo
STEREO
STEREO is a solar observation mission. Two nearly identical spacecraft were launched into orbits that cause them to respectively pull farther ahead of and fall gradually behind the Earth...
version.
It has been included on the compilations albums
Compilation album
A compilation album is an album featuring tracks from one or more performers, often culled from a variety of sources The tracks are usually collected according to a common characteristic, such as popularity, genre, source or subject matter...
Through the Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2)
Through the Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2)
Through the Past, Darkly is The Rolling Stones' second official compilation album, released in 1969 shortly following Brian Jones's departure from the group and subsequent death. The album was released by Decca Records in the United Kingdom and London Records/ABKCO Records in the United States.In...
(album version), Hot Rocks 1964-1971
Hot Rocks 1964-1971
Hot Rocks 1964–1971 is the first compilation album of Rolling Stones music released by former manager Allen Klein's ABKCO Records after the band's departure from Decca and Klein...
(album version), Singles Collection: The London Years
Singles Collection: The London Years
Singles Collection: The London Years is a compilation album of Rolling Stones music released by former manager Allen Klein's ABKCO Records after the band's departure from Decca and Klein....
(single version) and Forty Licks
Forty Licks
Forty Licks is a double compilation album by The Rolling Stones. A 40-year career-spanning retrospective, Forty Licks is notable for being the first retrospective to combine the band's formative Decca/London era of the 1960s, now licensed by ABKCO Records , with their self-owned post-1970 material,...
(album version). A staple at Rolling Stones live shows since the band's American Tour of 1969
The Rolling Stones American Tour 1969
The Rolling Stones' 1969 Tour of the United States took place in November 1969. Rock critic Robert Christgau called it "history's first mythic rock and roll tour", while rock critic Dave Marsh would write that the tour was "part of rock and roll legend" and one of the "benchmarks of an...
, concert recordings of the song have been captured and released for the live albums Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!, Stripped
Stripped (Rolling Stones album)
Stripped is The Rolling Stones album released in 1995 during the Voodoo Lounge Tour. The album was a mixture of live recordings from smaller venues and studio recordings - made with no overdubs - of songs mostly from their previous catalogue...
, and Live Licks
Live Licks
Live Licks is a double live album by The Rolling Stones and was released in 2004. Coming six years after No Security, this seventh official Rolling Stones full-length live release captures performances from the band's year-long 2002–2003 Licks Tour in support of their career-spanning retrospective...
.
Legacy
"Street Fighting Man" has been covered by many artists.Rod Stewart
Rod Stewart
Roderick David "Rod" Stewart, CBE is a British singer-songwriter and musician, born and raised in North London, England and currently residing in Epping. He is of Scottish and English ancestry....
covered it on the debut solo album An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down
An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down
An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down was the debut album by Rod Stewart, released on February 1970 on Vertigo Records...
. Oasis
Oasis (band)
Oasis were an English rock band formed in Manchester in 1991. Originally known as The Rain, the group was formed by Liam Gallagher , Paul "Bonehead" Arthurs , Paul "Guigsy" McGuigan and Tony McCarroll , who were soon joined by Liam's older brother Noel Gallagher...
recorded a version that was released as the B-side to their 1998 single "All Around the World
All Around the World (Oasis song)
"All Around the World" is a song by the English rock band Oasis, written by the band's lead guitarist and principal songwriter Noel Gallagher. Released on 12 January 1998, the track peaked at number one in the UK Singles Chart; it is the longest single ever to do so...
". The song can be found on the fourth and last studio album by Rage Against the Machine
Rage Against the Machine
Rage Against the Machine is an American rock band from Los Angeles, California. Formed in 1991, the group's line-up consists of vocalist Zack de la Rocha, bassist and backing vocalist Tim Commerford, guitarist Tom Morello and drummer Brad Wilk...
, titled Renegades. It appears on Mötley Crüe
Mötley Crüe
Mötley Crüe is an American heavy metal band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1981. The group was founded by bass guitarist Nikki Sixx and drummer Tommy Lee, who were later joined by lead guitarist Mick Mars and lead singer Vince Neil...
's Red, White and Crüe
Red, White and Crüe
Disc 2Single Disc Version track listing#"Live Wire"#"Piece of Your Action"#"Black Widow"#"Looks That Kill"#"Too Young to Fall in Love" #"Shout at the Devil"#"Girls, Girls, Girls"#"Wild Side"#"Kickstart My Heart"#"Dr...
album as well as the Ramones
Ramones
The Ramones were an American rock band that formed in the New York City neighborhood of Forest Hills, Queens, in 1974. They are often cited as the first punk rock group...
' 2002 re-release of Too Tough to Die
Too Tough to Die
Too Tough to Die is the eighth studio album by the American punk rock band The Ramones. It was released on October 1,1984. It is the first Ramones album to feature new drummer Richie Ramone...
. The band Prima Donna
Prima Donna (American band)
-Personnel:* Kevin Preston – Vocals, Guitar* Aaron Minton – Keyboards, Tenor & Baritone Saxophones, Backing Vocals* David S. Field – Drums, Percussion, Backing Vocals* Erik Arcane – Guitar, Backing Vocals* Daniel Nyby – Bass, Backing Vocals-Kiss Kiss:...
performed a live cover early in their career. The band Tesla
Tesla (band)
Tesla is an American hard rock band formed in Sacramento, California in 1984. They have sold 14 million albums in the United States.-Formation and Mechanical Resonance :...
also covered this song on their covers album Real to Reel which can be found on the rare disk 2 track number 5. (You needed to attend a concert during the Reel to Reel tour to obtain this disk.)
Guitarist Pete Townshend
Pete Townshend
Peter Dennis Blandford "Pete" Townshend is an English rock guitarist, vocalist, songwriter and author, known principally as the guitarist and songwriter for the rock group The Who, as well as for his own solo career...
of The Who
The Who
The Who are an English rock band formed in 1964 by Roger Daltrey , Pete Townshend , John Entwistle and Keith Moon . They became known for energetic live performances which often included instrument destruction...
has claimed that the staccato beat–rhythm structure of "Street Fighting Man" is the inspiration for "I'm Free" on Tommy
Tommy (rock opera)
Tommy is the fourth album by English rock band The Who, released by Track Records and Polydor Records in the United Kingdom and Decca Records/MCA in the United States. A double album telling a loose story about a "deaf, dumb and blind boy" who becomes the leader of a messianic movement, Tommy was...
.
Dave Perkins & Lynn Nichols
Lynn Nichols
Lynn Arthur Nichols is an American songwriter, producer, and musician from New York who now resides in Nashville, Tennessee.In 1977, Nichols was a member of the Phil Keaggy Band, with Phil Madeira, Terry Andersen and Dan Cunningham. The band released one album together, entitled Emerging...
covered the song in their side project "Passafist".
In 2009, the Australian rock band Sick Puppies
Sick Puppies
Sick Puppies is an Australian rock band, formed in 1997. The band consists of vocalist and guitarist Shimon Moore, bassist Emma Anzai and drummer Mark Goodwin....
used the first 15 seconds of Rage Against The Machine's version for their single "Street Fighter (War)".
Radio personalities Opie and Anthony
Opie and Anthony
Opie and Anthony are the hosts of The Opie & Anthony Show, a talk radio program airing in the United States and Canada on XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio. Since the merger of the two satellite companies, this is now called Sirius/XM...
use Rage Against the Machine's version as part of the opening theme for their show.
The song plays over the end credits of the film V for Vendetta
V for Vendetta (film)
V for Vendetta is a 2005 dystopian thriller film directed by James McTeigue and produced by Joel Silver and the Wachowski brothers, who also wrote the screenplay. It is an adaptation of the V for Vendetta comic book by Alan Moore and David Lloyd...
and during the documentary Sicko
Sicko
Sicko is a 2007 documentary film by American filmmaker Michael Moore. The film investigates health care in the United States, focusing on its health insurance and the pharmaceutical industry. The movie compares the for-profit, non-universal U.S...
.
It is also used in the film State of Grace
State of Grace
State of Grace is an American comedy-drama series that ran for two seasons on the Fox Network's Fox Family channel during 2001 and 2002.-Plot:...
.
Wes Anderson
Wes Anderson
Wesley Wales Anderson is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, and producer of features, short films and commercials....
used the track in his 2009 stop-motion animated film Fantastic Mr. Fox
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Fantastic Mr Fox is a children's novel written by British author Roald Dahl. It was published in 1970 by George Allen & Unwin in the UK and Alfred A. Knopf in the U.S., with illustrations by Donald Chaffin. The book was later published with new illustrations by Jill Bennett, Tony Ross and Quentin...
.
The Buffalo Sabres
Buffalo Sabres
The Buffalo Sabres are a professional ice hockey team based in Buffalo, New York. They are members of the Northeast Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League .-Founding and early success: 1970-71—1980-81:...
of the National Hockey League have used the song as their unofficial theme song, taking the ice at home games as the song plays in the HSBC arena.