Le 165 canzoni bandite dalla radio americana dopo l'11 settembre

Dopo gli attacchi terroristici dell'11 settembre 2001 al World Trade Center e al Pentagono, quasi 200 canzoni sono state bandite dalle stazioni radio americane da Clear Channel Communications, oggi nota come iHeartMedia. Come riporta Consequence of Sound ci sono state poche o nessuna conseguenza per i DJ che hanno rotto l'embargo. Ora, a venti anni di distanza, quell'elenco è poco più che una curiosità che, data la portata della tragedia, ha portato a uno dei movimenti di censura più radicali della storia recente.

Clear Channel ha annunciato i "suggerimenti" in un memorandum inviato alle sue oltre 1.100 stazioni radio il 14 settembre, tre giorni dopo gli attentati a New York. Molte canzoni sono state citate come "liricamente discutibili", il che significava che le parole potevano essere scatenanti, come in "Fire and Rain" di James Taylor, "Shot Down in Flames" degli AC/DC o "Learn to Fly" dei Foo Fighters. Ma le altre sono state cancellate dalle playlist per motivi politici.

L'intera discografia dei Rage Against the Machine - quattro album e oltre 50 canzoni - è stata ritenuta inaccettabile, a quanto pare perché la band era stata critica nei confronti dell'America e del capitalismo. E' stata bandita anche "Imagine" di John Lennon, perché immaginare un mondo in cui tutti si vada in concordia era in contrasto con la richiesta pubblica di giustizia. 
Anche diverse canzoni metal hanno incontrato la censura. "Bad Religion" dei Godsmack non ha nulla a che fare con il fuoco, gli aerei, le uccisioni oppure New York, è stata comunque bannata. Così come "Break Stuff" dei Limp Bizkit, "Intolerance" dei Tool e altri brani relativamente inoffensivi, ad esempio “Walk Like an Egyptian” delle Bangles.

Questo l'elenco:
3 Doors Down –“Duck and Run”
311 — “Down”
AC/DC — “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap”
AC/DC — “Hells Bells”
AC/DC — “Highway to Hell”
AC/DC  — “Safe in New York City”
AC/DC — “Shoot to Thrill”
AC/DC  — “Shot Down in Flames”
AC/DC  –“T.N.T.”
The Ad Libs — “The Boy from New York City”
Afro Celt Sound System feat. Peter Gabriel — “When You’re Falling”
Alice in Chains — “Down in a Hole”
Alice in Chains — “Rooster”
Alice in Chains — “Sea of Sorrow”
Alice in Chains — “Them Bones”
Alien Ant Farm — “Smooth Criminal”
The Animals — “We Gotta Get Out of This Place”
Louis Armstrong — “What a Wonderful World”
Bad Company — “No Smoke Without a Fire”
The Bangles — “Walk Like an Egyptian”
Barenaked Ladies — “Falling for the First Time”
Fontella Bass — “Rescue Me”
Beastie Boys — “Sabotage”
Beastie Boys — “Sure Shot”
The Beatles — “A Day in the Life”
The Beatles — “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”
The Beatles — “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da”
The Beatles — “Ticket to Ride”
Pat Benatar — “Hit Me with Your Best Shot”
Pat Benatar — “Love Is a Battlefield”
Black Sabbath — “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath”
Black Sabbath — “War Pigs”
Blood, Sweat and Tears — “And When I Die”
Blue Öyster Cult — “Burnin’ for You”
Boston — “Smokin'”
Los Bravos — “Black Is Black”
Jackson Browne — “Doctor My Eyes”
Bush — “Speed Kills”[Note 2]
The Chi-Lites — “Have You Seen Her”
Petula Clark — “A Sign of the Times”
The Clash — “Rock the Casbah”
Phil Collins — “In the Air Tonight”
Sam Cooke — “Wonderful World”
The Crazy World of Arthur Brown — “Fire”
Creedence Clearwater Revival — “Travelin’ Band”
The Crickets — “That’ll Be the Day”
The Cult — “Fire Woman”
Bobby Darin — “Mack the Knife”
The Dave Clark Five — “Bits and Pieces”
Skeeter Davis — “The End of the World”
Neil Diamond — “America”
Dio — “Holy Diver”
The Doors — “The End”
The Drifters — “On Broadway”
Drowning Pool – “Bodies”
Bob Dylan — “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”
Everclear — “Santa Monica”
Shelley Fabares — “Johnny Angel”
Filter — “Hey Man, Nice Shot”
Foo Fighters — “Learn to Fly”
Fuel — “Bad Day”
The Gap Band — “You Dropped a Bomb on Me”
Godsmack — “Bad Religion”
Green Day — “Brain Stew”
Norman Greenbaum — “Spirit in the Sky”
Guns N’ Roses — “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”
The Happenings — “See You in September”
The Jimi Hendrix Experience — “Hey Joe”
Herman’s Hermits — “Wonderful World”
The Hollies — “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother”
Jan and Dean — “Dead Man’s Curve”
Billy Joel — “Only the Good Die Young”
Elton John — “Bennie and the Jets”
Elton John — “Daniel”
Elton John — “Rocket Man”
Judas Priest — “Some Heads Are Gonna Roll”
Kansas — “Dust in the Wind”
Carole King — “I Feel the Earth Move”
Korn — “Falling Away from Me”
Lenny Kravitz — “Fly Away”
Led Zeppelin — “Stairway to Heaven”
John Lennon — “Imagine”
Jerry Lee Lewis — “Great Balls of Fire”
Limp Bizkit — “Break Stuff”
Local H — “Bound for the Floor”
Lynyrd Skynyrd — “Tuesday’s Gone”
Johnny Maestro & the Brooklyn Bridge — “Worst That Could Happen”
Martha and the Vandellas — “Dancing in the Street”
Martha and the Vandellas — “Nowhere to Run”
Dave Matthews Band — “Crash into Me”
Paul McCartney and Wings — “Live and Let Die”
Barry McGuire — “Eve of Destruction”
Don McLean — “American Pie”
Megadeth — “Dread and the Fugitive Mind”
Megadeth — “Sweating Bullets”
John Mellencamp — “Crumblin’ Down”
John Mellencamp –“Paper in Fire”
Metallica — “Enter Sandman”
Metallica — “Fade to Black”
Metallica — “Harvester of Sorrow”
Metallica — “Seek & Destroy”
Steve Miller Band — “Jet Airliner”
Alanis Morissette — “Ironic”
Mudvayne — “Death Blooms”
Ricky Nelson — “Travelin’ Man”
Nena — “99 Luftballons”/”99 Red Balloons”
Nine Inch Nails — “Head Like a Hole”
Oingo Boingo — “Dead Man’s Party”
Ozzy Osbourne — “Suicide Solution”
Paper Lace — “The Night Chicago Died”
John Parr — “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion)”
Peter and Gordon — “I Go to Pieces”
Peter and Gordon –“A World Without Love”
Peter, Paul and Mary — “Blowin’ in the Wind”
Peter, Paul and Mary — “Leaving on a Jet Plane”
Tom Petty — “Free Fallin'”
Pink Floyd — “Mother”
Pink Floyd — “Run Like Hell”
P.O.D. — “Boom”
Elvis Presley — “(You’re the) Devil in Disguise”
The Pretenders — “My City Was Gone”
Queen — “Another One Bites the Dust”
Queen — “Killer Queen”
Rage Against the Machine — All songs
Red Hot Chili Peppers — “Aeroplane”
Red Hot Chili Peppers — “Under the Bridge”
R.E.M. — “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)”
The Rolling Stones — “Ruby Tuesday”
The Rolling Stones — “Shattered”
Mitch Ryder & the Detroit Wheels — “Devil with a Blue Dress On”
Saliva — “Click Click Boom”
Santana — “Evil Ways”
Savage Garden — “Crash and Burn”
Simon & Garfunkel — “Bridge over Troubled Water”
Frank Sinatra — “New York, New York”
Slipknot — “Left Behind”
Slipknot — “Wait and Bleed”
The Smashing Pumpkins — “Bullet with Butterfly Wings”
Soundgarden — “Black Hole Sun”
Soundgarden — “Blow Up the Outside World”
Soundgarden — “Fell on Black Days”
Bruce Springsteen — “I’m Goin’ Down”
Bruce Springsteen — “I’m on Fire”
Bruce Springsteen — “War”
Edwin Starr — “War”
Steam — “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye”
Cat Stevens — “Morning Has Broken”
Cat Stevens — “Peace Train”
Stone Temple Pilots — “Big Bang Baby”
Stone Temple Pilots — “Dead & Bloated”
Sugar Ray — “Fly”
The Surfaris — “Wipe Out”
System of a Down — “Chop Suey!”
Talking Heads — “Burning Down the House”
James Taylor — “Fire and Rain”
Temple of the Dog — “Say Hello 2 Heaven”
Third Eye Blind — “Jumper”
The Three Degrees — “When Will I See You Again”
Tool — “Intolerance”
The Trammps — “Disco Inferno”
U2 — “Sunday Bloody Sunday”
Van Halen — “Jump”
Van Halen — “Dancing in the Street”
J. Frank Wilson and the Cavaliers — “Last Kiss”
The Youngbloods — “Get Together”
Zager and Evans–  “In the Year 2525”
The Zombies — “She’s Not There”