The first time I listened to Rage Against the Machine (RATM) was around early 2000. By that time, my brother usually played their song when he was picking me up from school. Listening to RATM inside the comfort of my father’s car, I never really understand the meaning of their lyric. I overheard “Sleep Now In The Fire,” hundreds of time that I was becoming familiar with the song. Among a lot of other rock music that my brother was listening to, I like this song the best.

As I am entering my adult life, working as a minimum wage employee to a company that belongs to the richest man in the world, making me feel that I can relate more to the song. My coworker, the dishwasher, usually plays rock song in the dish room while he is working. I often stop for a bit to sing along with him. The 22-year-old dishwasher listened mostly to System of Down. I wanted to introduce him to RATM. That was when I am rediscovering “Sleep Now In The Fire.” This time, I listen to the song not as a daughter of an Indonesian middle-class family that lives comfortably, but as a struggling working mother from a working-class family in the United States. I am no way near my brother’s knowledge and comprehension about rock and RATM (or anyone else in that matter), yet when I was looking for an object to be analyzed for this essay, I listened to their song frequently.

Rage Against the Machine (RATM) is an American band. They are Zack de la Rocha (vocalist), Tom Morello (guitarist), Tim Commerford (bassist), and Brad Wilk (drummer). Rolling Stone writes in 1999, “The mightiest band in rock and roll is ready to take on racism, economic injustice and political oppression” (Fricke, 1999). “Sleep Now In The Fire” is the fifth track from their 1999 album The Battle of Los Angles. “Sleep Now In The Fire” was filmed in front of Federal Hall in Downtown Manhattan on January 26th, 2000 (Basham, 2000). Just like how Rolling Stone describes them, “Sleep Now in the Fire” video clip is filled with anti-capitalism messages that I will breakdown in this essay.
In general, “Sleep Now in the Fire” clip consist of four parts. First part is the band playing in front of Federal Hall and additional information regarding their “show” in that venue. The second part is them pretending to make a “fancy” video clip. The third part is them in their regular outfit in front of a green screen that portrayed footage of crises around the world. The fourth part is the mock game show, “Who Wants to be Filthy F#&%ing Rich?”.

First Part: Federal Hall
One of the very first footage that I noticed when I watch the video clip twenty years after the first time I heard them, is when police argue with and eventually take Michael Moore away. As I am not a “hardcore fan” of RATM, I did not know that Michael Moore directed the clip. His appearance in the clip speaks loudly to me since I knew Moore’s other creations before I learn about this. Moore’s appearance and ethos add more value to RATM’s clip. To me, it gives the nod about what RATM’s persona and credibility. Undoubtedly, footage of RATM playing their music in front of Wall Street gives us a clear picture of their ethos. As their name suggested, they want to be depicted as a threat to capitalism. Footage of them being seized by police officers explains how their sentiment toward authority.
At the same time, footage of RATM playing in front of Wall Street and then get apprehended, touch their audience at the emotional level. As a working-class member of society, I feel empowered. I feel like I can channel my anger when I see them walking to the building and seeing how authorities are feeling threatened.

Luxurious Background vs. Crisis Background
These two parts of the clip are shoot in the same way. They are playing in front of a green screen. However, their outfit, their expressions, and the images in the background are in contrast. The part when they are all dressed up in suits shows the frontman smiling when singing the lyric “Sleep Now in the Fire.” This is a sarcasm toward greed of the richest that their song is firmly giving critics to. To give head-to-head contrast, RATM gives out images of bomb explosions, the battle of Seattle, and the one that surprises me the most, footage of Indonesian riot police. I cannot talk a lot about other visuals that are used in this part, but I know that in 2000, when the clip was filmed, Indonesia has just starting to recover after a mass riot in 1998 due to the overthrown of Soeharto after his 32 years of ruling.
Why do they choose to include images of Indonesian riot police in their clip? I believe it is has a strong connection with both RATM and Michael Moore’s value about globalization and colonization. In the lyric, RATM mentions the Nina, the Pinta, the Santa Maria, the name of Columbus’ ships that was sent to America. Soeharto is well known as a friend of the U.S, where he built his empire with a lot of help from the U.S. I argue that the inclusion of Indonesian riot police gives a massage that the power of the people is strong enough to overthrow the power of the authoritarian leadership. It also persuasion to their audience’s emotion, a message that people that hold on to their rich should be scared of getting eaten by the poor.

Images of the “crisis” on the background of RATM in their regular clothing also appeals to my logic. As they are using real footage, I can see how the greed of big corporations can do the world. The footages that were used show how to very a small percentage of people, the world is their expense, and they are more than willing to do anything as the cost of their desire.
Mock Game Show
RATM obviously not being subtle in sending their messages. It is easy to follow RATM’s value just by looking at the questions of this mock game show. RATM giving out a lot of logos, appeal to our logic, to persuade us. In part with the mock game show, “Who Wants to be Filthy F#&%ing Rich?”, each of the game show’s questions and their two choices of answers sending a direct message about values that RATM’s believe. It started with a host, a middle-age looking Caucasian man who asks another white man with a no-brainer question, “What letter follows “A”?, (A) B or B (Q)”. The white man getting asked with easy question contain deeper meaning, that is, for RATM, life is more comfortable when you are a white man.

The last contestant of the mock show is a black man with a beanie and a dull parka. The black man is obviously not looking as neat as other contestants of the show. His question is, “How many Americans live in poverty? (A) 35 million, (B) what poverty?”. The black man is the only one that can answer the question correctly (A) other than the white man from the former part. As the black man answers correctly, he got the jackpot. Women in revealing clothes with suitcase of money circling the black man giving the money to him. However, the black man does not look happy. He gives back the money and leave the studio follows by the riot of the audience. This last segment of the mock-game communicates effectively to my emotional and logic appeals. Of course, the black man does not want to accept the money since he does not want to be part of the greed as he is also aware of thirty five million people that live in poverty. Riot among the audience in the mock-game show imitates “riot” that is happening in the front of Wall Street. Both of these riots appeals to the audience emotion, I guess the riot bring satisfaction to their audience.

Conclusion
As I presented above, “Sleep Now in the Fire” filled with messages of renegade against the machine of capitalism. The context of the Sleep Now in the Fire is still ongoing right now: economic inequality and social injustice. The purpose of the video clip is to share their Rage towards their fans. It is fascinating to see how RATM chooses those four separate parts to wrap “Sleep Now in the Fire” clip. If RATM only peruse one part of the clip, for example the mock game show part, probably the clip will be less effective to ignite rage in their audience heart. Robert Atwan says, “In understanding a text’s method of expression, we should also be careful to observe patterns: regular or repetitive arrangements of elements within a text” (10). All four parts of this video clip have a similar visual pattern, all of them have one goal. They are blunt and explicit criticism of capitalism. These visual patterns interweave with RATM verbal message as their lyric provokes anger in my heart. This video gives a story about who I can channel my anger to and to whom I can share my empathy.

Works Cited Entries
Atwan, Robert. Convergences: Message, method, medium. Macmillan, 2005.
Basham, David. “Rage Against The Machine Shots New Video With Micahel Moore”. MTV. 28 January 2000. http://www.mtv.com
Fricke, David. “The Battle of Rage Against the Machine”. Rolling Stone. 25 November 1999. http://www.rollingstone.com