Our analysis of Eastwood and Springsteen’s role in the 2012 election provides a window into how this relationship can be read as a product of particular US cultural and political traditions, and also broader processes of social, cultural and industrial transformation that have, transnationally, worked to transform celebrity, democracy and their mutual imbrication. In doing so, we draw on theoretical engagements with celebrity politics as both a product and productive of shifting practices of governance, wherein the symbolic power of cultural narratives becomes tied to the symbolic power of electoral marketing. This paper argues that, and analyses how, contemporary US politics is characterised by a battle between ‘competing populisms’, where the struggle to claim popular support relies on and enacts broader cultural narratives and idealised notions of identity. Celebrity involvement in politics is an increasingly prominent element of the professional mediatised campaign. As a storyteller of the American experience, Eastwood would offer the Republicans, and Springsteen the Democrats, a link to the fans for whom the myth of cowboy hero or blue-collar solidarity was a familiar foundation of American identity. Each was co-opted by the campaigns as part of their efforts to lay claim to the values of an imagined ‘grassroots’. In the 2012 US Presidential election, cultural icons Clint Eastwood and Bruce Springsteen were prominent supporters of the Romney and Obama campaigns. Using the theories expressed by Ien Ang in On Not Speaking Chinese as a starting point, I will apply the ideas of hybridity in the Chinese abroad presented by Ang to Irish-Americans and the idea of "Shamrock and Roll" created by the Murphys. Creating a new edge to punk with the incorporation of bagpipes and banjos the Dropkick Murphys have not only created a niche that they have filled happily for the past two decades but have created their own hybrid of what it means to be Irish-American. As Irish-Americans, the members of the Murphys are among the large group of Irish abroad, and in particular, those residing in the United States. As punkers, the reinvent traditional Irish music made famous by the likes of the Clancy Brothers and Christy Moore while building upon the "full range of characterization" of the Irish present in punk mainstays The Pogues (McLaughlin, McLoone, 191). In The E Street Shuffle to The ’59 Sound: Appropriation of the New Jersey Working Class Hero, I look at Springsteen’s early works and the work of new bands such as The Bouncing Souls and The Gaslight Anthem’s appropriation of the style and sound of “The Boss,” the Asbury Park Boardwalk and the image of the central New Jersey working class in relation to Dick Hebdige’s theories on subcultures as “noise.” In these bands we can then see a redefinition of what it means to be from a beat up beach town off the Garden State Parkway and what it means to be from Jersey.Ĭeltic-Punkers the Dropkick Murphys blend traditional Irish folk songs with gruffy, angry and a distinctly Boston edge. Since Bruce Springsteen’s first album, Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ, bands in the Garden State have appropriated the look and image of the working class hero to reflect on their own upbringings in the area in style and sound. Most notably, the image of Asbury Park and its denizens have been used as cover art and fuel for songs about hard times and dead end jobs. New Jersey punk rockers The Gaslight Anthem and The Bouncing Souls, much like Springsteen before them, have appropriated the working class images of Central New Jersey. So you almost feel that you want to win for everybody- that you’re carrying on a lot of people’s concerns, and their hopes, and their stories,” (Hiatt, 86). “There’s a lot of parallels between Bruce Springsteen’s younger life and mine We came from the same area, and there’s a certain sense that everybody loses down there. ![]() In the Apissue of Rolling Stone, Brian Fallon of the Gaslight Anthem talked about similarities the music press has made between his band and the work of Bruce Springsteen.
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