____________Expressions in Song & Spirit & Social Change____________

Lately, while taking a (well deserved) break from  reading four plus novels a week, I turned to movie series which I have always enjoyed. I am also reading the books for the first time, and as always, there is a distinct difference between the two perspectives, though the movie certainly catch the entertainment theme studiously. I am referring to the Hunger Games series here, and fortunately, there is a song (no coincidence in the millennium blues universe) written by Bob Marley, and later, picked up by his son. The second book in the series is called Catching Fire, which is a strong parallel to the refrain in Bob Marley’s ‘Slave Driver,’ and when remade by his son Damian, called ‘Catch a Fire.’

There are an interesting amount of correlations between the songs and the Suzanne Collins’ series of books. For those of you unfamiliar with the Hunger Games, uh, well, listen to the song Slave Driver. The most obvious first, when Katniss states emphatically in Mocking Jay, ‘if we burn, you burn with us!’ easily directly comparable to ‘Slave driver, the table is turn; catch a fire, catch a fire: gonna get burn. catch a fire. There are almost too many comparisons to mention here, yet some are not as obvious as the titles. In ‘Slave Driver,’ the line ‘It’s only a machine that makes money,’ could be construed as a reference to the Hunger Games’ Capitol’s ability to create and manipulate genetic code to produce ‘muttations,’ because the Capitol clearly uses their technology to control the districts which they ‘govern.’

There are a few lines in Damian Marley’s ‘Catch a Fire,’ which could cause consternation in a re-active mind, which I will go ahead and address now, (in order to generate controversy and through it,SALES!) ‘You influence di youth a turn dem gays and fags, and rest den can afford not even torn up rags.’ While on a cursory listening, or reading the line seems to be disparaging (specifically male) homosexuality, the lines in fact are not referring to people born gay, rather referenced in the second line, the use of money to sway people’s choices, in order to procure desired results. This thought is summarized excellently in the roof top scene, before Katniss and Peeta’s first game.  Peeta’s line ‘…they don’t own me…’, is there a better way to describe staying true?

Each of these creative works are stand alone as songs and novels, my interpretation of the similarities is purely subjective, and entirely co-incidental.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1lSB2PS_K4