Song of the Day 6/2: Sublime, “April 29, 1992”

The title is the date the Rodney King riots broke out in Los Angeles, when the cops who beat him were acquitted of assault — but lead singer and songwriter Bradley Nowell sings it as April 26. Apparently is was just a mistake, but given that Nowell was dead of a heroin overdose by the time the track was released in 1997, nobody really knows for sure. Just a little reminder that police brutality has been a thing since forever, but it really started enflaming the public via video technology. Once it became wide-reaching enough, video produced the kind of evidence that in earlier times was dismissed by authorities.

As Nowell’s lyrics point out, in these situations the triggering event quickly becomes beside the point.

They said it was for the black man,
They said it was for the Mexican
And not for the white man
But if you look at the street, it wasn’t about Rodney King
It’s this fucked-up situation and these fucked-up police