On Monday night’s Late Night With Jimmy Fallon the band picked some inflammatory music for featured guest (and Republican presidential candidate) Michele Bachmann to walk into.
The song they picked? Lyin’ Ass B— by Fishbone.
And it wasn’t a slip-up. Questlove even told fans and followers to pay attention via Twitter: “aight late night walkon song devotees: you love it when we snark: this next one takes the cake. Ask around cause I aint tweeting the title,” he wrote.
Then he even took it a step further by tweeting a link to the album and making fans guess which song they picked.
As Spin points out, The Roots often use songs to express their feelings.
Two notable examples are playing Milli Vanilli when notorious lip-syncer Ashlee Simpson came on the show and introducing Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt with Beck’s Loser.
Both of those were tongue and cheek — and directed to fixtures of popular culture. This is a presidential candidate, congresswoman, and a foster parent to more than 23 children. No matter what you think of Bachmann’s political views, it’s offensive that a house band would sneakily suggest a woman is a “b—” on national television.
If Fishbone only had come up with a ska song entitled: You Have Different Political Views Than Me — Many of Which I Find Utterly Misguided and Wrongheaded — But We Live in a Country Where We Are Allowed to Have Different Beliefs and So We Will Just Agree to Disagree.
Also, It is Not Polite to Call a Woman a ‘B—’…. Fallon and The Roots would not find themselves in this pickle. And it will be a pickle.
A huge, massive pickle.
