| "Cop Killer" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Single byBody Count | ||||
| from the albumBody Count | ||||
| Released | 1992 (1992)[1] | |||
| Recorded | 1991 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 4:08 | |||
| Label | ||||
| Composer | Ernie C | |||
| Lyricist | Ice-T | |||
| Producers |
| |||
| Body Count singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Audio sample | ||||
"Cop Killer" is a song by Americanheavy metal bandBody Count. Released on the group's 1992self-titled debut album. The song's lyrics about "cop killing" were criticized byPresident of the United StatesGeorge H. W. Bush[6] andVice PresidentDan Quayle.[6] Ice-T has called "Cop Killer" a "protest record".[7] He eventually recalled the album and rereleased it without the song.[1]
Ice-T, who wrote the song's lyrics, referred to "Cop Killer" as a "protest record",[7] stating that the song is "[sung] in the first person as a character who is fed up withpolice brutality".[8] He has credited theTalking Heads song "Psycho Killer" as an inspiration for the song.[9] "Cop Killer" was written in 1990 and had been performed live several times, including at the 1991Lollapalooza tour, before it was recorded in a studio.[10]
The recorded version mentionsLos Angeles police chiefDaryl Gates andRodney King, a black motorist whose beating byLos Angeles Police Department officers had been caught on videotape. Shortly after the release of theBody Count album, a jury acquitted the officers andriots erupted inSouth Central Los Angeles. Soon after the riots, theDallas Police Association and the Combined Law Enforcement Association of Texas launched a campaign to forceWarner Bros. Records to withdraw the album.[6]
Following its release, the song was met with opposition, with critics ranging from PresidentGeorge H. W. Bush to various law enforcement agencies, with demands for the song's withdrawal from commercial availability, citing concerns of promotinganti-police sentiment. Ice-T defended the song's lyrics, as did other proponents who did not believe that the song posed any risk and supported its release and sale.
The Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas called for a boycott of all Time Warner products in order to secure the removal of the song and album from stores.[11][12] Within a week, they were joined by police organizations across the nation.[6] SenatorsDaniel Patrick Moynihan,Lloyd Bentsen andAl D'Amato protested the release of the song by canceling their planned cameo appearances in the 1993Warner Bros. Pictures political filmDave.[13]
Some critics argued that the song could cause crime and violence.[6][14] Dennis R. Martin, the former president of theNational Association of Chiefs of Police, argued:
The misuse of the First Amendment is graphically illustrated in Time Warner's attempt to insert into the mainstream culture the vile and dangerous lyrics of the Ice-T song entitled "Cop Killer". TheBody Count album containing "Cop Killer" was shipped throughout the United States in miniature body bags. Only days before distribution of the album was voluntarily suspended, Time Warner flooded the record market with a half million copies. The "Cop Killer" song has been implicated in at least two shooting incidents and has inflamedracial tensions in cities across the country. Those who work closely with the families and friends of slain officers volunteering for theAmerican Police Hall of Fame and Museum are outraged by the message of "Cop Killer". It is an affront to the officers—144 in 1992 alone—who have been killed in the line of duty while the police was upholding the laws of our society and protecting all its citizens.[15]
Others defended the album and cited the fact that Ice-T had sympathetically portrayed a police officer in the 1991 filmNew Jack City.[16] Many people from the music world and other fields were supportive of the song. For example, in response to Dennis Martin's criticism, Mark S. Hamm and Jeff Ferrell argued:
Ice-T is not the first artist to put a "cop killer" theme inUnited States popular culture. This theme has been the subject of countless cinematic and literary works, and has appeared many times before in popular music. During theGreat Depression, for example, people celebratedPretty Boy Floyd and his exploits, which included murdering law enforcement personnel. Similarly, the highly respected fiddler Tommy Jarrell wrote and sang "Policeman", which begins, "Policeman come and I didn't want to go this morning, so I shot him in the head with my 44." But perhaps the best-known case isEric Clapton's cover version ofBob Marley and the Wailers' "I Shot the Sheriff", which reached the top of the U.S. music charts in the mid-1970s (a feat not approached by Ice-T). "I Shot the Sheriff", though, never suffered the sort of moral and political attacks that "Cop Killer" did. How do we account for this difference?[17]
Ice-T stated of the song, "I'm singing in the first person as a character who is fed up with police brutality. I ain't never killed no cop. I felt like it a lot of times. But I never did it. If you believe that I'm a cop killer, you believeDavid Bowie is anastronaut."[18]
In a July 1992 editorial inThe Wall Street Journal defending his company's involvement with the song, Time Warner co-CEOGerald M. Levin repeated this defense, writing that rather than "finding ways to silence the messenger", critics and listeners should be "heeding the anguished cry contained in his message".[19]
TheNational Black Police Association opposed the boycott of Time Warner and the attacks on "Cop Killer", identifying police brutality as the cause of much anti-police sentiment, and proposed the creation of independent civilian review boards "to scrutinize the actions of our law enforcement officers" as a way of ending the provocations that caused artists such as Body Count "to respond to actions of police brutality and abuse through their music. ... Many individuals of the law enforcement profession do not want anyone to scrutinize their actions, but want to scrutinize the actions of others."[12]
Over the next month, controversy against the band grew. Vice President Quayle branded "Cop Killer" "obscene", and President Bush publicly denounced any record company that would release such a product.[6]Body Count was removed from the shelves of a retail store inGreensboro, North Carolina after local police had told the management that they would no longer respond to any emergency calls at the store if it continued to sell the album.[12]
In July 1992, theNew Zealand police commissioner unsuccessfully attempted to prevent an Ice-T concert inAuckland, arguing that "anyone who comes to this country preaching in obscene terms the killing of police should not be welcome here",[16] before takingBody Count and Warner Bros. Records to theIndecent Publications Tribunal in an effort to have it banned under New Zealand'sIndecent Publications Act 1963. This was the first time in 20 years that a sound recording had been brought before the censorship body and the first case involving popular music.[16] The tribunal found the song "Cop Killer" to be "not exhortatory", saw the album as displaying "an honest purpose" and foundBody Count not indecent.[16]
At the July 1992 Time Warnerannual shareholders' meeting, actorCharlton Heston, who was a minor Time Warner shareholder, addressed the crowd and recited lyrics from both "Cop Killer" and another song fromBody Count, "KKK Bitch", which namecheckedPMRC headTipper Gore, in an attempt to embarrass company executives into dropping the album.[20] In his autobiography, Heston wrote that he considered "KKK Bitch" "even more disgusting" and that he had tried to persuade theNational Organization for Women to join a protest against its mentions of sex with 12-year-old girls, but that the group did not show interest.[21]
At aBeverly Hills press conference to announce a change in policy, Ice-T began by presenting almost 40 minutes of a video documentary on thecivil-rights movement before he spoke. He announced the withdrawal the song from future copies of the album. Time Warner announced that it would recall copies with "Cop Killer" included, which sparked panic buying of the album.[22]
Death threats were sent to Warner Bros. Records executives, and somestockholders threatened to disassociate themselves from the company.[7] According to his 1994 bookThe Ice Opinion: Who Gives a Fuck?, Ice-T decided to remove the song from the album of his own volition.[7] Ice-T left the label in 1993, following additional disputes over his solo albumHome Invasion.[7] He stated: "When I started out, [Warner] nevercensored us. Everything we did, we had full control over. But what happened was when the cops moved onBody Count, they issued pressure on the corporate division of Warner Bros., and that made the music division, they couldn't out-fight 'em in the battle, so even when you're in a business with somebody who might not wanna censor you, economically people can put restraints on 'em and cause 'em to be afraid. I learned that lesson in there, that you're never really safe as long as you're connected to any big corporation's money."[23]
The Source magazine, which was central to American hip-hop at the time, dubbed the decision "the beginning of the end of rap music", viewing it as a gateway to widespread censorship of hip-hop. An editorial by Reginald Dennis cast doubt on Ice-T's statement that it was his decision to withdraw the song.[24]The Source became more critical of Ice-T in subsequent months, writing that he had avoided an interview on the subject in October[25] and then awarding him the "Ross Perot Award", which implied that he had withdrawn the song for business reasons.[26] Ice-T responded by criticizingThe Source in his song "It's On". In his 2011 autobiography, he wrote thatSource magazine had constantly criticized him for his decision to remove the track.[27]
Warner Bros. Records chairmanMo Ostin said in a 1994 interview with theLos Angeles Times, "[Time Warner] got so thin-skinned after the incident at the shareholders' meeting. In the end, Ice-T decided to leave because he could not allow tampering with his work. And I can't blame him, considering the climate." Expressing regret at the circumstances leading to Ice-T's departure, Ostin praised him as "a terrific artist who spoke the truth".[28]
The studio version of "Cop Killer" has not been rereleased, although a live version of the song appears on the 2005 releaseBody Count: Live in LA. According to Body Count guitaristErnie C, the controversy over the song "still lingers for us, even now. I'll try to book clubs and the guy I'm talking to will mention it and I'll think to myself, 'Man, that was 17 years ago', but I meet a lot of bands who ask me about it too and I'm real respected by other artists for it. But it's a love/hate thing. Ice gets it too, even though he plays a cop on TV now onLaw & Order SVU."[10]
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "There Goes the Neighborhood" | 4:01 |
| 2. | "Voodoo" | 5:01 |
| 3. | "Bowels of the Devil" | 3:43 |
| 4. | "Momma's Gotta Die Tonight" | 6:11 |
| 5. | "Cop Killer" | 4:08 |
'Cop Killer' and the Body Count album were Ice-T's foray into crossover thrash metal
| |
| Studio albums | |
| Singles | |
