Record Industry Heavyweights Tussle Over Tipper

While the Clinton-Gore ticket appears to have captured most of liberal Hollywood’s affection this election season, there is a pocket of discontent in the rock ‘n’ roll world. The problem isn’t with the sax-blowing presidential candidate, his greener-than-thou running mate or even his oh-so-politically-correct spouse.

Nope. The grumbling is over Mrs. Albert Gore Jr., better known in recording circles as the co-founder of the irksome Parents Music Resource Center.

Call it the tussle over Tipper. On one hand, there are a number of music industry leaders who, while deploring Gore and her organization, are willing to hold their noses and support the Democratic ticket. But there is a smaller faction within the business that cannot reconcile casting their votes for a ticket that includes--even if by marriage--their longtime foe.

That faction promises to come out in the open Wednesday night, when half a dozen industry executives are scheduled to speak at a forum called “Tipper Gore: The Election and the Future of Rock and Rap” at the Midnight Special Book Store in Santa Monica.

“I was so horrified when I heard that Clinton decided to nominate Gore, I could barely sleep,” says Howie Klein, managing director of Sire Records.

“I could never bring myself to enter a ballot box and pull a lever for any presidential ticket associated with a censor as bad as Tipper Gore. I’m going to have to vote for a protest candidate.”

Klein has been an outspoken free-speech advocate and a key supporter of the industrywide, multimillion-dollar “Rock the Vote” campaign to encourage young music fans to register and vote in November’s presidential election. The campaign has registered 250,000 new 18- to 24-year-old voters.

Klein’s roster at Sire includes Madonna and Ice-T, both of whom have been active in “Rock the Vote.” Klein himself has been a leading figure in the rock world’s anti-censorship efforts.

Wednesday’s event is sponsored by Rock & Roll Confidential, an anti-censorship industry newsletter opposed to both party tickets and particularly critical of Tipper Gore, who has been repeatedly criticized by the recording industry since 1985 when she founded the PMRC to police record lyrics.

The Arlington, Va.-based organization--co-founded by Susan Baker, wife of longtime George Bush confidant and Chief of Staff James Baker--initiated the 1985 Senate hearings on potentially harmful lyrics and was instrumental five years later in pressuring the music industry to reluctantly introduce a voluntary labeling system to identify “explicit” albums.

Even so, many leaders in rock’s anti-censorship battle believe that the presence of an apparently electable Democratic candidate is too good to waste, even with Tipper in tow. Jeff Ayeroff, co-founder of the “Rock the Vote” registration drive, says he’s not going to throw his vote away by casting a third-party protest.

“It’s not like anybody has forgotten who Tipper is, but I don’t think Clinton and Gore are an anti-rock ‘n’ roll ticket,” says Ayeroff, who maintains that he and every Democrat he knows in the music business will vote the party line on Election Day. “Besides, there is a myriad of political issues people in our industry must face. Censorship is only one of many problems the country is up against.”

Julie Ritter, a singer in the rock group Mary’s Danish (which is currently doing a concert tour sponsored by “Rock the Vote”) and member of the Bohemian Women’s Political Alliance, says her organization will attend the forum to argue in favor of endorsing the Clinton/Gore ticket.

“To pretend that we are fighting censorship by not voting for Clinton and Gore would be like cutting off our nose to spite our face,” declares Ritter. “Bill Clinton is pro-choice and Al Gore is pro-environment. They’ve got my vote because the positive aspects of this ticket outweigh the negative.”