From rock to hip-hop, Obama's scrolling finger is on the pulse

Brian Boydon music

In 1963, Martin Luther King delivered his famous "I Have A Dream" speech. In it, Luther King fervently wished for the day when people would not be judged by the colour of their skin but simply by the content of their character. Now, though, it seems that people, and particularly US presidential candidates, are being judged by the content of their iPods, and Barack Obama is the latest to submit to the iPod cultural challenge.

In an election where all aspects of a candidate's life are being forensically examined, his iPod selections have been given a rigorous semiotic analysis and been broken down by race, class and genre. Depending on which way you swing, his choices were either "adventurous and unpredictable selections of classics mixed with all manner of contemporary references" or "his playlist is a bone or two to toss to the white working class". Gosh.

To be fair to the detractors, and to be desperately unfair to the man himself, his iPod selections do seem to be have been artfully massaged by a bunch of PR executives desperately scanning the demographic charts for "product placement" opportunities.

Speaking to Rolling Stonemagazine about his choices, the senator said that the music he grew up loving was by Stevie Wonder, Earth, Wind and Fire and Howlin' Wolf. He also gave the nod to jazz legends such as Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Charlie Parker. All good classic choices and all quite consistent so far.

There were a few eyebrows raised, though, at how much he talked up his love for Bruce Springsteen. Cynics have argued that the senator never expressed any opinion on Springsteen's music until he became the Democratic nominee and realised that he had to get all those pesky blue-collar white voters - the very same people that Springsteen deifies in his lyrics - on board. To really hammer the point home, he told Rolling Stone that whenever he now meets Springsteen (one of his most prominent backers) he refers to him as "The Boss".

Prior to his nomination, Obama was quite critical of the hold that the baby-boomer generation still has over American political life and discourse. His Democrat opponent, Hillary Clinton, of course, was the female baby boomer pin-up for the Joni Mitchell generation. He referred to how the US needed to put all the "psychodrama" of the 1960s (Vietnam, race riots etc) behind it. Perhaps cognisant of the fact that he's now dealing with huge swathes of baby-boomer voters, his iPod now contains two iconic baby-boomer choices in Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones. His favourite-ever Stones track is Gimme Shelter. In Shine a Light, Martin Scorsese's documentary about the band, there's a scene where both Bill and Hillary Clinton are seen drooling over the members of the band.

On another demographic front, Obama also talked up hip-hop stars Jay-Z and Ludacris, although with the caveat that he is troubled "by the misogyny and materialism of a lot of rap lyrics". He added that "the genius of the art form has shifted the culture and helped to desegregate music".

But, curiously, the group who were largely responsible for creating politically and socially conscious rap music, Public Enemy, are not on his iPod list. The group's main man, Chuck D, is a vocal supporter of Obama, but with album titles such as Fear Of A Black Planetand allegations of anti-Semitism surrounding the band, perhaps they weren't the most politically sound choice.

Obama is due to provide vocals (albeit spoken) on rapper Q-Tip's new album, The Renaissance, which is due out later this month.

As for his rival, John McCain, it's perhaps telling that nobody is really that bothered as to whether the 71-year-old even has an iPod, much less what's on it. It is known, though, that McCain is a huge Abba fan and that, if elected, he has vowed to have Abba music "played in all the elevators around the White House". With the musical Mamma Mia! playing to full houses in US cinemas, Obama must be ruing the fact that the Swedish pop stars were the only demographic box he forgot to tick.