Born As Ghosts

Album: The Battle Of Los Angeles (1999)
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Songfacts®:

  • This song seems to be about children born into very poor families in Mexico where they have no advantages and feel their lives don't matter. The part about Gates, Guns, and Alarms shaping the calm of the dawn is in reference to the US/Mexico Border and the border guards blocking the children's entrance to the US. The line about "One book and forty ghosts locked in a room" is in reference to the poor school system which children born into poverty must deal with.
  • De La Rocha explains the album title: "Los Angeles is famous for Hollywood and for its culture of entertainment, but the reality is that it's a city that's in permanent conflict between those who have and those who do not, between those who were born privileged and those who have been abandoned by the Government system." Rage's music has always tried to reflect and to raise those voices of the vulnerable, and the album's title has to do with that. Tom has also said that this album relates the important factor that a band like Rage Against the Machine could have only occurred in Los Angeles - the sound, the ethnic makeup of the band, the intensity of the live shows - it's entirely Los Angeles. The struggles that the band went through in order to make it all work was a battle in it's own. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Tim - Pittsburgh, PA, for above 2

Comments: 4

  • Gember Dinarte from Washington, DcJoey exactly Michael shut up if you dont know how it feels not to have the food you eat the clothes on your back or the roof over your head. They are so desperate to make it here for their kids that they have to break the law and come here ILLEGALLY for a better life. I thought my parents were wrong saying how people in America are ignorant, but apparently they were right
  • Austin from Smallsville,new England, --The main riff of the song is created using a wammy bar.
  • Joey from North Barrington, IlMichael...why are you even looking at RATM song meanings if you're just going to be an ass and rip on their music. Oh yeah, it is called ILLEGAL immigration for a reason, because our government is too selfish and ignorant to reach out and help those who need it, even if they aren't Americans they are still humans and we are no better than them. We wouldn't have a border "problem" if we helped the families in Mexico who are poor and have nothing to eat and no hope except to make it to America, the land of "opportunity" where they will find nothing but people like you who are selfish and will only give them discrimination and stereotypical, labor intensive jobs for minimum pay. There I'm done.
  • Michael from Morris County, NjO.K., if this song is partanti-border control RATm is worse than i thought. It's called ILLEGAL immigration for a reason
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