President Obama sang a couple of lines from Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together” to a crowd of supporters at a fundraising event at the Apollo Theater the other night. Does anybody really believe that the president's choice of this particular song from the great singer’s vast catalog of hits was random? Of course not. It’s how we know that the 2012 presidential campaign is just about to slip into high gear.
The prez’s performance comes on the heels of news that the White House has begun reaching out to its celebrity friends to lend their talents to this year’s campaign. The White House has already assembled “a wish list of potential surrogates…who could help carry the Democratic president’s message to voters across the country over the next ten months.” The list of 194 names includes Jay-Z, will.i.am, Adam Levine, Alicia Keys, Arcade Fire, Jamie Foxx, John Legend, Sara Bareilles, Josh Groban, India.Arie, and, yes, Al Green.
Here at Complex, this news has inspired us to ask for your ideas about what might be a suitable theme song for the president’s campaign this time around.
The Al Green tune is nice, but you know presidents always like to "keep all options on the table." So now is the time to let your voice, or at least your music, be heard. If you love Obama as much as you did in 2008, you might wanna go with something along the line of Heatwave’s “Always and Forever.”
If—like Jay-Z—you’re at least slightly ambivalent, you might suggest something like Big Daddy Kane's "Ain't No Half Steppin'," Shalamar’s “The Second Time Around” or even Janis Joplin’s ”Try (Just a Little Bit Harder)."
On the third hand, you could be disgusted with the President and decide that Cee-Lo’s “Fuck You” is the track that really says it all for you.
Whatever your ideas for an Obama 2012 campaign theme song, please leave them the comments below or hit us up @ComplexMusic.
