Thursday, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was nominated by the Republican Party to be the first female vice presidential nominee.

During the Republican National Convention, which took place at the Xcel Energy Center, the band Heart’s song „Barracuda” was played in honour of the nominee, whose highschool nickname was „Sarah Barracuda”.

After this, all hell broke loose. Ann and Nancy Wilson, Heart’s band members, didn’t waste any time before sending a cease and desist letter to the Palin campaign. According to a statement made by their representative, the Republican campaign did not ask for permission to use the song. And even if they had asked, Heart would have refused to grant it, he added.

Despite this, the tune was played again at the end of the Convention, when Sarah Palin joined presidential nominee John McCain on stage, after the latter had finished delivering his acceptance speech.

Nevertheless, this is not the first incident of the like. On August 29, in Dayton, Ohio, John McCain took the stage while Van Halen’s 1991 track „Right Now” was blasting the speakers. Few hours later, Van Halen’s publicist announced that the band was clueless about McCain using the song for his campaign.

„Barracuda” was the first single released from Heart’s third album, called „Little Queen”. It became the band’s second top-twenty hit in the U.S, reaching the eleventh position on the Billboard Hot 100. Initially, people thought that the song had been Ann Wilson’s way of dealing with some issues between her and her boyfriend but, as she later stated in interviews, it had at its core the sisters’ anger with Mushroom Records, which had pulled a publicity stunt by making up a lesbian affair about the two.