Jared Swilley in an interview with The Maneater:
I try to keep politics out of music. I don’t think musicians have any role being politicians or having too many political views. That always seems kind of silly. We’ll maybe mention stuff that’s going on around us, our kind of observations, but we definitely don’t try to have any political message except have a great time and do what you want to do.
Kids Like You & Me (KLYAM) 
Artists should be honest, so if they don’t feel like singing about politics then don’t. But, I would never go as far as saying one doesn’t have any role in it, that’s silly.
I whole-heartedly agree with you, Chris. I mean, so long as artists not only feel passionate towards the topic they’re protesting/sending awareness about, but also have enough knowledge to debate certain arguements for said topic, I don’t see why they can’t. There’s a little something called Freedom of Speech that everyone’s entitled to.
Well, I’m glad you feel so strongly about free speech, but I think you’re looking too far into Swilley’s statement. He’s saying music is about having a fun time and not making political decisions like politicians or what have you. I highly doubt he’s suggesting we suspend the first amendment, but to him, artists shouldn’t be political. In other words, they “can” do as they please, but to him it’s not tasteful.
That sounds like something Criswell said would happen in the future that “entertainers will be entertainers and entertainers only”. My own opinion on his comment is that it is not unlike Mark Sultan telling everyone that lyrical content is not important because lyrics aren’t very important in his own act. Just because he hasn’t any political position about which he feels passionately and can be integrated in the act in a manner that makes it work doesn’t mean others cannot. Besides, this is someone from the Black Lips isn’t, isn’t he making political statements when involved in male to male kissing and the rest of that? To many people that is a clear and loud political statement, and many people violently disapprove of it and I am sure that one reason he and his band does such things is because they disapprove of it because he disapproves of them!
The context in which the quote is really is the interviewer charging that the Black Lips make political statements and he’s denying such a charge. He does this in part by narrowing the definition of “political”. There’s a reluctance by many to touch that word in any way or to be associated with it at all. I don’t think I want to go more into this now but when I read it in the original context it felt very different than how I read it here.
woke from my sleep last night, woke up with quite a freight, and noticed this. You are right XYZ maybe I should have linked to the original interview.