MUMBAI: Just how strong the conservative wave sweeping America is can be gauged by this piece of news! A disagreement over US President Bush has led to rock band Nine Inch Nails deciding not to appear at the upcoming MTV Movie Awards.

The rock band was scheduled to perform a song with the image of Bush serving as a backdrop. The music broadcaster found this unacceptable.

The band was slated to perform the first single from its latest album With Teeth. The album, selling over 270,000 copies in its first week, debuted at the top of the charts upon release this month.

The song The Hand That Feeds criticises the Iraq war. It includes the lyrics: "What if this whole crusade's a charade / And behind it all there's a price to be paid / For the blood on which we dine / Justified in the name of the holy and the divine."

Alternative rockers The Foo Fighters will perform instead at the awards on 4 June in Los Angeles. Nine Inch Nails' singer Trent Reznor said that the image of the president would have been unaltered and straightforward.

"Apparently, the image of our president is as offensive to MTV as it is to me," he said. MTV issued a statement saying, “While we respect Nine Inch Nails’ point of view, we were uncomfortable with their performance being built around a partisan political statement. When we discussed our discomfort with the band, their choice was to unfortunately pull out of the Movie Awards."