Jan 12, 2012 - Libyan activist musicians, who go by the name GAB Crew, have been putting out activist music supporting the youth uprising and the Arab Spring in Libya from the start. They wrote a song called "Libya Bleeds Just Like Us" while Qaddfi was still in power, and months before Tripoli fell. The song was leaked, and when asked by a Qaddai loyalist to write a pro-Qaddafi song, they were horrified and went underground. When the rebel force took the capital, they returned home, and are happy now that they can be more free to be creative and express themselves with protest songs under the new transitional government.
Read more in a NY Times article here, and check out GAB Crew's "Libyan Bleeds Just Like Us" music video below.
JAN 11, 2012 - Ran across this pro-Occupy activist song from a band called "New Party Systems", and it is called "We Are". Check it out below, and read more here.
Justice Through Music's director sits down with PRX, or Public Radio Exchange, and talks music, activism and politics. JTMP has supported musical activists around the world and is a voting rights advocate. We are heavily involved with the occupy movement that is sweeping the world, and check our website for daily musical activist news. Check out Public Radio Exchange for great news and information. Listen to the podcast interview below.
OCT 24, 2011 - Ry Cooder is a musical activist that is not afraid to speak out on issues, and his latest album, "Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down" hits on the bailout, immigration, war and more. From his website:
"His latest album, Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down grew out of this information void—and the pervasive political and corporate double-speak that began swirling in its absence. Snaking through it are familiar themes—the struggle toward real democracy, the trials of the working man, the elusive goal of equality—set against the mayhem of contemporary front page news. [It] has been Cooder’s way to consider some complex questions, to pull back the curtain on the “official stories” by applying a healthy dose of reporter-style skepticism. The album gives “voice” to those affected by corporate greed, self-serving legislation, a culture of fear and hate—and the corrosive nature of apathy.
Consequently, these 14 songs—voices from the wreckage—work as a meditation on not just the state of the union or of the world, but really the state of our hearts and minds—our priorities and values. What happened to the concept of community? Who are we behind our fences and multi-billion dollar homes? What have we—or are poised to—become? Cooder sets these questions in motion, some as “eyewitness” soliloquies, others as allegories—in “El Corrido de Jesse James,” the erstwhile-bank robber asks God if he can have the .44 he checked at Heaven’s gates so he can clean up Wall Street. In “John Lee Hooker for President,” Cooder, fully inhabiting Hooker’s pace and flow, the musician re-appears to make a run for the presidency after being turned away from the White House door."
HBO Documentary Covering the Musical Activist's Life "Sing Your Song" Debuts Tonight
Oct 17, 2011 - Harry Belafonte, a long time musical activist, will be featured in a HBO documentary debuting tonight called "Sing Your Song". His musical career has spanned decades and paralleled the civil rights movement, and he always spoke out and worked against social injustice in the world. In a recent Reuters interview, he commented on the Occupy Wall Street protesters saying, "I'm very encouraged by what young people are doing, and I think that the examples that we set with our own lives in the past have been a good measure for young people to begin to evaluate their own lives."
Harry Belafonte was a ground breaker and crossed over the segregated lines to become a star in 1956 with Calypso, and he was the first artist ever to sell over a million copies of a record. His activism caused him to be blacklisted and harassed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, and the CIA and FBI spied on him.
Some of the causes he has fought for over the years has been equality, civil rights, human dignity, and voting rights. In 1985 launched "We Are The World" to help fight famine in Africa. He constantly speaks out politically, and is not afraid at all to speak out against wars, Presidents, and more. When asked if he feared criticism from his remarks he said, "Bring it on. Dissent is central to any democracy."
To read more about the documentary go the HBO website or click here.
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