[Mb-civic] NYTimes.com Article: Rockers Open Tour in Support of Kerry

[swiggard at comcast.net]

The article below from NYTimes.com 
has been sent to you by swiggard at comcast.net.


Activities like this could decide the election. There are NOT a lot of undecided voters out there - but there ARE a lot of unregistered young people  whose opinions are not usually measured in the polls that receive media attention. Higher voter turnout means a Kerry victory, I think.
Peace,
Bill

swiggard at comcast.net


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Rockers Open Tour in Support of Kerry

October 2, 2004
 By JON PARELES 



 

PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 1 - Bruce Springsteen began stumping the
swing states here tonight to support Senator John Kerry.
"We're here tonight to fight for a government that is open,
rational, forward-looking and humane, and we plan to rock
the joint while doing so," he said at the beginning of the
concert he was headlining at the Wachovia Center. The
concert, which also featured R.E.M., was one of six
simultaneous concerts in Pennsylvania for the Vote for
Change tour, a week of benefit concerts in battleground
states. 

For the next 10 days, million-selling musicians including
Mr. Springsteen, Dave Matthews, the Dixie Chicks, Pearl
Jam, Bonnie Raitt and John Mellencamp will be headlining
concerts in closely contested states. The tour features
rock musicians, but the lineups also encompass blues,
country and hip-hop. 

The tour will reach 11 states and 33 cities, winding up
with a concert by 13 of the headliners on Oct. 11 at the
MCI Center in Washington. That show, to be televised live
on the Sundance cable channel, will also include John
Fogerty, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, Keb Mo', Kenneth
Edmonds and the hip-hop group Jurassic 5. 

The concerts are benefits for America Coming Together, a
voter-mobilization effort, and they are presented by the
liberal MoveOn political action committee. Some performers,
including Pearl Jam and Ms. Raitt, have done benefits for
political candidates through the years. But this tour is
the first time in his three-decade career that Mr.
Springsteen has made a partisan stand. 

"These are people who are the best experts at connecting
with the American public, people who have had an emotional
connection with millions of people for years,'' said Eli
Pariser, the executive director of MoveOn PAC. "Politics is
a part of that, and I think it just extends what they do,
their art.'' 

"It does take some courage in this climate to stand up and
do what they're doing,'' he continued. "A lot of them have
been galvanized by the kind of extremist repressive
response that they've seen. They're not going to be
silenced.'' 

The Dixie Chicks, who started their part of the tour in
Pittsburgh, faced radio-station boycotts and a talk-show
furor last year after their lead singer, Natalie Maines,
disparaged President Bush onstage. 

"We have nothing to lose at this point, so any sort of fear
or inhibition is out the window,'' Ms. Maines said by
telephone this week. "We definitely want a regime change,
and now that we're getting down to the wire I'm even less
afraid to speak out. I just think things are absolutely
life or death right now.'' 

"We sort of weeded out the people who apparently didn't
know who we were, though we never felt like we were trying
to hide what we thought,'' she added. "Free speech is not
free: we paid dearly. But we're more determined and
stronger now. And from this point on, what fans we have
will be our true fans.'' 

It is a complex enough undertaking to gather rock stars for
a one-day event like Live Aid or Mr. Mellencamp's annual
Farm Aid. Arranging six simultaneous weeklong benefit tours
by such popular musicians is probably unprecedented. There
is no comparable undertaking on the Republican side. The
musicians are not playing their standard sets; they are
including more political songs and collaborating with the
others on the bill. The Dixie Chicks sing backup for Mr.
Taylor; Ms. Raitt harmonizes with Mr. Browne. 

All shows on the tour go to Ohio on Saturday, Michigan on
Sunday and Florida on Friday; shows on Tuesday and
Wednesday are in Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Missouri.
The tour's first show, featuring Ms. Raitt and Mr. Browne,
took place on Monday night in Seattle. "It was a very
energized, responsive audience,'' Ms. Raitt said by
telephone after that concert. "When we sang Little Steven's
'I Am a Patriot' and the whole audience was standing up, it
just brought me to tears. It's more fun to do this than it
is to do my own shows. It's just so inspirational, and
there's so much at stake.'' 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/02/arts/music/02pare.html?ex=1097719515&ei=1&en=0e610f5457ec3bd2


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