Anti-Bush, pro-voting concerts rock the Valley
By DAN DELUCA
Philadelphia Inquirer

In the notes to his new album, ‘‘The Revolution Starts Now,’’ roots rocker Steve Earle writes that Nov. 2 is the date of ‘‘the most important election of our lifetime’’ and that he and his band ‘‘desperately wanted to weigh in, both as artists and as citizens of a democracy.’’

When it comes to using music to get a political message across, Earle’s words are an article of faith that could have been spoken by any number of artists, from Bruce Springsteen to Kenneth ‘‘Babyface’’ Edmonds, from Will.I.Am of Black Eyed Peas to Justin Sane of the punk-rock band Anti-Flag.

In this election, pop music and partisan politics are more intertwined than ever before.

Music has been instrumental in social protest going back at least as far as 1960s civil-rights marchers singing Pete Seeger’s ‘‘We Shall Overcome.’’ But with debate about President Bush and the war in Iraq the catalyst, it seems everyone with access to a guitar or a microphone is having a say-so.

John Kerry supporters dominate the discourse, but a handful of Bush backers are speaking out to boost voter turnout and influence the election.

When pop artists band together to take a stand, it has usually been a comfortable, nonpartisan one, such as opposition to African famine with Live Aid in 1985 or nuclear power with 1979’s No Nukes.

This violently contested election has changed all that.

The big kahuna is the Vote for Change tour, an ambitious undertaking that will send more than a dozen artists — including Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp and R.E.M. — to 28 cities in swing states crucial to the tight presidential race. One of the tour's legs — featuring Crosby, Stills & Nash, Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Keb Mo and Jack Johnson — comes to the Valley's Cricket Pavilion on Wednesday.

‘‘This doesn’t just cross the line into electoral politics,’’ says Springsteen biographer Dave Marsh, who edits the newsletter Rock and Rap Confidential. ‘‘This is not Rock the Vote. This is specifically: You should vote for this candidate. And the reason you should is the other guy is a very bad guy.’’

Organized by www.moveon.org’s political action committee, Vote for Change’s proceeds benefit America Coming Together (ACT), a voter mobilization effort with the stated goal of electing ‘‘progressive’’ candidates.

The tour is only one of many agitating initiatives.

There’s ‘‘Rock Against Bush, Vol. 1’’ and ‘‘Vol. 2,’’ compilations featuring rockers such as Green Day, No Doubt and Sum 41 put out by the Washington organization www.punkvoter.com. The CDs have spawned a multi- act tour of their own: Anti-Flag, Midtown and The Epoxies are among several bands who will perform Thursday at Tempe's Marquee Theatre.

There’s also the ‘‘Future Soundtrack for America,’’ whose 22 artists range from Tom Waits and David Byrne to indie pop Death Cab for Cutie.
And there’s ‘‘Wake Up, Everybody,’’ a re-recording of the Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes classic featuring Missy Elliott, Jadakiss and Eve. The song anchors an album of the same name with tracks by the Roots, Marvin Gaye and Yoko Ono. It was put together by Babyface and Russell Simmons, who have been registering young voters at his Hip-Hop Summit Action Network events around the country.

While none of these initiatives is directly affiliated with the Democratic Party, most of the artists are open about their goals.

‘‘Hey, it’s called Vote for Change — we’re trying to change the current administration. There’s no need to be coy about it,’’ Springsteen says.
Country and gospel acts such as Travis Tritt, Lee Ann Womack and the Blind Boys of Alabama performed at the Republican National Convention alongside celebrities Arnold Schwarzenegger and Dennis Miller.

But the impressive lineup — the Dixie Chicks, Pearl Jam, the Dave Matthews Band — for Vote for Change, which is expected to raise $10 million, has not been met by a corresponding pro-Bush tour.

Toby Keith, whose career took off with the post-Sept. 11 flag-waving anthem ‘‘Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American),’’ is a registered Democrat, according to his publicist. And while stars such as Brooks & Dunn and Tim McGraw have appealed to patriotic sentiments onstage, there hasn’t been a rush to support the president in public.
Ricky Skaggs, the country and bluegrass vet who has campaigned for Bush, is an exception.

‘This is a very important election,’’ says Skaggs, 50. ‘‘America is so divided. It’s like we’re at war. It really reminds me of the way the country was around the time of Vietnam. And I just don’t think that the thinking of the Democratic left-wing liberals is good for the country.

‘‘I don’t think abortion is good, and I don’t think marrying gays and giving them the same equal rights I have with my wife is good. And I think if we lose, we’re going to go down a slippery slope.’’

But Skaggs thinks his fellow Nashville artists are afraid of alienating fans, ironically, because of the criticism the Dixie Chicks faced after singer Natalie Maines’ anti-Bush comments last year.

‘‘A lot of people think that if they stand behind President Bush, they’re going to be counted as mean-spirited, right-wing Christians,’’ says Skaggs, who joined country acts Randy Travis and Blake Shelton for the get-out-the- vote initiative Your Country, Your Vote. ‘‘They’re afraid of losing fans.’’

Are the Vote for Change acts facing similar risks?

‘‘We do get a few people who send back all our records in the mail when we do something like this,’’ says R.E.M. manager Bertis Downs. ‘‘And I’m sure there are a heck of a lot of Republicans in Bruce’s audience.’’

The all-star initiatives are designed, at least in part, to motivate voters in the 18-to-35 age group, whose numbers have dwindled in every election since 1972, with the exception of the 1992 race.

And some — like the underground hip-hop Slam Bush tour — will naturally attract a young audience. That can’t be said, however, for the Vote for Change lineup, stocked with wrinkled rockers like Springsteen, Mellencamp and Raitt.

Even if these initiatives raise money and register voters, what’s the likelihood that they’ll affect the election?

‘‘With how close the election was last time?’’ asks Steve Earle. ‘‘What I’m doing, what Russell Simmons is doing, has a chance to reach people who haven’t been involved ... If you reach one person, that’s enough.’’

Diminishing youth turnout, however, is ‘‘a complex problem that’s not going to be turned around by a series of concerts,’’ says James Stroupe of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics. Voting is learned at home and at school, and celebrities urging people to vote ‘‘may create the sense that this is the chic thing to do this year, but it’s not likely to create sustained behavior.’’

And even this year, just ‘‘because large numbers of new voters are registered doesn’t guarantee they’ll make it to the polls,’’ Stroupe says. ‘‘If young people could go into a room and all vote at the same time, we might be successful in getting them to vote.’’

Jonathan Trichter of Pace University says that even if left-leaning voter- registration efforts are successful, they will likely be countered by less celebrity-studded efforts from the right. A 2004 Pace poll found that among voters who had registered since 2000, four in 10 were evangelical Christians.

‘‘The churches are doing a better job of preaching to the choirs than the rock stars,’’ Trichter says.

Rock Against Bush
Who: Anti Flag, Midtown, Strike Anywhere, Epoxies, Mike Park
When: 7 p.m. Thursday
Where: Marquee Theatre, 730 N. Mill Ave., Tempe.
How much: $15
Info:

Vote for Change
Who: Crosby, Stills & Nash, Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Keb Mo, Jack Johnson
When: 6:30 p.m. Wednesday
Where: Cricket Pavilion, 2121 N. 83rd Ave., Phoenix
How much: $19-$59
Info: