Plea for Peace calls for music activism
By Vasiliki Marras
May 19, 2004 9:00 p.m.
With this year’s Plea for Peace tour ““ founded by
singer/songwriter Mike Park in 2000 ““ bands like Cursive,
Decahedron, Darkest Hour, Saul Williams, EE, Planes Mistaken for
Stars, as well as Park will be performing to bring people together
for a political cause.
The Plea for Peace tour is a politically charged event working
to increase political awareness, geared specifically toward
encouraging young people to vote. Headlined this year by Cursive,
the tour will be be stopping at the Troubadour from May 26 to
28.
The tour is sponsored by the Plea for Peace Foundation, a
nonprofit organization founded by Mike Park in 1999 aiming to
promote peace through music. The tour began traveling across the
entire United States in April and will continue through June.
“At the time, I felt like there was a lull in the music
industry in terms of politics and music,” said Park, the
vocalist/saxophonist for the 1990s ska-punk band Skankin’
Pickle.
“Growing up in the Bay Area and seeing the early
’80s punk music ““ the activism with the Rock Against
Racism shows, and Jello (Biafra of Dead Kennedys) running for mayor
of San Francisco, and it seems that those original ideas of punk as
a philosophy have become drowned out by capitalism.”
Along with performances, there are stations where concertgoers
can register to vote. Music for America, a liberal grassroots
organization, has representatives at each show to help register
voters. The group also passes out literature with statistics about
political issues.
“It’s a good time. It’s a very positive
experience,” said Cursive’s bass player Matt Maginn.
“We get a pretty good amount of people registering every
night.”
While the Plea for Peace tour is politically oriented, Cursive
isn’t an overtly political band ““ but they do believe
in many of the foundation’s tenets.
“I would say we are mostly (liberal), everybody kind of
shifts a little bit on that line here and there, but we are
definitely more to the left,” said Maginn. “We’re
not a political band really. We are doing this because its
pro-voting, which I think everyone should be (doing) regardless of
political stance.”
For being a small event, the tour can bring a decently sized
audience, with anywhere from 400 to 1,200 people.
“It’s a pretty big draw,” said Maginn.
Historically, the 18- to 24-year-old demographic that this tour
targets has had low turnout at the polls ““ a situation Park
aims to remedy.
“The hope is that we can at least get them to think a
little bit about why we are doing it, if we are able to influence
anybody ““ even one person out of 1,000, then I feel like it
was worth it,” said Park.
Along with trying to raise political awareness and encourage
voting, Park is also promoting his solo album, “For the Love
of Music.”
“Its not overtly political, but there are a lot of
political overtones,” Park said. “It’s mostly
about coming of age in the United States, dealing with racism, and
many facets of everyday life.”
