Join the Warchild Army

U.K. based charity Warchild is building an army of people like you and me; people who want to lead the fight on the ground for the millions of children whose lives are ravaged by war and who are powerless to stop it.

As a complement to Sophia's magnificent review of Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, a former child soldier, here's the call out:

War destroys children's lives. They lose friends, family, homes and education. Many end up living on the streets, turning to crime or getting involved in fighting itself. War Child is building an army to fight against these injustices.

Join Akala, Corinne Bailey Rae, Lostprophets and Feeder. Become our latest recruit.

Now you know the cause. How about the mission:

Your Orders:

1) Identify yourself as a member of our army. Get your dog tags for only £2 at HMV stores across the UK and wear them with pride.

2) Find out more. Visit warchild.org.uk to check out our projects or befriend us on MySpace.

3) Make a donation. Text 'warchild' to 84424 to donate £1.50 or visit our website to become a regular donor.

Oh you don't know about Warchild? Because you see, these folks have been putting your favorite tunes right at your fingertips (and eardrums) while helping countless victims of armed conflicts at the same time. War Child Music should be a regular stop on your daily Internet commute if it's not already. Imagine tracks by bands like Feeder, Radiohead, Coldplay, Gorillaz, Arctic Monkeys, etc, etc, etc. One part ass-kickin rock n' roll, one part hope and healing for children, equals rocking it for a better world. And really, what can be better than that?

Read Ishmael Beah, have your heart ripped from your chest, support Warchild, listen to some sweet beats, have your heart put back together again.

And now a special comment on LoveGod'sWay

Following up on Doughnutman's excellent post about music that will turn you gay and why God hates that, I couldn't help but add my own $.02 to the pot. Are you fucking kidding me? Why do people like this still exist? A quick examination of the web site is like an exposé of the guide to Christian anti-homosexual protocol. First we have the abuse of an Oscar Wilde quote (which, much to the contrary of the author's opinion, was not about repudiating the gay lifestyle). But this is just the beginning, my friends, of a long, protracted declaration of bigotry, prejudice, and ignorance spewing from this unfortunate soul.

We also have the C.H.O.P.S. program, or Changing Homosexuals into Ordinary People. Well now, the only reason the LGBT community is contextually segregated from other demographics is no different than the reason Blacks, Women, Jews, or any other repressed and persecuted minority has been. That reason, simply put, is because of the unjustifiable, unfounded, baseless, and immoral labeling and singling out of a group of people due to a single defining characteristic of that group. Now, before I go any further, it's vital that an important distinction be made. Certainly a group like Al Qaeda is singled out based on the criterion that they perform acts of terrorism. In the same way, pedophiles and rapists can be singled out based on a lone trait. It is therefore imperative that the key difference is that being Jewish or Black or Gay has no inherent effect on any other person. Your identity cannot, by definition and cause, hurt, imperil, or pain anyone else; it can, however, be used AGAINST (i.e. to discriminate) the person who bears it. This is why these inalienable human rights are legally protected in the United States. To in any way encourage that one's identity be used in an inflammatory or degrading way, as the site clearly does, is unequivocally abhorrent.

But it gets even worse. Mr. Davies (who runs the website) has some multimedia to share with all of us curious would-be haters out there. Despite numerous attempts to stop this man's evil tirade of malice, he soldiers on undisturbed, singing of how much "God Hates Fags." Now, this is especially ironic since in a separate video message to his faithful he calls for tolerance and acceptance for all those who would malign his weight problem. So let me get this straight...he's attacking those whose lifestyle he disagrees with (in God's name, which of course for people like this is merely a manipulative tool for a self-righteous agenda), yet he condemns those who attack his lifestyle. This is not to say that it's alright in any way, shape, or form to degrade a person based on their weight or any attribute of their physical appearance. It IS to say, though, that the failure of this man to realize and acknowledge his own hypocrisy is absurd.

Then, of course, we finally get to what Doughnutman was talking about, the difference between Gay Bands and Safe Bands. What, pray tell, is a Gay Band? Well, why not let Mr. Davies himself explain:

One of the most dangerous ways homosexuality invades family life is through popular music. Parents should keep careful watch over their children's listening habits, especially in this Internet Age of MP3 piracy.

It's truly insulting to see Evanescence make the safe list, since they certainly do not endorse his platform. Music can do a lot of things. It can inspire us to unseen levels of creativity, hope and peace, it can brighten a dreary day, or bring us together through strife and conflict. But there are certain things music can not (or rather does not) do and that is turn us gay. It's interesting to see how Mr. Davies called for ultimate free speech when it comes to his anti-gay messages, yet he adamantly opposes people listening to what he considers to be inappropriate music. Music is fundamentally a series of wave patterns and thus cannot be appropriate or inappropriate. Lyrics perhaps can be, but they must first be put into the context of the song in which they reside. None of these bands evangelize the glory of a homosexual lifestyle, but even if they did, that's their artistic freedom to exercise or not exercise. The same freedom you, Mr. Davies, clamor for in order to preach your warlike proclamations.

While it may boil down to the fact that Mr. Davies has both the freedom and the right to express his misguided views, so too do we have that power. That's why I call on you, my fellow human beings of reason, of morality, of ethics and dignity and integrity, to exercise your First Amendment rights to let Mr. Davies know just how you feel. Let him regurgitate his doctrine of division and inequality, while at once proclaiming his 'Christian' homo-erotic love for Jesus Christ. After all, why should the hypocrisy stop at anywhere for him? By the way, doesn't the Bible also say "Judge Not, Lest Ye Be Judged?" (Thanks Harriet Hayes a.k.a. Sarah Paulson from "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip"). Well, here's my judgment on Mr. Davies. You are an unloving, hypocritical, prejudicial, bigoted, intolerant asshole, and you cannot possibly speak for God (nor can any of your brethren). There is no such thing as ministering love through hate or vice-versa. God is God, just as Love is Love, and Hate is Hate. And you are you, irrelevant and self-important, and I cannot wait for the time when you and your kind fall miserably to the bottom class and ranks of civil society, where your hate, fear-mongering beliefs and politics belong. Do you feel as I do? Let Mr. Davies hear from you:

donniedavies@gmail.com

Again that's: donniedavies@gmail.com. Exercise your free speech! Let's give him a piece of our mind.

And finally to introduce another new AtD Feature: Put This to Music! This is where you have the opportunity to take something discussed on the site, and put it to music! Compose an entire song, compose a few lyrics, create a freestyle rap, you name it; it's all fair game here. Post your responses in the comments, or if you're feeling ambitious upload your song to MySpace or YouTube. Just let us know about it, so we can work together to empower ourselves through music.

Love God's Way, because your music will make you gay

According to Love God's Way:

One of the most dangerous ways homosexuality invades family life is through popular music. Parents should keep careful watch over their children's listening habits, especially in this Internet Age of MP3 piracy.

Bands to watch out for

* The Spores (endorse suicide)

* Scissor Sisters
* Rufus Wainwright
* Merzbau
* Ravi Shankar
* Wilco
* Bjork
* Tech N9ne
* Ghostface Killah

* Bobby Conn
* Morton Subotnik

* Cole Porter
* The String Cheese Incident
* Eagles of Death Metal

* Polyphonic Spree
* The Faint
* Interpol
* Tegan and Sara
* Erasure
* The Grateful Dead (AIDS)
* Le Tigre
* The Gossip
* The Magnetic Fields
* The Doors
* Phish
* Queen

* The Strokes
* Sufjan Stevens
* Morrissey(?questionable?)

* The Pet Shop Boys

* Metallica
* Judas Priest
* The Village People
* The Secret Handshake
* The Rolling Stones
* David Bowie
* Frankie Goes to Hollywood
* Man or Astroman
* Richard Cheese
* Jay-Z
* Depeche Mode
* Kansas
* Ani DiFranco
* Fischerspooner

* John Mayer
* George Michael (texan)
* Angel Eyes
* The Indigo Girls
* Velvet Underground

* Madonna
* Elton John
* Barry Manilow
* Indigo Girls
* Melissa Etheridge
* Eminmen
* Nirvana
* Boy George*
* The Killers
* Lou Reed
* Lil' Wayne
* Motorhead
* Jill Sobule
* Wilson Phillips
* DMX
* Lisa Loeb
* Ted Nugent (loincloth)
* Dogstar
* Thirty Seconds to Mars
* Lil' Kim
* kd lang

* Frank Sinatra
* Hinder
* Nickleback
* Justus Kohncke
* Bob Mould
* Clay Aiken
* Arcade Fire
* Bright Eyes
* Corinne Bailey Rae
* Audioslave
* Red Hot Chili Peppers
* Panic at the Disco
* Elton John(really gay)

They got pissed because their song "God Hates Fags" was taken off MySpace. Poor them. Enjoy the list - your music will make you gay!

The Power of Music I: Preserving Traditions

In what I expect to become a recurrent feature on the site, I proudly present the initial installment of "The Power of Music." Now with such a simple, generic, and cliched title, one might worry that the segment will suffer from prolonged and grandiose ruminations of musical glory. Instead, I wish to relate stories, anecdotes, and reflections that in essence sing truth to power. I aim to expound upon the many ways in which music affects the events both surrounding and penetrating our lives, like a deep breath of the freshest air which cools our skin and refreshes our lungs at the same time.

Tonight, we travel to Mali, where Toumani Diabate serenades us with the kora, a traditional stringed African instrument. In doing so, he is perpetuating a tradition more than 70 generations old. And as the AP discussed in an article today, he is deemed by many to be the finest at his craft in the world:

The music is East meets West, past meets present, a 21st century take on ancient Malian harmonies that smacks of flamenco, Far Eastern strings and the winding legato improvisations of freeform jazz.

For Diabate, the show is much more than just music: it's the preservation of culture and tradition, a way to keep alive the spirit of the defunct Mande empire that once stretched across a vast swathe of West Africa.

Long before the region's history was recorded in books, it was told through a caste of griots, musical storytellers. Seven centuries later, the songs are still sung over powerful rhythms and haunting pentatonic scales produced on traditional instruments like the banjo-esque ngoni, the wooden xylophone-like balafon, and kora players from Guinea to Niger.

"If West Africa was a living being, the griot would be the blood," Diabate says over lunch at his Bamako home, scooping couscous and fish from a silver tray on his Persian-carpeted floor. "As griots, we are the memory, we are the link between society and the past."

That this form of musical storytelling preceded (for all intents and purposes) recorded history is a startling fact. That the sonic reenactment and transmission of preserved and honored customs is somehow more ingrained and basic than even something like reading and writing speaks to a fundamental and inherent communicative force which surpasses rational understanding and transcends time. For Toumani, the only kora player to win a Grammy, this notion is precisely what enables him to express the heart of his culture:

...The same year he released "New Ancient Strings," an exquisite set of cascading acoustic kora duets performed with Ballake Sissoko. The work was an interpretation of "Ancient Strings," the seminal 1970s recording made by their fathers and credited with introducing kora music to the world.

Diabate says such instrumentals allow foreigners to understand Mande culture.

"Music has its own language," Diabate says. In the modern world, "you have lots of books about the histories. We have the Internet, we have mobile phones. ... Now what we are doing is bringing the Mande culture outside of this continent to meet different cultures. We're still griots, but we are griots in different way."

This last idea is critical to the need for music to promulgate the social fabric of different societies, particularly in a world where cultural isolation is no longer possible. Even though the medium changes, the notes and melodies fluttered or beamed through that medium stays the same, save for melding and conjoining with other local influences:

The music is East meets West, past meets present, a 21st century take on ancient Malian harmonies that smacks of flamenco, Far Eastern strings and the winding legato improvisations of freeform jazz.

In the end it all goes back to the kora. Whereas the music is the heart of the culture, the kora is the heart of the music:

In July, Diabate's 50-man Symmetric Orchestra released "Boulevard de l'Independance", named after the thoroughfare that bisects Bamako's dusty moped-packed streets. The sounds range from Cuban-Senegalese salsa to horn-driven funk, but the kora is always at the heart.

(all emphasis mine). And that really is the way it ought to be. The kora as played by Toumani goes beyond being his instrument and in fact becomes the instrument of the Mande, living on and growing in an increasingly shrinking and colliding world.