May 12, 2001
@ The Palace in Hollywood
(North of Hollywood on Vine) 6:00 p.m.

featuring Ozomatli, Blackalicious, The Coup, Saul Williams, Dilated Peoples, Pan Afrikan People's Arkestra and the Great Voice of UGMAA, Mystic, Jerry Quickley, Wanda Coleman and East LA Sabor Factory with special appearances by Ras Michael, Leon Mobley, Hassan Hakmoun, and Money Mark.

Video projections from Sarah Jones, Reg E. Gaines, Suheir Hammad, Robbie Conal and Mariana Botey. Visual arts include "From Goya to Golub" curated by Nina Felshin, I.C.U. Arts, Ami Motevalli, Lida Abdullah, Dread Scott, Mear One, Nancy Buchanan, Sheila Pinkel, Kim Abeles, Erica Cho, Tony Do, Sandra Loh, Kat Skraba and many others...

THE FIRST ANTI-WAR CONCERT
Each year the artists who work with the network pick a theme. It is always one of great importance to the people and concentrates in many ways their gravest concerns as well as their most courageous resistance. This year, we have chosen to make our music, poetry and art against the war now being waged in our name around the world and at home. ArtSpeaks 2002 is the first major concert against the war. ArtSpeaks 2002 is our fifth concert and may be our most important yet.

We are told that this is a war with no end and no boundaries. We are expected to support the rounding up of thousands because of their nationality or religious beliefs. We are expected to go along with the silencing of those who dissent. And in every corner of society, blind patriotism justifies the rapid growth of the politics of intolerance, cruelty and punishment. They are stealing the very air that we breathe. ArtSpeaks is about changing the atmosphere.

Our artistic collaboration creates a whole different vision. As the late great jazz pianist Horace Tapscott put it, in times of great social upheaval and change art is "ammunition for the head" - it tears down boundaries of what is thinkable, it clears new pathways, poses profound questions, and carves out critical space in a society in desperate need of change.

Tickets are $22.50 and are available at through Ticketmaster Outlets Ticketmaster.com/213 480-3232/714 740-2000 Tower Records, Ritmo Latino, Robinson-May, The Wherehouse, Tu Musica Concert

Infoline: 323 860-9992

Proceeds to benefit the Artists Network of Refuse & Resist!

Ozomatli playing at the Artspeaks concert © 2002 Zee
(for more concert photos

The artists appearing this year have all made important contributions to the Culture of Resistance and have been out front in their opposition to the war:

Blackalicious. The band's new CD, Blazing Arrow, is due to be released on April 30th. DJ Excel explained - "Nia(their last release) was really about purpose and finding the path - Blazing Arrow is about faith, having the strength to endure that path." These remarkable musicians have created a powerful new work - featuring collaborations with Saul Williams, ?westlove, Zach De la Rocha, Gil Scott Heron, Tracy Moore, Rakaa Iriscience, Chali 2Na, Cut Chemist and Ben Harper. We look forward to their third performance at ArtSpeaks!

Ozomatli has been a part of ArtSpeaks from its inception. Since their Grammy Award winning CD - Embrace the Chaos - was released on September 11th, they have been touring non-stop, speaking out against the war from stages and in interviews. Ozomatli's music concentrate the heart of Los Angeles - the wild mix of people and cultures that make this city unique and links it to the people of the world.

The Coup joins us for the first time at ArtSpeaks. As a powerful voice of resistance, their CD, Party Music broke through barriers of controversy this year - named as one of the best in the year 2001 by Spin Magazine, Rolling Stone, Robert Hilburn of the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times and the Village Voice. Boots Riley's truth and humor filled lyrics are backed up with the outrageous turntable magic of Pam the Funkstress, and the full force of their funk driven band. Boots has such a clear connection to the people in his community and every song brings their lives into ours.

Pan Afrikan People's Arkestra and the Great Voice of UGMAA. This band carries with it the music and rebellious spirit of one of ArtSpeak's founders, Horace Tapscott. The 30 piece jazz orchestra will perform with vocalist Dwight Trible and the Great Voice of UGMAA. We are extremely honored to have some of the greatest jazz musicians of Los Angeles on the stage with us.

Saul Williams is a master of spoken word. He was the co-author and lead actor in the 1998 film Slam (winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize and the Cannes Camera d'Or) - Saul Williams brought a powerful new art form to a world audience. From the Nuyorican Poet's CafŽ, to museum spaces like the Whitney and now on concert stages, his art has consistently pushed the envelope - both in content and form. This will be a solo performance.

Mystic performed at Artspeaks last year - prior to the release of her Grammy nominated CD, Cuts for Luck and Scars for Freedom. Her lyrics are filled with her love for the oppressed in our communities - their trials and their dreams.

Rakaa Iriscience (Dilated Peoples) has brought an important message to thousands of hip hop fans throughout the country with his version of War, What Is It Good For“featured on their current CD Expansion Team. Dilated Peoples have been extolled as one of the most important groups representing a new consciousness in hip hop.

Jerry Quickley has been part of the curating artists committee for ArtSpeaks since the first show. His performance last year was duly noted in the LA Times review as full of "the energy and flair of freestyle Beat poetry." Much of Jerry's work is rooted in the lives, desperation, hopes and dreams of oppressed people. He has read on stages throughout the United Stages and Europe. He was the regular host for Words and the weekly Spoken Word event 33 1/3.

East LA Sabor Factory is a band formed by a group of friends who played together in a high school marching band. They bring the youth of LA into the house. Their music is drawn from their experiences growing up in the projects and streets of East LA and is filled with all the joy, energy, anger and resistance they found there.

Big screen art projections around the theme of the event will be featured throughout the night.

Artists from other parts of the country will participate through video performances created especially for ArtSpeaks.

Artspeaks!
Concert for
2002:

Not In
Our Name
Artspeaks Against
the War
concert photos

press release

artists info

press coverage

Sunday, May 12, 2002

Palace Theatre, Hollywood

More info on past Artspeaks!

Some of the press coverage on ArtSpeaks:
(there was also a piece on the concert which ran nationally the week before on MTV2 News featuring Wil-Dog from Ozomatli.and describing ArtSpeaks as the first national anti-war since 9/11)

PBS: the concert was featured in PBS piece about Ozomatli in connection with the show "American Family". They described the ArtSpeaks concert and reported on the "Cultural Resistor" award which the Artists Network gave Ozomatli that night. -

Revolutionary Worker. Go to: http://rwor.org/A/V24/1151-1160/1152/artspeaks.htm

LA WEEKLY, May 10-16, 2002 ArtSpeaks Against War with Dilated Peoples, Ozomatli, Blackalicious and many others at the Palace.

Hey, we unanimously support a war without end, a war against everybody, with intolerance and suspension of civil liberties for all, right? Growing numbers of citizens are starting to think it's not unpatriotic to say HELL FUCKING NO, and ArtSpeaks has raised its own army to voice opposition.

In addition to the above hip-hoppers and world-embracers, some other musical presentations will include humanist rap from The Coup, North African pluck from Hassan Hakmoun and glorious polyphony from the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra. There'll be poetry from Saul Williams, "Mad Dog" Wanda Coleman and others. Video? Observe the work of Sarah Jones and Suheir Hammad. And Ras Michael, Leon Mobley and Money Mark will be making those ever-popular "special appearances." This is ArtSpeaksā fifth concert, each having a theme; this year's could hardly be more obvious or more appropriate.
From 6 p.m. -- Greg Burk

LA Times
Tuesday, May 14, 2002
POP MUSIC REVIEW
Concert Against War Relies on Familiar Rituals
By STEVE HOCHMAN, Special to The Times

In a long Sunday night of music, poetry and art at the Palace in protest of post-Sept. 11 U.S. military actions, the truest words spoken from the stage may have been about the event itself.

"Performance isn't strictly performance. It's ritual. We are here tonight for ritual," said poet-rapper Saul Williams midway through thenearly eight-hour "ArtSpeaks! A Concert Against the War," put on by the Artists Network of Refuse & Resist.

Indeed, rituals from past protest and pop culture movements shaped the event. L.A. ensemble Ozomatli, honored with the organization's Cultural Resistor award for its stance after the attacks, screened Vietnam-era film clips in its set. Bay Area rap acts the Coup (given the same award) and Blackalicious slotted their criticisms alongside throw-your-hands-in-the-air hip-hop rituals.

The event's titular slogan, "Not in Our Name," lacks the rhetorical wallop of "Hell, no, we won't go" or "No justice, no peace," and the emotions of the situations in the spotlight can be contradictory. While art projected throughout the evening and chants and commentary from various speakers and emcees were pointed, there was little outright topical music.

That's not actually bad, given the pedantic nature of most protest music. As always, Ozomatli led by example, letting its culturally blended lineup and music be the message. The Coup and Blackalicious offered sharp observations, but little specifically about the topics at hand.

In an event that also featured hip-hop artists Mystic and Dilated Peoples, Moroccan rock from Hassan Hakmoun and progressive jazz from the Pan Afrikan People's Arkestra, the most pointed call for peace came in brief remarks by Ji Sung Kim, who had family members on the second plane that crashed into the World Trade Center. And the most effective representation of the issues and emotions came in a video of Brooklyn-based Palestinian American poet Suheir Hammad performing the first piece she wrote after Sept. 11.

Laying out a personal perspective with passion and grace, the piece concludes with a statement worth ritualizing: "You are either with life or against it. Affirm life."

Copyright 2002
Los Angeles Times

concert photos

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.