I'd Rather Go Naked

Today my boyfriend celebrated his 22nd birthday. Exactly a year ago, on his 21st birthday, he got to meet the man his mother named him after. Tommy Lee from Motley Crue walked into the club where my boyfriend, Tommy Lee Stevens, and his friend were celebrating the big night. Tommy Lee actually wound up taking my boyfriend’s seat in the V.I.P. section. After some trash talking from my Tommy toward Motley Crue’s Tommy Lee for taking his seat, Tommy Lee laughed and invited Tommy to sit with him and have some drinks. By the end of the night, Tommy Lee had given him two back stage passes to their concert the next night at the New Orleans Arena, where my boyfriend partied with Tommy Lee after the show. All-in-all, it made for a pretty awesome 21st birthday.

But, with it being February 28th again, I started thinking about the whole event and wondering what kinds of things Tommy Lee was up to when he wasn’t on stage. After a moment or two on Google, I came across this picture.



Tommy Lee, who learned about PETA through his ex-wife and longtime animal advocate Pamela Anderson, posed for PETA’s “I’d Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur” campaign. The advertisement was unveiled on August 15, 2005 at Home, a nightclub in New York that showed its support for PETA’s campaign by announcing a no fur door policy. Steve Lewis, the man who runs the nightclub, said that he would train his doormen to deny entrance to anyone wearing fur. “People come here to have fun,” says Lewis. “Fur is a buzz kill.”

Here is a video of Tommy Lee in an interview with PETA:



Other musical artists such as Mario, Danity Kane, Simple Plan, and Peaches have also posed to be in advertisements for this campaign. However, not all celebrities are against wearing fur. Celebrities who wear fur are often criticized and questioned by PETA.

---Dear J.Lo

---Dear Beyonce

---Kanye West was criticized by PETA for wearing fur at Men's Fashion Week in Paris. Vice President of PETA, Dan Matthews, said in a statement: “Kanye can't help making himself look like an idiot, whether at an awards show or a fashion show. He and his girlfriend look like pathetic creatures from a shabby roadside zoo." Kanye West responded by posting the following message in his blog: "When it's all said and done, remember the fearless, remember the dreamers, remember those who represent the ghetto ... The fairy tale of nothing to something," Kanye wrote. "I'm briefly saddened by negative comments, but I have to remember those people are scared, incapable or just plain idiots. We are the f***ing rock stars baby. No cocaine, just life my n****s!! No cocaine, just life! It's funny to me when fashion bloggers down our outfits and then super jock outlandish sh** on the runway, but they dress mad prude and don't live fashion."

---Lindsey Lohan was flour bombed by a member of PETA for wearing a fur coat in Paris. The member of PETA called Lohan a "Fur Hag" before running from security.


---The issue has even caused artists to lash out towards fellow artists for their clothing choices. For example, Pink bashes Beyonce for continuously wearing fur. Pink says, "Some of the practices are so cruel and as a celebrity you have a responsibility to think about the message you're sending out by wearing fur. People will think it's OK or cool, but it's not. I only hope she gets bit on the ass by whatever animal she wears."

Animal rights are an extremely controversial topic, and are even more so in the world of celebrities who are often "setting an example" for the men, women, teens, and children who adore them.

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Jon Bon Jovi Soul Foundation

During his tour this year, Jon Bon Jovi is doing more than just promoting his band’s new release, “The Circle.” In between sleep, practices, and shows, Bon Jovi is visiting as many homeless shelters as he can. These visits are to help the artist with the work he is doing in his Jon Bon Jovi Soul Foundation. The foundation is based in Philadelphia and is a charity built to fight against homelessness. Efforts by the foundation include building homeless shelters and community kitchens as well as cleaning up vacant lots in rundown neighborhoods. Bon Jovi’s foundation has been working for the past six years building affordable housing, and since 2006, has built more than 150 units of affordable housing in seven different cities. Bon Jovi says of his visits to various homeless shelters and programs, “I will go to shelters and try to learn more about the issue and how to combat it." Visiting existing programs throughout his tour, will give him new ideas and perspectives that should be beneficial when he is working with the foundation. “Various problems of homelessness require different solutions,” he says.

Before beginning the tour, Bon Jovi toured a very well known homeless program in Seattle. The building is run by Downtown Emergency Service Center and provides a place for homeless alcoholics to live, and even drink alcohol. The program has saved taxpayers millions of dollars in social service and jail costs. The program is also considered a place where residents are more likely to recover and get sober in a safe environment.

Sometime in the next few days Jon Bon Jovi is supposed to stop by Skid Row in Los Angeles with Steve Lopez. Lopez is the Los Angeles Times columnist who wrote the book “The Soloist,” about a schizophrenic homeless man, Nathaniel Ayers, who is also a talented cellist. Lopez, who has witnessed the homeless population during some of their hardest times, says, “Skid Row is an eye-opener. I don't know Jon Bon Jovi, but I suspect he may come out of this with a keener sense of how many people are suffering in this economy, and of how many people on Skid Row are dealing with a combination of financial, physical and mental health issues, many of them veterans."
Skid Row is estimated to have approximately 7,000 to 8,000 homeless people within its official boundaries. In 2006, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals determined that there were an inadequate number of beds for the homeless. This led the court to suspend the city's anti-camping ordinance within the official boundaries of Skid Row, between the hours of 9 p.m. and 6:30 a.m. This meant that during the day, the homeless people must be roaming the city until about nine o’clock at night. From 9 p.m. to 6:30 a.m., people were allowed to sleep on the streets.


“Working for the Working Man,” is one of the songs on Bon Jovi’s new album that relates to the issues the Jon Bon Jovi Soul Foundation faces.





Check out Jon Bon Jovi Soul Foundation for pictures, videos, and more information about the foundation!!!

Lenny Kravitz records song for peace with musicians from around the world

Musicians are always producing music that speaks out against war. As conflict escalated in Iraq a few years ago, a whole new line of anti-war songs started showing up from every kind of musician imaginable. Some bands took a very violent stand against the President while others were more interested in finding peace and wanted to inform people about what they can do to help.

Lenny Kravitz produced “We Want Peace” in 2003. Kravitz made his song stand out from everyone else’s in one very important way. Lenny Kravitz didn’t play all the vocals and instruments himself for this track like he usually does. Instead, he gave the song much more meaning and power by recording with Iraqi pop star Kadim Al Sahir, Palestinian strings musician Simon Shaheen, and Lebanese percussionist Jamey Hadded. Kravitz says, “This song for me is about more than Iraq. It is about our role as people in the world and that we all should cherish freedom and peace because of its strong stance with young people as defenders of free expression.” The first video at the bottom of this post is of Lenny Kravitz commenting about the song. In it he says that he is not trying to make an anti-war song but is instead just trying to promote peace and encourage people to work together. He expresses his feelings of disappointment that people are still not able to settle conflict without violence. According to Denisoff this would be a magnetic protest song because Lenny is trying to promote people to join the movement for peace. The song opens with the lines “Come on people, it’s time to get together, it’s time for a revolution,” and the last verse starts off with the line “The solution is simple and plain, there won't be peace if we don't try.” These lines clearly show that the song is magnetic. The latter even gives a “solution” which is necessary for a song to be magnetic.

The greatest thing about this song is definitely the fact that people from several different countries worked together to record and produce it. This song is a prime example of Lenny doing what he preaches. What better way is there to promote peace through music?


Video of Lenny Kravitz commenting on the song.



Here is the whole song!

The Rage Never Ends

Rage Against the Machine is a band that many would argue was one of the most popular political bands in contemporary music and they certainly impacted many people in some way or another. I know their songs and I know that they produce very political music; and, I found it very interesting to learn about all of the things they’ve done. Rage went beyond just putting words and music together on an album and actually stepped out into the world to publicly SHOW what they believed in.

Here are a couple of the things that stuck out most to me.

The band was scheduled to play on Saturday Night Live during April of 1996 on a night when Steve Forbes was to be hosting the show. The band hung two upside down flags over their amplifiers in preparation for their performance. Right before the band went on stagehands from SNL and NBC were sent to take the flags down and the band was asked to leave the building. The bands bassist reportedly stormed into Forbes dressing room and threw pieces of the torn down flag around the room. Tom Morrello said about the flags, “Our contention that American democracy is inverted when what passes for democracy is an electoral choice between two representatives of the privileged class. America's freedom of expression is inverted when you're free to say anything you want to say until it upsets a corporate sponsor. Finally, this was our way of expressing our opinion of the show's host, Steve Forbes.”

Rage Against the Machine joined a campaign to close down Guantanamo Prison. The band also fought to declassify records regarding the use of music in torture. There are reports saying that some of Rage Against the Machine’s music was used during torture at the prison.

During their 1993 performance at Lollapalooza the band members stood on stage naked with duck tape over their mouths and the letters PMRC painted on their chests for fifteen minutes. This was in protest to the censorship by Parents Resource Music Center.

In Rage Against the Machine’s song “Killing in the Name,” the band, with only eight lines of lyrics, talks about discrimination, bigotry, and control. The song stresses the idea that there are people in positions of leadership and power who are guilty of racial discrimination and that many of them act on it. The first lines say “Some of those that work forces are the same that burn crosses.” This is a direct reference to people such as policemen being in the anti-color radical group the Klu Klux Klan and the group’s ritual of burning crosses. The “chosen whites” likely refers to how most people who commit racist acts usually feel that they are superior to others around. The line “You justify those that died by wearing the badge, they're the chosen whites,” is saying that when police officers or military people commit acts of racism, they aren’t as likely to get in trouble because they were in uniform and have authority. What’s even worse is that because these people do have authority, someone fighting back against their acts of hatred would be the ones to get in trouble. Finally, the line “And now you do what they told ya, now you're under control” is directed to the people listening. The band is telling them to stop being lazy and do something about what’s happening. Just because officials are doing it does not mean that it’s right or that you have to sit back and watch. (The band Infectious Grooves actually produced a song titled “Do What I Tell Ya!” mocking this songs lyrics.)






Rage Against the Machine burning the American flag at the 1999 Woodstock Festival in New York during the song Killing in the Name.