British attorney Clive Stafford Smith's organization Reprieve recently worked with legendary musician and human rights activist Peter Gabriel and other musicians to prepare a letter to President Obama asking him to ban the use of music by U.S. military interrogators. The letter, dated July 16, 2009, is co-signed by the Musicians' Union and UK Music, and supported by several prominent musical artists.

On June 26, 2009, while under arrest for threatening Federal jurors and judges, right-wing talk-radio host Hal Turner made activist history when he transmitted his famous Letter From A Newark Jail. This filmic tribute is in honor of that historic call. Streaming out of YouTube, 04mins 53secs MPEG4 download, 16.7mb

Nationally renowned anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan spoke at the Regent Theater in Arlington, MA on June 29, 2009. Veterans for Peace musicians Pat Scanlon and friends opened the event, singing some spirited peace songs. WATCH THE VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9OJTHZahoE

The 21st Fremont Solstice Parade took place on June 20th. Thousands of people turned out to watch the parade. The collective work and creativity that goes into the floats is reason enough to attend the parade. However, the hundreds of naked bicyclists are also very popular with the crowd. Most of the bicyists have painted bodies with elaborate designs. They pass so quickly that it's hard to appreciate the quality of work that the body artists have created.

Indymedia presents the June 2009 Indymedia NewsReal. The NewsReal is a joint effort of Indymedia and Free Speech TV. The idea is that independent videographers send in their short news videos, which are edited into a monthly show. We carry the resulting show on Indymedia Presents each month.

Michael Steinberg writes: , "On Saturday the third annual Bicycle Music Festival in San Francisco was kicked out of two sites in Golden Gate Park, and then threatened with expulsion in Dolores Park, before finally partying on pedal power late into the night on the SF waterfront."

A band of eco-rebels is crossing the US Empire to renew a fighting movement that can stop this industrial nightmare from choking the life out of the earth: the Earth First Roadshow!

The need for resistance in solidarity with the wild has never been louder or clearer than it is today; the roadshow is a tool for growing that resistance. There are countless examples to draw from in the story of radical movements before us: militant labor organizing tours, anti-fascist resistance recruitment and international speaking tours to build cross-border solidarity. The origin of Earth First! itself is credited to a few roadshows that kicked it all off in the early 1980s. We are building on this tradition; akin to a fellowship crossing Middle Earth to amass insurgents to face Mordor head-on.

* Thursday, June 25th, 3p
Laurelhurst Park (west side of Park)
FREE
Learn all you want to know about Direct Action: Media, Lockdowns, Tri-pods & a DA role-play
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* Saturday, June 27th, 7p
Red & Black Cafe (12th & Oak)
$ 3-5

- Music:
The Rising Phoenix Society (Old Timey Party Down Crunk)
Slow Teeth (Harmonic Folk Punk)
Here Comes Trouble (Ukelele Country Funk)

- Presentation:
Learn about Direct Action, the Greenscare, Earth Forst! History & more through a puppetshow, a slideshow and skits!
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* Saturday, June 28th
Let Live Animal Rights Conference
 http://www.letlivefoundation.org/conference

homepage:  http://www.earthfirstroadshow.wordpress.com

On Friday, June 19, Checkpoint 303 perfumed at the Pork Store at SF. Checkpoint 303 (Palestine/Tunisia/France) is a non-profit activist sound art project launched in 2004 by sound-catcher SC Yosh (Palestine) and sound-cutter SC MoCha (Tunisia). It creates experimental electronic music aimed at raising international awareness about the ongoing injustice and suffering of civilian populations throughout the Middle East. It combines field recordings performed in Palestine with electronic beats, FX and subtle oriental tunes. Checkpoint 303 next two performances will be held in SF on Tuesday June 23rd at the Balazo Gallery (2183 Mission Street), and on Wednesday 24th at Baobab Village (3372 19th Street).

Equality Rocks! All ages Concert and DJ Dance Party
to benefit the Queer Ally Coalition/Marriage Equality Contingent at Seattle Pride

Friday, June 19th
9pm | Doors open at 8:30
Hidmo, 2000 S. Jackson
Sliding Scale $5-$10

Worcester’s Albanian Festival came together this year over the weekend of June 5th – 7th at Saint Mary’s Assumption Albanian Orthodox Church. The festival celebrated the culture and tradition of Worcester’s large Albanian community.

This from Barbara O'Connor, UIPD police chief: The University of Illinois Police Department seeks the public's help in identifying the suspect responsible for the theft of two artworks that occurred on Saturday (June 13) between 2:13 a.m. and 2:28 a.m. at 1206 W. Nevada St., Urbana.

The artworks, which resemble metal signs, are 18 inches by 36 inches and are painted white with red block lettering. One says, INILLI GNITHGIF, TODAY YOUR HOST IS PEORIA; the other says, INILLI GNITHGIF, TODAY YOUR HOST IS HO-CHUNK. The Peoria sign was removed from its location directly south of the Native American Studies Building. The Ho-Chunk sign was removed near the west entrance of the building.

This morning around 9:30am I was traveling on the MAX reading a book and I saw bright red from the corner of my eye. I looked up to see bright red paint splattered across a building like blood. Then I noticed it was Nicholas Ungar Furs. So I got off the train to get some photos and info for this article. The entrance, the sidewalk, the windows, and the sign on the front of the building were significantly splattered. The Police arrived very shortly after I did leading me to believe that perhaps this just happened last night.

As of this posting I have not seen a communiqué from this anonymous guerrilla artist so I will attempt to piece together an understanding of why such an action has been taken.

From the newswire: "On Saturday, June 6th in Chicago, local artists partnered with the Tamms Year Ten coalition to protest state-sanctioned torture at the [Tamms] supermax prison in Southern Illinois. And they did it with mud.

"Artists from Chicago and Milwaukee engaged in a non-destructive type of public messaging called “mud-stenciling.” More than 30 volunteers stenciled their message “End Torture in Illinois” in the afternoon on walls and sidewalks around the city [while] offering fact-sheets about TAMMS supermax prison to curious pedestrians. The teams [placed mud stencils in] spots such as Navy Pier, The Chicago Art Institute, the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Jane Adams Hull House, Hyde Park Art Center, the Logan Square skate park, the Chicago Zoo, DePaul University, as well as sidewalks, underpass walls, and numerous other locations.

Read more | Coverage from Just Seeds

Activists from throughout Massachusetts gathered in front of the Wang Theater in Boston on Friday and Saturday May 29th and 30th to demand that Leonard Cohen uphold the cultural boycott of Israel. Demonstrating before Cohen’s concerts at the Boston theater, protesters demanded that Cohen cancel his September tour stop in Tel Aviv, holding signs that said “Leonard Cohen: Don’t Play Israel” and leafleting concertgoers about the call for cultural boycott of Israel.

I was so uplifted to hear one of the best concerts of my life in Corvallis Oregon last week. It was emma's revolution, who sang their hearts out for war resisters including Benji Lewis (whom Ashland WILPF just hosted last week) and Vets for Peace.

I first heard at the end of January 2009 that the Israeli dance group, Batsheva, was performing in Minnesota as part of a wider North American tour that would take it to Michigan, Chicago, California, New York and Vancouver. After Israel's brutal December 2008 attack on Gazan civilians and civilian infrastructure, it was definitely time to come out of hibernation, say the hard things, and organize some protest.

As a veteran of the student Anti-Apartheid Movement in London during the 1980s, the notion of cultural boycotts was not alien. After all, cultural boycotts were part of what brought the pressure that ended the Apartheid regime, along with divestment and product boycott campaigns.

New York activists gathered in front of Radio City Music Hall Sunday night during a Leonard Cohen concert to call upon the singer/songwriter to cancel his scheduled September concert in Israel. The protesters sang songs, chanted, handed out leaflets to concert attendees and produced sidewalk art. The call comes in support of earlier calls by Jews, Palestinians, Israeli citizens and residents of the UK, and coincides with the publication of an open letter by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) calling for protests throughout the cities Cohen is touring. Read More | Past Coverage: New York & London protesters call for Valentine’s boycott of Leviev over Israeli

Thursday the jury came to a verdict of guilty for Brian P. White, in the June 2008 stabbing death of Useless Wooden Toys' singer, Christopher Johnson.

When Useless Wooden Toys, a skate thrash band from Minneapolis, played a show at a house in Bloomington, Indiana in late June 2008 they never imagined that this show might be their last or that they would lose one of their lead singers that night....

For the most part, his representationalist sculpture captures and sets forth a message with the force of a sudden wind storm. And in a city held together by threads of promise, the sculpture of the artist Richard Hunt breaks free from formality and brings one quickly into a realm of light, text, and shadow which only folded, hammered, heated and burnished bronzes and steels can do. His work directs, without speaking.

Lions and Tigers and Bears Oh MY paraded through the streets of Olympia on Saturday in celebration of earth day. Dressed in bright costumes or carrying batik windsocks, roller skating or dancing to the samba beat, they delighted all who lined the streets along the parade route.

The Procession of the Species is an annual event in Olympia. Volunteers assemble in March to begin working on the event. A studio is available for people to make costumes and create floats. Others plan their dance routines and practice every week for 2 months. It is a joyous celebration of creativity.