Artists Get Partisan At DNC

Tuesday was a big night for music events at the Democratic National Convention in Denver. The music industry wore its political affiliations on its sleeve at The Recording Academy and Grammy Foundation bash Rock the Conventions at a nightclub converted from an old church, featuring Daughtry, Everclear and The Flobots. The Denver-based Flobots stole the show with their politicall charged lyrics that met with enthusiastic approval by the crowd. Wearing an Obama T-Shirt and sporting a US flag badanna, frontman Jonny 5 pumped up the Democratic crowd with lyrics like "Saying the same thing over again/ tired of the same thing/we want change" and then set them over the top with their anthem "Rise."

Meanwhile hardcore democrat Art Alexakis of Everclear--he was an elected delegate in the 2004 campaign--took his own shots at the republicans during an otherwise uninspired set. Other event that night included local music show/producer Etown, which hosted James Taylor, David Crosby, Graham Nash and Irma Thomas, as well as a surprise appearance by Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello. Cyndi Lauper, Melissa Etheridge and Rufus Wainwirght played the "Rock to Win" benefit for the GLBT outfit Human Rights Campaign, where Lauper echoed Hillary Clinton's earlier speech and urged the audience "Don't vote insane."

A3's "Woke Up This Morning" Removed From Washington Democratic Party Ad

The State Democratic Party of Washington ran an advertisement featuring "Sopranos" theme song "Woke Up This Morning" by A3 without permission. The band released a statement saying it disapproved of using any of its music for political purposes, since A3's music is meant to be "pop music for intelligent people—not politicians." After Republican Party protests, the song has been removed from the Democratic Party's campaign ads.

Obama says to stay in school 'cause you're probably not the next Lil Wayne

Presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama name-dropped Lil Wayne in a Monday (July 8) speech to African American youth about high school dropout rates. Obama told the Powder Springs, Ga., crowd that rap stardom or an NBA career are not so likely: "You probably are not that good a rapper," he said. "Maybe you are the next Lil Wayne, but probably not, in which case you need to stay in school."

Stars root for Obama at BET Awards

Shouts of "Obama or die" and "Obama, y'all" were heard throughout last night's BET Awards as musicians and actors praised Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Among the supporters were Sean "Diddy" Combs, Alicia Keys,  rapper David Banner, actress/comedian Kym Whitley and John Legend.

As Keys took the stage to accept her award for Best Female R&B Artist, she said black people should take the word "can't" out of their vocabulary. Combs encouraged attendees to vote so the country can see its first black president.

MTV to air political ads

Since MTV's inception in 1981, the network has refused to air political ads—even though the channel has been home to several campaigns that have encouraged citizens to vote.

In part because of the importance of getting the younger generation to exercise their voting rights, the former policy is being reversed and the network will now allow limited political ads to air. Ads must be through political candidates and party political committees, but not from third parties.

Barack Gets "Shafted"

It's not nearly as long as the original version, but now there's an Obama-fied version of Isaac Hayes' Academy Award–winning "Shaft" theme.

Written by comedian Brett Eidman, "Barack Theme" uses the same hi-hat intro and '60s-esque female backup singers as the original, this time hailing Obama as the man to "change the economy for the working man."

"The best candidate gonna fix health care before it's too late," he says before the backup singers chime in with "Barack!"

Obama celebrates his "beautiful day" with U2

On Tuesday night, Sen. Barack Obama declared and celebrated his victory over Sen. Hillary Clinton with more than 15,000 supporters at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn., and another 15,000 watching from monitors outside the building. As he took the stage to speak to the crowd, U2's "Beautiful Day" blasted in the background, Yahoo! News reported.

But this isn't the first time Obama has used U2 to celebrate—after January's Iowa caucus victory, the Illinois senator marked his win with the Irish band's "City of Blinding Lights." What U2 track will it be if he wins the presidential election?

Latin Stars For Obama

Following the buzz created by the pro-Barack Obama "Yes We Can" viral video and song produced by the Black Eyed Peas' will.i.am, producer Andres Levin has made a similar video in Spanish on will.i.am's Dipdive site. READ MORE

Crickets

As the primary season comes to an end finally with Obama and Clinton still vying for the Democratic nomination, it has been remarkably quiet in the music world on the subject. There haven't been a raft of new candidate fundraiser concerts announced and there haven't been a ton of artists speaking up about which hopeful -- Republican, Democrat, or otherwise -- they're pulling for. It's been silent, the sound of crickets. It's almost like the entertainment world is kind of holding their activity until the next phase of this election year kicks into gear: when the conventions start announcing their programs and the race kicks into a party v. party contest in ernest. It will be interesting at that point to see which artist come out of the woodwork to announce their support. That's also when more campaign donations get involved. One wonders if there will be any big tours this year like the Vote For Change extravaganza Bruce Springsteen organized for Kerry in '04. It will all be interesting to see.

Tomas Young: Obama Vs. McCain & Bush

Tomas Young, the Iraq War vet who is the subject of the documentary "Body of War" and who curated the film's rich soundtrack, brings his unique experience and opinion to these pages as Audiocracy '08's special contributor.

George Bush and John McCain have made some very interesting comments this week. Now I'm not going to rehash those comments (that's what YouTube is for) but I find it quite humorous that the White House at first said that the comments were directed at Sen. Obama until people reacted poorly. Then it became about Jimmy Carter or Democrats in general for being soft on terror and willing to let the country be attacked again.