Throughout my rock fan life I have witnessed dozens of rock artists support social justice concerns.  What is most impressive to me is when musicians embrace an issue that could prove unpopular with their fans.  One striking example would be Springsteen’s song ”American Skin (41 Shots),” which was inspired by the death of Amadou Diallo, a young man who was shot by NYPD officers.  When Springsteen played the song at a concert in 2001 at Madison Square Garden the cops in the audience held up their badges and booed him.

I imagine that some of the rockers who get involved with social justice concerns do so because they feel very passionately about the issues.  Others may have ulterior motives: raising their media profile, increasing their popularity, etc.  Very rarely, however, do I see rock musicians critique the industry of which they are a part.  One example that comes to mind is Pearl Jam’s crusade against TicketMaster for their inflated concert ticket fees (“convenience charge?”–hey, don’t do me any favors, I’ll pick it up at Will Call–sorry, personal rant!).

While doing research for my book Rock-A My Soul I stumbled upon a great website for a non-profit called Axis of Justice created by Tom Morello (Rage Against the Machine, Audioslave) and Serj Tankian (System of a Down).  Here’s the mission statement from the website:

Axis of Justice is a non-profit organization formed by Tom Morello and Serj Tankian. Its purpose is to bring together musicians, fans of music, and grassroots political organizations to fight for social justice.

We aim to build a bridge between fans of music around the world and local political organizations to effectively organize around issues of peace, human rights, and economic justice.

These guys have tons of street cred with rockers, so it is possible that many of their fans take notice of their positions on a number of issues.

I was most impressed to see that Tom and Serj were highlighting an issue that fell way below the media radar.  Managers at Korean guitar factories that sell to companies such as Fender and Gibson were mistreating their employees.  Axis of Justice held a rally last year to call attention to this issue and to put pressure on U.S. guitar companies to demand that the Korean companies change their practices.  Additional info can be found here

Kudos to Morello and Tankian for informing their fans and others about this issue!  It is possible that both of these guys have endorsement deals with music companies that could be threatened by this action.  I know that Morello, for example, sometimes plays (played?) a Fender Telecaster.

Now perhaps they’ll turn their attention to those damn “convenience charges.”

Dave Nantais

Detroit, MI

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