DENVER—A group organizing protests, marches and concerts during the Democratic National Convention said Monday that Public Enemy will play a free show in a downtown park during the second day of the convention.
The pioneering hip-hop group will perform at 2 p.m. on Aug. 26 in Civic Center Park across the street from the state Capitol, Glenn Spagnuolo of Recreate 68 said. He said the band was impressed with the speakers the group had attracted to Denver, including Black Panther Kathleen Cleaver and Pamela Africa of MOVE, the radical back-to-nature group that was bombed by police in Philadelphia in 1985.
Spagnuolo said the hip-hop group, known for songs like “Fight the Power” and “Bring the Noise”, fit with Recreate 68’s philosophy of opening up the political landscape to the oppressed.
“They sing about a different world. They sing about a government that’s taking things in a different moral direction,” he said as city workers worked to prepare the park’s amphitheater for the week’s events.
An agent for Public Enemy could not immediately confirm the group’s performance.
Recreate 68 also announced that anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan would speak at a rally planned for Sunday on the West Steps of the Capitol. Other speakers in the lineup include Cleaver, Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic—whose story inspired the movie “Born on the Fourth of July”—as well as former University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill, who wrote an essay comparing some Sept. 11 victims to Nazis, and Green Party presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney, a former Democratic congresswoman from Georgia.
A march to the Pepsi Center, the site of the first three days of the convention, will follow the rally.
Members of Recreate 68 also plan to try to levitate the Denver Mint and shake the money out to draw attention to the issue of poverty. The coin-making machines will be shut down for maintenance that week.
The group has permits to use eight city parks for events during the DNC and 23 bands have agreed to perform at its events throughout the week of the convention.
Last week, Rage Against the Machine announced it would play a concert at an anti-war music festival in Denver on Aug. 27 sponsored by another group, Tent State University.
