THE POP LIFE

Raging Against an Unusual Benefit Concert

By NEIL STRAUSS

LOS ANGELES -- When the rock group Rage Against the Machine heard that the final appeal of Mumia Abu-Jamal, a journalist who was sentenced to death in Pennsylvania for killing a police officer in 1981, had been rejected, the band decided to hold a benefit concert. After all, celebrities, governments and human rights organizations -- from Amnesty International to the European Parliament -- have been clamoring for a new trial for Abu-Jamal.

So Rage Against the Machine contacted friends in the Beastie Boys and Bad Religion and arranged a benefit scheduled for Thursday night at the Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford, N.J., which quickly sold out. But these bands did not anticipate the fury and outrage their concert would inspire, especially since the last time Abu-Jamal was scheduled to be executed, Rage Against the Machine held a similar benefit in Washington, to little rancor.

But this time, Gov. Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey called the event despicable and urged concertgoers not to go. A New York State Senator, Serphin Maltese, a Queens Republican, accused ticket buyers of being "pro-cop killer." The National Association of Police Organizations lambasted the concert's organizers for lionizing "a convicted cop killer." The commander of the New Jersey State Police, responsible for providing security for the show, declared his opposition. The general manager of the Manhattan radio station K-Rock (WXRK 92.3 FM) apologized on-air for promoting the concert, calling it a "big-time" mistake. And the arena offered refunds to ticket buyers unaware that their money would benefit Abu-Jamal. The concert is expected to bring in $375,000 in ticket sales.

Normally, when pop groups appear at benefits, they perform for popular causes: helping cancer research, AIDS awareness, homeless people. But this benefit is not so clear cut. Abu-Jamal was convicted of shooting a Philadelphia police officer, Daniel Faulkner, point-blank during an argument over a traffic violation, but Abu-Jamal's supporters say he was set up, citing witness tampering, suppression of evidence and a racially biased judge and jury.

Police and prosecutors have called the conviction fair, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled in October that there would not be a new trial.

Tom Morello, Rage's guitarist, said that no groups turned down the band's invitation to perform, and many others -- ranging from the folk duo the Indigo Girls to the heavy-metal heroes Black Sabbath to the Latin big band Ozomatli -- offered to play.

"It's not the first time that Rage Against the Machine has opened up a can of worms by standing up for what we believed in," Morello said from his Manhattan hotel yesterday. "We've had the Ku Klux Klan protest our shows, but I didn't expect this from the Governor of New Jersey's office."

The others performing in the concert were equally caught off guard. The Beastie Boys distanced themselves from the controversy by declining to talk about it, and Greg Graffin, the Bad Religion singer, said he felt like the victim of a smear campaign.

Graffin said his band had always promoted "skeptical inquiry," and that this had been absent from Abu-Jamal's case."But I want to emphatically state that this does not mean we support cop killers."

Graffin and Morello said they felt that the benefit, arranged to help win a new trial for Abu-Jamal, had been wrongly portrayed by its opponents as a village meeting of police haters.

Morello said he saw a model for the event in Bob Dylan's benefit concerts for Rubin (Hurricane) Carter in the mid-70's. At the time, Carter, a former middleweight boxer, was serving three life sentences for a triple murder, and Dylan helped begin the process that led to a 1985 judge's order to release Carter because the case had been tainted by corrupted evidence.

"This is not some far-flung left-field crazy case," Morello continued. "This is as mainstream as human rights cases get: you've got Amnesty International on board saying give him a new trial. But because the incident involved the killing of a policeman, all rationality goes out the window. I would think that any decent policeman would want this guy to have another trial. If they're so sure he's guilty, why not?"