On Thursday’s Radioshow: Environmental Encroachment the Magic Circus Band

Independent media comes in all forms, next to ‘zines, podcasts and blogs there are trombones, drums and batons. In parades, clubs and gatherings of all types across the US, and across the world a fresh wave of marching bands are bringing musical chaos to the streets.

Insurgent marching bands from around the globe are soon gathering in Boston for the Honk! Festival. One of those bands will be Chicago-based Environmental Encroachment. But before they head to Beantown EE is making a stop into the WNUR studios for an appearance on the mediageek radioshow.

As a Magic Circus Band, EE uses circus acrobatics, live music and costumes to create unique entertainment environments. At the same time they bring incredible marching band interpretations of classic and modern rock that you’ll never hear on a high school football field.

It’s going to be a fun and unique episode of the radioshow. You can hear it live this Thursday, Oct. 1 at 9 PM CT on WNUR 89.3 FM in Chicago and online at www.wnur.org. Afterward listen to the podcast at the mediageek radioshow website.

San Antonio’s Local 782 Organizes for Media Empowerment

Anne Elizabeth Moore reports on independent musicians and media makers organizing right in Clear Channel’s own backyard:

“People in San Antonio have been doing media justice organizing for over 30 years,” the outspoken Latina activist and director of the Texas Media Empowerment Project DeAnne Cuellar explains. It makes perfect sense. One of the most renowned radio conglomerates in the world is spitting distance from your doorstep, and “you are nowhere on the radio at all,” as Cuellar puts it. This, plus the hour’s drive away from Austin, the so-called live music capital of the world, fosters a keen awareness of what locally consumed media could look like. …

Local 782’s approach is upfront and very clear. The group aims to organize local musicians, improve working conditions and the local music economy with socio-economic strategies, archive the diversity and history of music in San Antonio, and strive for solidarity throughout the music industry—especially among the working class.

Local music is local culture, and serves as a glue that ties people and communities together. Seems to me that musicians and artists in a lot of towns and cities could take a page from Local 782′s playbook, joining with existing truly local media, or working to create new local media opportunities.