On March 3rd, Earth Amplified will be performing for a world renowned group of scientists, celebrities and leaders as part of Singularity University’s VIP SESSION: “EXPONENTIAL TECHNOLOGIES EXECUTIVE PROGRAM.” The event is hosted by Fox CEO, Jim Gianopulos, Actor and Producer Danny DeVito, PhilanthropistsLyn and Norman Lear; Managing Editor of The Washington Post Raju Narisetti; Actor, Writer and Producer Rob McElhenney; Founder of Lotus 1,2,3 Mitch Kapor; American rapper/musician (and technologist) Will.i.am.

Singularity Organization puts on programs to teach people about exponentially changing technologies and how to use those solving humanity’s grand challenges. They offer 10-week summer program, we have 80 ‘students’ (last summer from 35 different countries) live at our campus at NASA Ames Research Center in Mt View and the final 3 weeks they undertake team projects to come up with a business, product, or service to positively impact 1 billion people within 10 years! Some really cool stuff is coming out of it!

Some of the confirmed participants include Will.i.am., Ashton Kutcher, John Cusack, and Rob McElhenney, Aneesh Chopra, US CTO, Assistant to the President, Hon. John Hickenlooper, Governor, State of Colorado, Norman Lear, Activist & Philanthropist, to name a few.

The purpose of the event is to educate a select group of leaders on the exponentially growing technologies that are soon going to change our world. Advances in fields such as robotics, AI,computing, synthetic biology, 3D printing, medicine and nanomaterials are allowing small teams to do what was only once possible by governments and large corporations. These exponential technologies will allow us to address many of the grand challenges: Education, Water, Food, Shelter, Health and Security.

In addition to SU’s normal world-class faculty (See below), joining us at the event will be Dean Kamen, inventor of the wearable infusion pump, advanced prosthetic arm, water purification system, Segway, Dr. Sebastian Thrun, leading Stanford University’s AI program and development of Google’s autonomous car; Vint Cerf, widely known as one of the “Fathers of the Internet” as the co-designer of the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of the Internet; and Dr. Craig Venter, one of the greatest scientists in the 21st Century, who will speak about using synthetic life to create fuels, food and vaccines.

Exponentially growing technologies exert a tremendous influence in our world. The tools of creativity, innovation and disruptive change are in everybody’s hands. Conversations during this exclusive VIP Executive Program at Fox Studios will focus on how these powerful technologies can be used to solve Humanity’s Grand Challenges.

THIS EXECUTIVE PROGRAM WILL FOCUS ON THE FOLLOWING GRAND CHALLENGES:
— Abundant Clean Water
— Elimination of Poverty
— Global Health
— Education
— Safety and Security
— Clean Renewable Energy

Just days right after the Oakland PD made downtown Oakland look like a war zone, Michael Moore made a guest appearance. After listening to his inspiring talk, I joined a conversation with, Bay Area activist and emcee Sellassie (http://www.myspace.com/sellassie), J.R. from KPFA, Prison Radio, and the Block Report (http://www.blockreportradio.com/), and others about the current status of the Occupy Movement and if/how it could serve people of color. In the midst of all the discussion a few of us became more committed to create a plan to do more direct service for our community versus expecting the government to fulfill our needs.

We took inspiration from the Black Panther Party Free Breakfast Program (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Breakfast_for_Children). It was the perfect example of the community taking power into their own hands. It is clear why the Panthers and their community program were such a threat: nourish the people, grow the movement. The
S.O.S. Juice – W/ United Roots & Earth Amplified // Mending News

Panthers pointed out the failure of a society who could pay for bombs but not breakfast for children. A secondary threat was that such community programs that were proliferating across the country were nuturing the next generation of youth committed to self-determination. Futhermore, addicted and undernourished people are not in a strong position to lead a nation toward sustainability and justice. We have all heard the statistics regarding health in low income black and brown communities: obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. are all symptoms of poverty, lack of access to healthy food choices and nutritional education. We owe this awareness to a powerful and growing food justice movement. We occupy to decolonize. In order to effectively decolonize our minds we must detox or bodies and restore our souls. We must get the system out of our system.

Earth Amplified, as artivistas inspired by the Black Panthers, the principles of Landmark Education (http://www.landmarkeducation.com), indigenous wisdom and medicines, and documentaries such as Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead (http://www.fatsickandnearlydead.com/) and Simply Raw: Reversing Diabetes in 30 Days (http://www.rawfor30days.com/index5.html) is creating a live juice, nutritional education, and urban healing series to combat the illness in our communities.

S.O.S (System out of your System) Juice is happening every last Friday of the month. From 3-6pm Earth Amplified is offering FREE live juice and food, nutritional/health education, and music for the youth and staff @ United Roots: Oakland’s Green Youth Arts and Media Center. (www.unitedrootsoakland.org). This is a partnership between Food Not Bombs (http://www.foodnotbombs.net/), RBG Fit Club (http://www.rbgfitclub.com/), Green For All (www.greenforall.org), Phat Beets (http://www.phatbeetsproduce.org/), Planting Justice, People’s Grocery, the Regenerative Design Institute, Pursuit of a Green Planet, and countless other local farms, farmers, and community supporters.
Connect with us here or at our facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Earth-Amplified/116350365042817

Earth Amplified was humbled and honored to be invited to perform at the Liberation Day of the Land and help honor the warriors of Wounded Knee 1973 this past Monday Feb. 20th, 2012. There was great storytelling from Ms. Jessie Riddle, the spiritual advisor for Leonard Peltier. The event also featured movement updates from Tony Gonzales from American Indian Movement West, Corrina Gould and Wounded Knee DeOcampo from the Sogorea Te Warriors, Roots, Rap, Reggae artist Ras Ceylon, and poet Mariposa. The message was loud and clear: Native Americans have been at war with this government since 1492 and so has humanity been at war with the Earth since humanity has forgotten the wisdom of the ancient ways. Let all nations pray together for future generations. Without respect for Mother Earth 100% of us are destined to fail, not just the 99%. Instead of occupy, lets decolonize. The ancestors are calling and the children are watching. For more information on how to protect the indigenous people’s sacred sites worldwide go to http://protectsacredsites.org/

Create a platform for 10 amazing artists to get their music to the masses with a 20 date live tour called the Feel Good Festival includes yoga, fitness, and health food with a local non-profit beneficiary (Dates to be held between May and August 2012, Exact Times and Venues will be announced in February). To create a compilation CD of these same 10 artists that will be rewarded to you in exchange for donating to this campaign and donated to at risk youth programs like Boys and Girls Club of America and United Roots Oakland.
Last but not least, to empower millions of people through our CD and Festival with healthy lifestyle choices like yoga, fitness, and healthy food. Support now!: http://www.indiegogo.com/FeelGoodMusic

Earth Amplified, the new full-length release from Seasunz + J.Bless, is set for release on June 21, 2010. This seminal Green Hip Hop album features lyrics that touch on many of the environmental and socio-political issues of the day, highlighted by Oakland-based frontman Seasunz, who uses his virtuoso vocals to move effortlessly between melodic narratives, hardcore rap, double-time flow, reggae, and blues styles. Produced by Brooklyn-based J.Bless and multi-instrumentalist Golden Horns, the organic sound of Earth Amplified’s heavy, layered beats blend influences ranging from afrobeat, dancehall, funk and old school soul with the jazz vibes of Golden Era Hip Hop.

Download the new album now:



seasunz-and-jbless.bandcamp.com

The album features guest appearances from stic.man (dead prez), Killah Priest (Wu-Tang), Zumbi (Zion I), Wes Restless (The Gents, Dynamic Vibrations), Rocker T (Jah-Warrior Shelter) and Jahiti (Brownfish).

Every movement needs a soundtrack and Earth Amplified is a Hip Hop anthem for our times. It bumps – and packs a potent message. The new album captures today’s sense of urgency as it illustrates the plight of the planet. Covering topics from food and water security, climate change, poverty and prisons, to the potential for social transformation, it is rooted in a fierce passion for justice. But this is no idealistic, hippy album. This is the conscious rap of 2010 – edgy, unrelenting, textured and melodically complex, unwilling to shy away from a real look at the world we’re living in.

The bi-coastal duo put out underground gem Solar Stereo in 2007 and they are excited about the direction of the new album. “I envisioned an album that gives a Hip Hop voice to the green movement that was soulful and authentic, and that could build upon the motto ‘act globally, think universally.’ With Earth Amplified we attempt to fill a void with one of the most powerful cultures on the planet: Hip Hop,” says the Chicago-born and current California resident Seasunz. On this album, producer and emcee J.Bless joined forces with longtime collaborator Golden Horns, to craft the organic, live sound of the album, which features Golden Horns on saxophones, flute and bass.

The album kicks off with the first single, the danceable, Fela-inspired “Lady Justice,” which is driven by an infectious bass and horn line and four-to-the-floor kicks. This ode to powerful women and the Mother Earth they inhabit shows off Seasunz’s versatility, with upbeat raps, falsetto vocals and the spirited blues refrain: “I know it gets tough in the grind sometimes, bills high, ain’t got no time, gotta keep on rollin’, gotta keep on rollin’.” In the second verse, Seasunz shouts out Angela Davis, Wangari Maathai, Assata Shakur, and Vandana Shiva for being fearless female revolutionaries.

“Global Warning,” featuring a fierce verse from stic.man of dead prez, describes a post-meltdown world, where citizens swim among skyscrapers and toxic waste spreads disease while executives and politicians pad their bank accounts. Utilizing a wailing high-pitched arpeggio and dancehall-tinged bassline, the song is an impassioned chant for climate and environmental justice. With a chorus that urges the listener to “take a look at the world around,” Seasunz warns that without action there will be “another 600 acres gone in the Congo and Amazon, by the end of the song,” while stic.man prods us to “go green, go solar, go agriculture.”

In “Food Fight,” Seasunz takes on a dark back-alley persona in equating the food industry’s tactics with the violent acts of gangsters and genocidal governments. Over a sinister jazz/rap fusion beat, he paraphrases classic rap lines while calling out genetically modified foods and high-fructose corn syrup in warning that “there’s a war going on inside no man is safe from.” In another guest spot, stic.man takes cues from KRS-One as he spits: “Suicide, it’s a suicide, don’t want no microwaves, no pesticides, fast food slow death in disguise, its the wild wild westernized world of deception and lies, what’s beef?”

“Water World” blends 808s and vocal samples of Seasunz with a meditative bass and world instruments, including Youssoupha Sidibe on the West African stringed instrument Kora and master Tabla player Robin Sukhadia. In his verse, J.Bless takes aim at the “fiscal interests in your liquids” as he rhymes about the “stocks and bonds in your ponds and your reservoirs,” while Seasunz poetically drops science about the shortage of drinking water and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Both lamenting the state of water resources and professing love for its life-giving force, the song is a melodic journey in both content and musical arrangement.

Other notable moments include “Nitewriters,” featuring a classic cosmic verse from Killah Priest, “Hungry Money,” a look at the funny business of the financial bust with Zumbi from Bay Area group Zion I, the Tribe-inspired “Sunnyside” featuring a verse and chorus from Chicago-based Wes Restless, the fast tempo soul feel of “Not The Same Thing,” and “Any Day Now,” a revealing look at the real-world impact of the prison-industrial complex.

As the second full-length offering from Seasunz + J.Bless, Earth Amplified redefines the “green movement” and further expands the Hip Hop voice into new territory.

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