Monday, March 31, 2008

'Wake Up' by Lo-Star - Benefit single for Burma Campaign released

12 Mar 2008
“WAKE UP TO BURMA” a new single in support of the Burma Campaign UK
Artist- Lo-Star // Single- Wake Up

Release Date- March 24th 2008
Launch Night: March 19th @ The Cobden Club – London.

The regime ruling Burma doesn’t want you to know what it’s doing to its people. Wake Up is a song penned by UK band Lo-Star to tell the world that it’s time to take action. Wake Up is available to download from March 17th and is available in the shops from March 24th, the profits of which will be donated to the Burma Campaign UK.

Hot, new band Lo-Star emerge with a song they were compelled to write after watching the appalling images on TV of the brutality and horrors in today’s Burma. Reading about the people of Burma and watching this modern day crisis as they sat in their free Western World led the London based 5 piece to unite their beliefs and write a song to tell the world to stop and take action.

Lead singer Adam Harris decided to take their campaign to the next level and once the track was recorded contacted the Burma Campaign to offer to help in some way. Consequently the single is now being released and the video was created to accompany the track.

Simply to sing a song about freedom and democracy in Burma is an arrestable offence, with a penalty of up to 20 years in jail. While the Burmese people are silenced, the rest of the world can speak out. The footage you are about to watch is harsh, horrific and Lo-Star challenge you not to be shaken and compelled by the reality of the current situation in Burma. It’s time to Wake Up.

Burma is ruled by one of the most brutal dictatorships in the world. It does not want the world to know about the atrocities it commits. All media is state controlled, access to phones, fax machines and internet is limited and closely monitored. You need government permission to own a mobile phone. In September 2007 monks led an uprising against the regime, and for a brief moment new media technologies enabled us to see what was going on in Rangoon. But within days they had cut off the flow of information, and the people of Burma were silenced again. The scenes from Rangoon of monks and other peaceful protesters being shot and beaten were shocking. What is happening out of sight in the jungles of Eastern Burma is even worse.

For 60 years people of the Karen ethnic group have been under attack by governments in Burma. The campaign of ethnic cleansing has driven millions of people from their homes. In the past twelve years more than 3,000 villages have been destroyed, equivalent to over four villages every week. Burmese army soldiers attack villages without warning. Women and children are raped, men tortured, mutilated or executed. Homes are burnt, and food destroyed. Those left alive flee towards neighbouring Thailand. Tens of thousands are packed into refugee camps. Many thousands more are refused entry into Thailand, and live precarious lives as internally displaced people (IDPs) in camps on the border, dependent on what little aid can reach them. A child dies of hunger or disease in Burma every 4 minutes.

‘The only real prison is fear, and the only real
freedom is freedom from fear…. Please use your liberty to promote ours’ Aung San Suu Kyi

For further details on Burma or this release please contact: Suki Dusanj on +44 (0)207 324 4716 suki.dusanj@burmacampaign.org.uk

For Regional Press requests please contact: Gordon@apb-pr.co.uk

For Radio and TV requests please contact: Dylan@angloplugging.co.uk

More information on the Burma Campaign UK – www.burmacampaign.org.uk

http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/pm/more.php?id=337_0_1_0

 
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