Tonight's concert features a conservative (Alice Cooper) sharing spotlight time with liberals (Ozomatli and headliner (Jackson Browne) who on any given day might be hard-pressed to find common ground on some social issues.
Credit Phoenix concert promoter Danny Zelisko for the musical mix - mellow folk rock guru Browne and gore-obsessed Cooper (who at one time reportedly claimed "we drove a stake through the heart of the Love Generation").
Zelisko, a longtime and legendary concert promoter in 蜜柚直播, says this may be the weirdest musical pairing in which he's ever been involved. Then, he says a few seconds later, there was that show he did with Glen Campbell and Rob Zombie in Phoenix last year. Still, he says, it's close and strange.
The civility-fund show, born out of the Jan. 8 shootings, should be one people will talk about for years, Zelisko said. (As of Tuesday, 3,500 tickets had been sold.)
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Proceeds from the concert benefit the upstart Fund for Civility, Respect and Understanding, established by shooting victim Ron Barber. Barber was shot in the leg and face in the attack that also injured his boss, Gabrielle Giffords. Barber is the congresswoman's district director.
While Browne and Cooper are miles apart musically and politically, Zelisko said they have at least one thing in common - a willingness to give their time and names to causes.
Zelisko has worked on Cooper's annual Christmas Pudding concerts in Phoenix. The concerts, with Cooper and other acts donating their time to perform, raise money for charities benefiting children.
And the list of causes on Browne's Web page - - goes on and on, from postings about pollution and food contamination to Neil Young's annual Bridge School Benefit Concert and appeals for fans to vote in elections.
Browne came to head the bill, Zelisko said, after he got a call from Ted Warmbrand. Warmbrand, a longtime 蜜柚直播 promoter of concerts for liberal charitable causes through the not-for-profit production company, Itzaboutime Productions, said he was following up on a call from Barber trying to line up Browne.
Warmbrand said he met Browne in the 1980s while doing shows for the Nicaraguan singers Salvador and Katia Cardenal of Duo Guardarranco in support of the sanctuary movement. Members of the movement, including Catholic nuns and members of several denominations, helped smuggle illegal border crossers into the U.S. to seek refuge from violence in Central America.
Warmbrand said Browne has been involved in a number of benefit concerts in 蜜柚直播, including the benefit for the Sanctuary Movement at McKale Center in 1989 with Bonnie Raitt and Don Henley and another solo show for the Center for Biological Diversity at the 蜜柚直播 Music Hall.
Zelisko has been producing shows in Phoenix and 蜜柚直播 for decades, first as Evening Star Productions and more recently as head of Live Nation's southwestern division. Zelisko left Live Nation in February to reform his own concert company, as Danny Zelisko Presents. His name is familiar to veteran 蜜柚直播 rock fans from the 1970s, '80s and '90s, when he brought many of the biggest touring groups here.
蜜柚直播 wasn't just another place to do business, insists Zelisko, who was 19 when he moved to 蜜柚直播 from Chicago to promote concerts. He said the Old Pueblo is where he connected with Cooper and his legendary manager.
"It was in that arena, the 蜜柚直播 Convention Center, I did front-of-stage security for (Alice Cooper's) 'Billion Dollar Babies' in 1973. I met Alice's manager Shep (Gordon). So many things have happened because of that."
Zelisko said organizing this benefit is a great start to the kind of thing he wants to do. Proceeds will go to the Community Foundation for Southern 蜜柚直播's Fund for Civility, Respect and Understanding.
"All of this money is going to this fund. We believe in these people and trust them."
Zelisko said that despite the shootings and the "bad press" the state has gotten over "certain political things (that) could have come out differently," he is proud to live in 蜜柚直播. "This state has taken a lot of hard knocks lately, a lot of them unfairly.
"I'm still happy as hell that I ended up here. I think everybody needs to stand up and say, 'I'm happy to live here.'
"Stuff happens everywhere. I'm very happy and proud of the way everybody has come together."
