Joining the company of Jonatha Brooke, Beastie Boys, and non-vote-rocking Lenny Kravitz (did Rock the Vote not bother to check his history before declaring him a spokesperson?), several other notable artists have recently recorded songs expressing anti-war sentiments and made them available for free public download.

R.E.M. returns to the fold with "The Final Straw," a track that musically harks back to the band's '80s college-rock heyday. Michael Stipe's lyrics are his least mysterious to date: "Now I don't believe and I never did / That two wrongs make a right / If the world were filled with the likes of you / Then I'm putting up a fight." It's available in Windows Media Player or Quicktime streaming format at http://www.remhq.com/finalStraw/finalstraw.html .

Another popular artist who's lost his chart dominance in recent years, George Michael, has also added his voice to the fray. George has been a regular on British talk shows in recent weeks, offering passionate yet nuances criticisms of the war and of British PM Tony Blair. To make sure no one missed his point, he distilled it into song format recently with a cover of Don McLean's 1971 song "The Grave." The song is of course not specific to Iraq -- it's simply the mourning of a soldier's loss -- but it effectively denotes some of the realities of war. "The Grave" is offered at George's home site, http://www.georgemichael.com/ .

Finally, an artist who has been mostly out of the public eye since the late 1970s has returned with his first new "pop" material in decades. Cat Stevens, who renounced the pop life and took the name Yusuf Islam all those years ago, has made his statement by re-recording his classic song "Peace Train." The new version replaces the original's jubilance with faint desperation, as evidenced by the presence of a Zulu chorus singing "Ngise'Khaya" ("take me home") throughout. Stevens has plans for the release of another song, "Angel of War," online, but for now only the new "Peace Train" is present: it can be downloaded at http://www.yusufislam.org.uk/audio/peacetrain.shtml .

Thus far, no prominent artists have come forth with new pro-war songs as downloads or streams -- the exception being Darryl Worley's current massive country hit, "Have You Forgotten," which can be streamed at http://darrylworley.dreamworksnashville.com/ . Regardless of point of view, though, the aforementioned tracks provide further evidence that artists who are past their prime as sales go can still get their songs and their messages out to their fans quickly and freely.

the beastie boys have one also. check out their site

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You might also want to check out www.resistwar.com. It is host to a song of the same name. More than that it has links to many other anti-war songs. Thanks to this article it will have a couple more! We're looking for more songs to list - visit the site and use the feedback function to send us a message.

Resistwar.com is 'sponsored' by www.harrisradio.com - which plays indie music that would not normally be heard on the Clear Channel-oriented commercial airwaves. As such, it's playing quite a lot of anti-war music right now. The Internet for sure is the medium by which artists are getting their messages out - since commercial radio is boycotting it, as well as those artists that speak out.