STEP LIGHTLY

Some people think much rock music sounds like land mines exploding. Bruce Cockburn may be the first rocker to do something to stop land mines from exploding. The Canadian musician has often visited and written about war zones, from Central America to Eastern Europe, and in his new song, “The Mines of Mozambique,” drawn from visits to the strife-torn African country in 1988 and 1995, he condemns a global problem of innocent victims of hidden explosive devices left by warring forces.

It’s a situation that, according to figures gathered by the U.S. Campaign Against Land Mines, causes a death or serious injury somewhere around the world every 20 minutes. To support this effort, Rykodisc, the label that is releasing Cockburn’s album “The Charity of Night,” will donate $5 to the campaign for each time the song is played on U.S. radio stations between Monday and Feb. 3. More information about the effort can be found at the campaign’s web site, www.vvaf.org.