POP MUSIC : Local Groups Set the Tune for Saving Mother Earth

April is Earth Month, and San Diego’s pop-music community is certainly getting in the spirit of things.

On Sunday, there will be a daylong San Diego Earthfair in Balboa Park. The musical entertainment will take place on two stages, the Main Stage at the Organ Pavilion and the “Everything Under the Sun Stage” at Presidents Way and Park Boulevard. Admission is free.

In honor of the day, San Diego rock band Crying Out Loud has released a single, “Goodbye Mother Earth,” that bemoans the destruction of the environment by depicting several scenes of environmental abuse.

“The objective was to just try to arouse the conscious awareness of our environmental problems among people,” said keyboardist Steven Diffendal, who produced and co-wrote the tune with his wife, pianist Jan Denny.

“We approached it not from a negative point of view, but from a real point of view, and we put a negative ending on it because what we’re trying to say is, ‘If we don’t turn around, this is what’s going to happen.’ It’s a warning.”

The single, on cassette only, will be on sale at Sunday’s fair.

Crying Out Loud is a studio-only band led by husband-and-wife team Diffendal and Denny. Other band members are singer Rob Boynton, who also sings lead for original-music nightclub band If Tomorrow, and guitarist Rob Thormure, who owns MACH-IN-A Sound recording studio in Kearny Mesa, where the single was recorded.

Others to appear on the Main Stage will be Greater Life Baptist Gospel Choir, 10:30 a.m.; folk singers Peggy Watson and Deborah Liv Johnson, 10:50; reggae rappers Meredythe Dee Winter and the Recycle Kids, 11:20; folk-rocker Jerry Giddens, 11:30; salsa group La Boom (with Brazilian dancers), 12:50 p.m.; West African drum and dance group Thissone, 1:45; organist Bob Plimpton with the La Jolla Symphony Orchestra, 2:00; Orange County reggae band the Rebel Rockers, 3:20; rappers Sky G. and H20, LeRonn, and Kennis Jones, 4:00; East County reggae band Shiloh, 4:20.

Performing on the Sun Stage will be jazz group Count 4, 10:30 a.m.; madrigalists Studio Mix, 11:00; punkers Feeding Frenzy, 11:15; folk-rock group Bordertown, noon; Meredythe Dee Winter and the Recycle Kids, 12:30 p.m.; new wavers Club of Rome, 12:45; Jerry Giddens, 1:15; country-rockers California Republic, 1:30; sixties-style folk trio Laguna, 2:00; progressive rockers Max Fable, 2:15; jazz singer Ellen Johnson, 2:45; power-poppers Emotional Front, 3:00; nouveau folkie Baba Yaga, 3:45.

Off the Record store in Hillcrest is preparing a monthlong exhibit of lithographs, drawings and paintings by Rolling Stones guitarist Ron Wood.

The exhibit, which will open May 5 and runs through June 6, will consist of more than two dozen different pieces, including lithographs of Chuck Berry, John Lennon, Eric Clapton and other pop-music greats from the 1930s through the ‘80s. Also on display, said Off the Record co-owner Rich Horowitz, will be two one-of-a-kind originals.

The exhibit is a follow-up to last February’s “A Tribute to the Art of John Lennon” and the second in an ongoing series of rock ‘n’ roll-related art exhibits produced by the local record store and Pacific Edge Gallery of Laguna Beach.

“Ron Wood, like John Lennon, was doing art long before he started doing music,” Horowitz said. “He studied it in London, and his work is very, very interesting. He does what are called ‘dry-point’ etchings, a very difficult process in which you actually etch onto a plate before you make the print.

“His work is very true to life, very detail-oriented. And his selection of subjects--he’s done all the pop favorites--sort of makes him the Annie Leibowitz of portraiture.”

Admission is free, both to the exhibit and to the opening-night reception (7-11 p.m.).

LINER NOTES: The latest additions to this year’s Concerts by the Bay series at Humphrey’s on Shelter Island: two shows by soul singer Patti Labelle, July 5 (7 and 9 p.m.), and one by ex-Tower of Power saxophonist Richard Elliot, Aug. 9 (8 p.m.). Meanwhile, the Aug. 6 Ray Charles concert has been moved to Aug. 8. . . .

Badlands, the hot new heavy-metal band led by guitarist and Imperial Beach native Jake E. Lee, will appear May 13 at the Bacchanal in Kearny Mesa, not May 10, as originally scheduled.. . .

Tickets go on sale Friday at 3 p.m. for the Cowboy Junkies’ concert June 20 at the California Theater downtown, and Saturday at 10 a.m. for Reggae Sunsplash ‘90, May 31 at San Diego State University’s Open Air Theater. Performing at the sixth annual reggae fest will be Burning Spear, Freddie McGreggor, Marcia Griffiths, Shinehead, Shelly Thunder, U-Roy, and the 809 Band. . . .

Best concert bets for the coming week: Carl Perkins, Thursday at the Bacchanal in Kearny Mesa; the Ventures with the Insect Surfers, Thursday at the Belly Up Tavern in Solana Beach; Elvin Bishop with the Havalinas and Jimmie Wood and the Immortals, Friday at the Bacchanal; Social Distortion, Friday at Iguanas in Tijuana; Kathy Mattea with Grand Central Station, Saturday at the Bacchanal; the Unstrung Heroes with Pam and Maggie, Saturday at Del Mar Shores Auditorium; Delaney Bramlett with the Woodpeckers, Saturday at the Belly Up Tavern; TSOL, Saturday at Iguanas; Marianne Faithfull, Sunday at the Bacchanal; and the Beat Farmers with the Mighty Penguins, Sunday at the Belly Up Tavern.