Senior Writer Gil Kaufman reports: Rage Against the Machine's upcoming string of live dates will include an outdoor performance on a New York street the day their album The Battle of Los Angeles is released.

The Nov. 2 performance in midtown Manhattan will be taped for airing that night on CBS' "Late Show With David Letterman." "We haven't gotten into the details yet," Sheila Rogers, the show's music producer, said, "but it will be a stage on 53rd [Street], and we think it'll be great." It will be the politically outspoken Los Angeles band's first appearance on the show.

The 12-song album, produced by Brendan O'Brien, was previewed last weekend when 20 stations began playing "Guerrilla Radio" (RealAudio excerpt), the disc's crunching first single. The rap-rock track mixes provocative and confrontational lyrics with hard drumming, guitarist Tom Morello's heavy riffing and singer Zack de la Rocha's aggressive rapped/sung vocals.

The band is also slated to appear Nov. 3 on MTV's "Total Request Live" and Nov. 11 on NBC's "Late Night With Conan O'Brien," according to an Epic Records statement. (SonicNet is a division of MTV Interactive.) Last July, Chicago rockers Smashing Pumpkins performed outdoors during their appearance on Letterman's show, transforming a block of West 53rd Street adjacent to the show's Ed Sullivan Theater into an impromptu concert venue and filling the street with an estimated 3,000 people.

Rogers said Rage Against the Machine's performance will be similar to the Pumpkins gig. She continued that she's wanted to book Rage on the show for several years and she and her staff sought a way to make the appearance stand out. "I think the idea to play outside came from them," she said.

Rage Against the Machine are scheduled to perform Saturday at New York's Roseland Ballroom, with rappers Public Enemy opening. They're also slated to play Oct. 31 at an undisclosed Washington, D.C., venue and Nov. 5 in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles show will be broadcast live on radio station KROQ-FM.

Rage are booked to headline the second day of the two-day Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, Calif., on Oct. 10. The festival lineup includes fellow hard-rockers Tool, ex-Smiths singer Morrissey, Beck, the Chemical Brothers and such electronica artists as Cornelius, Moby, Art of Noise, Breakbeat Era and DJ Shadow. Rage Against the Machine will perform Oct. 27 in Mexico City for an MTV special to be aired at a later date.

Before the release of "Guerrilla Radio," drummer Brad Wilk said the controversial case of convicted cop killer and death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal would be mentioned on the album. Rage have frequently lent their name to the effort to win a new trial for Abu-Jamal.

On the single, de la Rocha sings, "Way past the days of Harlem/ MCs sound off/ Mumia caught, please free. "Who caught him/ Yo, check the federal file/ All you pen devils know the trial was wild/ Army of pigs trying to silence my style," he continues. Those lines apparently refer to what supporters say were irregularities in the case against the former journalist. They also seem to address the boycott by New Jersey police of Rage's January 1999 show in support of Abu-Jamal.

Wilk said de la Rocha's delivery of his hard-edged, politically strident lyrics has changed since the band's second album, Evil Empire (1996).

"You'll just have to hear," Wilk said. "It's definitely evolved a lot more than [between] the first record and second record. It's branched out in a lot of different ways that will surprise people."

Morello — renowned for the noises he's able to coax from a guitar, which range from the sound of drills to turntable scratching — said the new album is "easily our best record." Rage Against the Machine have developed a reputation for explosive live shows and fervent left-wing activism offstage.

The track listing for The Battle of Los Angeles is: "Testify," "Guerrilla Radio," "Calm Like a Bomb," "Mic Check," "Sleep Now in the Fire," "Born of a Broken Man," "Born as Ghosts," "Maria," "Voice of the Voiceless," "New Millenium Homes," "Ashes in the Fall" and "War Within a Breath."