Edition: U.S. / Global  Milan Hlavsa, Rock Star of a Revolution,
Dies at 49  Published: January 8, 2001  Milan Hlavsa, the
founder, composer and bassist of the Plastic People of the
Universe, an underground Czech rock band that galvanized a
movement for human rights and democracy, died Friday at his home
in Prague. He was 49.  The cause was cancer, the group's
management said.  While countless rock bands tout themselves as
revolutionary, the Plastic People are among the handful who can
claim they changed history. The group persisted for two decades
in the face of harassment and imprisonment while its members
were treated as dissidents by the Communist government of
Czechoslovakia during the 1970's and 80's.  When the Plastic
People were arrested along with other underground Czech rockers
in 1976, a coalition of students, artists and intellectuals
arose to defend the band. That coalition turned into the human
rights movement that brought democracy to Czechoslovakia in
1989. Yet the Plastic People, Mr. Hlavsa s