Have you ever stopped to think about the effects that the music industry has on the environment? Turns out, there’s quite a few, and they’re not great! However, there’s still hope – and you can still enjoy your concerts! We chat with Dan Haggis from the Wombats and Kyra Wu of Tell All Your Friends PR about what the music industry needs to do better in regards to combatting the climate crisis.
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Transcript
SCENE #1: Voicer – Introduction
SFX: Rock band warming up – continues in background
Valie (OFF): Hello, hello? Check, 1, 2, 3, check?
SFX: Microphone check/tap Valie: Is this thing working?
SFX: Crowd cheering
SFX: Original rock band warm up fades SFX: Drum Countdown
SFX: Rock band intro (fades into outro) All SFX fade.
Valie: Have you ever stopped to think about the effect that the music industry has on the environment? I know that I never did! In the year leading up to the pandemic I attended 23 different concerts, interviewed countless bands and listened to music for up to 6 hours a day. As a musician myself, I thought the worst thing that could happen to me because of the music industry would be that it chew me up, and spit me back out. That was until I learnt some of the terrible effects that it canhave on environment and the planet. I tried to think of what aspects of the industry could have the worst effects and kept coming up short, so I decided to step outside and ask some passers by.
SCENE #2: Streeter – What do people think? – Transcript SFX: Roadside / Kitsilano street sounds
Valie: If you had to take a guess at what aspect of the music industry has the worst effect on the environment, what would you think it is?
Person#1: Something that comes to mind would be like… merch Person#2: Maybe… Noise pollution?
Person#3: A lot of littering and waste.
Person#4: My guess would be the touring process of travel and flying –
Person#5: I’d have to agree with that as well coz then you have to take into consideration the people going to the concert-
Person#4: Yeah
Person#5: Travelling to see it.
SFX: Falling by Valie. Intro starts and continues on
Valie: And in one way or another, they’re all right! But, maybe it’s time to chat with our experts!
SCENE #3: Voicer – Introducing Dan and Kyra
Valie: I was able to catch up with Dan Haggis from the Wombats – someone who’s been an active member of the Green Party and a voice of pushing for environmental change since TheWombats became a band back in 2003. I also wanted to get a better understanding of what’shappening behind the scenes,
and was able to chat with Kyra Wu, a publicist at Tell All Your Friends PR in New York. She wasable to tell me about the steps TAYF and the publishing side of the industry have been able to take in regards to climate action.
SCENE #4: Voicer – Chatting with Dan and Kyra – Transcript
Valie: Dan, you’ve been very involved with the Green party, and the environment, and so I wanted to know, especially now with the whole Climate Crisis and everything, how are you think the music industry has impacted, and can impact environmental change?
Dan Haggis: Yeah, I mean it’s obviously very talked about, and it’s obviously a massive problem and it wasalways really hard for us, I think, being in the music industry, touring around the world – I think it’s pretty carbon intensive. But, there is no real way round that, but we’ve always tried to make sure our tours are routed properly, so we don’t have to travel as far, if we can cut down the load that we are carrying. But there’s only so much that we can all do, and a lot of the impact from gigs is actually from fans travelling to shows apparently so it’s on all of us, to try and do what we can to take public transport, and do the best that we can. But obviously the climate crisis won’t be solved entirely by that, it takes government leadership and huge industries like oil and gas, and steel production, and blah, blah, blah.
Valie: But I feel like a lot more artists nowadays, are taking that step towards wanting to be carbonneutral, or at least make positive change. So, why is it that we are seeing this change happens so slow within the industry itself?
Dan Haggis: I think one of the main problems is, an artist can have a thought in their head: “Oh, well, it would be good if we did this”, but then they don’t know who to speak to. By that point it might be too late, booking agents, the promoter, and the manager and the festivals, they don’t all have the same script that they’re working from almost. It’s trying to pull togetherall parts of the music industry. And even vinyl production, CDs,
the record label, it’s a huge beast, in a way, but with lots of separate moving parts.
Valie: One of which is the publishing industry. Do you think that there are any aspects of that more, behind-the-scenes sector, that can also contribute negatively to the environment?
Kyra Wu: Yeah, I mean I feel like because we work on a small scale, a lot of the things we do don’t really have a huge impact, but I feel like if you’re looking at bigger PR firms that work with bigger clients, and stuff like that, the PR campaigns can look a bit different. In the sense that they probably have a much bigger impact than we do, because we just keep everything very small online. But if you’re looking at major artist, you can see things like in-print magazines and publications and a lot of billboards, and posters, and just disposable things going around. It’s just like wasteful products, I guess, in a way like single use products like a poster, being all overthe city that in the end just gets trashed or gets, you know, flying around in the street because nobody threw it away.
Valie: And the publishing realm isn’t the only one in which waste is an issue. Diana Cohen of Rolling Stone, wrote that The Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival produced more than 679 tons of waste back in 2015 – with an audience of around 90,000 people over 4 days. Festivals are a huge contributor to the waste produced by the music industry, but they are coming up with ways to encourage their participants to be more green – something which keeps Dan hopeful:
Dan Haggis: I do feel kind of positive, to be honest, in general. A lot of festivals now, there’s drinking taps backstage and encouraging that we all have our own reusable bottles and same for the fans. So like Glastonbury last year, they banned all single use plastics. And I think Reading and Leeds did the same. Trying to use renewable energy on festival sites, giving money off of tickets if youuse public transport to get to the festivals. Like incentives basically, to get people to think about their own carbon footprint, and all the rest of it. And then last resort, I
guess, is some carbon offsetting which, I don’t think that’s going to solve things, but I suppose, if it helps money get pumped in the direction of environmental projects, whether it’s the Amazon, or you know, rewilding places, planting trees, methane reduction, blah blah blah. You know,there’s so many things out there, it’s all a good thing.
Valie: And it’s true, every little thing helps – they are all good things. And, on that note, I asked Kyrawhat steps a boutique PR agency, such as TAYF, can take in regards to climate action.
Kyra Wu: we kind of downsized a lot during the pandemic, to the point that we don’t have an office space anymore. And office space you just such a huge – if you look at property and stuff like that, officesare one of the biggest uses of carbon and electricity in cities. Like most of our omissions in New York City, I think it’s like 90% of emissions come from buildings in New York.
Valie: Kyra also introduced meatless and vegan meals into the workspace.
Kyra: I came into this company and everyone was eating Popeyes or McDonald’s every day and I come in and I’m like “why don’t we try this vegan restaurant down the street?”. And eventually they were like this is actually really great. And diet is one of those things that you do havecontrol over that actually has decently sizeable impacts on emissions.
Valie: and it’s not only little things that are adding to the positive direction the music industry is going in, in regards to climate action and combating climate crisis. The Berkeley College of music’s music business journal said that “despite the increased energy and emissions associated with Internet data flows, purchasing music digitally reduces the energy and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions associated with delivering music to customers by between 40 and 80% from thebest-case physical CD delivery” and the major economic Forum even proposed that by 2050, CO2 emissions should be reduced by at least 50% from what they were in 1990.
SCENE #4: Voicer – Conclusions and next steps
Valie: However, there is still lots to do! Approximately three-quarters of the industry’s GHG emissions are attributable to the live music performance sector and approximately one-quarter to the music recording and publishing sector. The major GHG producing activity is audience travel which amounts to 43% of the music industry’s emissions. music fans, and audience members need to consider whether it is wise to travel to a festival or concert, or whether it’s best to wait for one to happen closer to their town.
Back in 2020, with the onset of the pandemic, Wired reported that live music’s revenue fell by85% and that artists and musicians lost two-thirds of their typical income. Not only that, but hundreds of small, independent music venue shut their doors for good over the past couple of years. At the same time, labels and streaming services such as Universal music group and Spotify, we are making hundreds of millions of dollars. Tours and concerts are often the only way musicians, especially independent ones, can make money to fund their music, passion, and life. However, it is also important for them to keep in mind the negative effects that there is touring process can have on the environment.
SFX: Current by Valie. and Jose Granizo Intro starts and continues SFX: Current by Valie. and Jose Granizo fades into song outro
Valie: There are so many continuously changing and growing parts inside of the music industry but more recently groups such as music declares emergency have started to appear and present the music industry with new options and challenges they can complete in order to work together towards a better future. There is still hope, and you can still enjoy your concerts, maybe convince your favourite artist to sign and show support for environmental initiatives thatare happening, and maybe take the train next time you’re going to a show.
SFX: Current by Valie. and Jose Granizo outro fades out END.