Touring green

Bowerbirds and their Airstream (Credit: Derek L. Anderson)

For musicians who make most of their living on the road, touring is already a rugged endeavor. But doing it with minimal environmental impact is a challenge artists are attempting at an ever-increasing rate.

“I don't like all the energy consumption. It's an ecological disaster, touring,” mused Radiohead singer Thom Yorke in a Wired magazine interview. “We did one of those carbon footprint things to work out where the biggest problems were. And it was obviously everybody traveling to the shows, especially in the U.S. Everybody drives. So how the hell are we going to address that?”

Reducing that carbon footprint presents myriad problems. Acts such as Jose Gonzalez, Serj Tankian and Cloud Cult turn to Reverb, a Maine-based nonprofit that works alongside tours to make them as green as possible. Reverb hooked up Canadian band Barenaked Ladies with a group that even recycled the band’s used guitar strings into jewelry. From creating green riders to setting up information booths at shows, they’re the current quick fix for lessening an act’s environmental impact.

Artists like singer-songwriter Ben Jelen make it a much more personal concern; he created the Ben Jelen Foundation to support green initiatives around the world. “We do everything we can,” he told us while on tour in Idaho. “There are just seven of us on the road, and we generate so much…stuff. The plastic bottles we accumulate are substantial, so we collect and recycle everything ourselves after each show.”

But what sounds simple can be very difficult, like the time Jelen and his crew found themselves in Dallas with garbage bags full of bottles and nowhere to take them. They eventually hauled them all the way to a library in Tempe, Arizona, for recycling.

“Usually, it’s not that bad,” he says. “There’s almost always a Wal-Mart or library where you can take them. There’s a really good website called Earth 911 where you put in your ZIP code and it shows you all of the local recycling centers.”

North Carolina folk outfit Bowerbirds take that same idealism even further. “At home we drive a biodiesel car, run all our home electricity with solar, live in an Airstream trailer and are building a small cabin out of almost all recycled materials,” says member Beth Tacular via e-mail. “But all this becomes a lot more difficult on the road. Our biodiesel station wagon isn't big enough for all our gear and ourselves, so we drive a minivan that runs on petroleum fuel. We looked into getting a van that ran on biodiesel, but we couldn't afford to buy one. Gas is probably the worst thing about touring, in terms of its impact on the environment as well as connecting us to the conflicts in the Middle East and the whole ANWR debate.”

Jona Bechtolt of Portland band Yacht deals with fuel issues by using as little of it as possible.

“We're going to buy a Prius after this tour with Vampire Weekend,” he said in an e-mail. “We're already saving more than other bands by touring in a VW Golf that gets around 30 miles to the gallon, but the upgrade to the Prius will nearly double that and give us more space. Also, we don't eat at fast-food restaurants—we're vegan, and the meat industry is the number one source of global warming, no bullshit—and we try to shop at local grocers and co-ops as much as possible on tour.”

To this end, Ben Jelen's passionate belief in the potential of saving the planet through personal action remains hopeful.

“It’s good to see states like California take matters into their own hands with environmental-friendly initiatives. In Austin, Texas, the city gives tax breaks to people that install solar panels. That’s the grass-roots revolution right there. Once we get past that first step of awareness, anything is possible. Look at the history of this country—we can make it happen.”

Scott T. Sterling is Music editor for Metromix Los Angeles.