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As we approach the holidays and the end of 2023, we’re struck by feeling much the same way we felt when the year started: hopeful. In our first newsletter of 2023, we shared a message about hopefulness and the hard work and serious resolve it takes to maintain hope in the face of adversity. We challenged this community to join us in not clinging to hope or seeking it out, but discovering hope through action. And as usual, this community of music-makers and music-lovers didn’t just rise to the occasion, you did so much more than we could have imagined.
As our team traveled the world with 22 artist partners across 24 tours and 7 festivals, and met fans at our 4 partner venues, we constantly saw the passion, kindness, and courage that creates, builds, and sustains hope. Tens of thousands of fans took over 150,000 actions for people and the planet at shows. Together, we eliminated the use of nearly 700,000 single-use plastic water bottles - just at concerts! We neutralized over 55,000 tonnes of CO2e. We raised more than $4 Million for environmental and social causes and organizations. We saw problems and we took action.
We also took a step toward a better future with the launch of Music Decarbonization Project. With a focus on finding solutions to music’s unique climate challenges, Music Decarbonization Project is forging a new path forward for the music industry; one that helps us to clean up our own house, leaving fossil fuels behind and accelerating the shift to clean energy and reduced pollution. The results have been powerful.
At Willie Nelson’s Luck Reunion during SXSW, we replaced highly-polluting diesel generators on the main stage and throughout the festival grounds with solar-powered intelligent battery systems. At Coachella and Stagecoach, Music Decarbonization Project helped fund the development and use of battery-powered solar light towers to replace fossil fuel systems. And at this summer’s Lollapalooza Festival, working with Billie Eilish and her team, we powered the majority of Billie’s headline set with zero-emission solar-charged batteries instead of fossil fuel powered generators.
The campaign is funded entirely by donations from artists and industry leaders including Billie Eilish, Dead & Company, The Lumineers, ODESZA, Tame Impala, boygenius, Jack Johnson, Guster, Rhiannon Giddens, Wild Rivers, and Universal Music Group. Your support, advocacy, and bravery has been incredible, and we are humbled and energized by your partnership! We’re also excited to announce more artists who will be helping to fund this effort in 2024. (More to come!)
And yet, even with that incredibly positive momentum, even as millions of people around the world are fighting to protect our planet, we continue to face the very real impacts of a worsening climate crisis. This year saw the highest global temperatures of any year in recorded history. Oceans warmed to unprecedented levels. Wildfires, floods, and droughts created devastating impacts in communities throughout the world. Biodiversity loss continued nearly unabated at a frightening pace. Extreme weather events grew worse and more frequent. The levels of greenhouse gas pollution from burning fossil fuels reached yet another record high.
Still, despite all of this, we have hope. As a planet, we still have hope that we can avoid the worst outcomes of a warming planet. Each action matters. Every gram of greenhouse gas pollution avoided matters. Each fraction of a degree matters.
And, personally, we have hope because of YOU. Next year marks REVERB’s 20th anniversary. From our humble beginnings traveling in a beat up old van on tour with Barenaked Ladies in 2004, to now touring globally with some of the biggest artists in the world, we have seen how a dedicated and active community can create change.
In 2004, we were struggling to get widespread recycling at concerts. Now, we’re working with partners to implement next-generation clean energy solutions at shows. In 2004, REVERB had one artist partner. Now, we have scores (and, yes, that still includes Barenaked Ladies!). In 2004, some person out there took the first action with REVERB at a show. Now, 7,246 shows later, we count actions for people and the planet in the millions (2,588,903 to be exact). Each year, this community grows, the positive impacts increase, and we continue to create real, lasting change in music and beyond.
We want to sincerely thank each and every member of this community for all the positive impacts you’ve helped create this year and every year for two decades. We’d also like to thank our office team: Lara, Tanner, Paige, Chris, Carson, Brian, MJ, Livi, and Liv and our road warriors Courtney, Rachel, Kelsey, Dan, Mercy, Steven, Brande, and Jimmy.
Wishing you all love and peace this holiday season and a happy New Year. May we all continue to discover hope through action.
-Lauren & Adam
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