Like many other social movements, the climate movement is a people’s movement that has been felt and communicated through music and the arts. The climate music scene was established in 1992 as a grassroots community surrounding the Rio Summit and has since grown significantly. It now features a variety of international artists.
Prominent climate artists include the following:
Adrian and the Macies
This four-piece folk-electronica fusion group rose to prominence in the late 1990s, first gathering fame amongst young Japanese environmentalists in Kyoto before gaining international support amongst audiences in developed countries. Adrian and the Macies combine the metronomic rhythm of early electronic music with the whimsy of late 60s folk to create a sound that inspires images of flower-wearing passengers on the Trans-Europe Express. The band have have performed well commerically throughout their discography, although music critics continue to be puzzled by the abysmal sales of the band’s second album in countries such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
The Durban Platform
This international collaboration of DJs became famous for its 2011 release of a 36 hour uninterrupted live album. The release featured such artists as DJ LDC, the G77 and BRICS and was available for purchase only via digital download. Similar in some ways to Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music, this live album has reached cult status and has spawned a twice-yearly album release by a follow-up collaboration called Working Group. The original Durban Platform is set to be headlining Parisella 21, a large international music festival to be held in France next year. Industry experts are divided as to whether the Durban Platform will bring a solid performance to their festival set as popular and critical reception of Working Group releases have deteriorated in recent years.
The Secretariats
Known for producing easy-listening pop-rock that appeals across demographics, The Secretariats have enjoyed considerable commerical success over recent years. The group have been characterised by the yearly replacement of the band’s drummer leading to a situation in which each new drummer is determined to lead the group to output an album, often to the detriment of artistic quality. This has resulted in several Secretariats releases that have been poorly received by critics although sales have remained healthy. Recent release ‘Manuel’s Silver Hammer’ has been slammed by international music critics and has resulted in a lawsuit from synth-pop group The Road to Paris, who claim that the group illegally sampled their work so poorly that The Secretariats completely ruined The Road To Paris.
Mechanizm Warszawa
This industrial metal group achieved underground success amongst the environmentalist scene after the release of their 2013 EP Lost and Damaged, a conceptual album about retribution and repayment. The group was subsequently signed by major record label GN Records and their first full-length studio album was released in December this year. Reception has unfortunately been poor with critical consensus being that in the process of establishing a wider fanbase in partnership with GN Records, Mechanizm Warszawa sacrificed their artistic integrity as their recently released album is significantly less powerful and provocative than the original Lost and Damaged. Indeed, industry insider reports are now surfacing that record company executives deemed the lyrical content of original recordings to be too challenging for targeted consumers and ordered that the content be toned down before the album could be released.
The Umbrella Group
This lounge jazz group has been an incredibly powerful player in the music industry for the last few decades and controls a large percentage of album sales worldwide. Targeted towards the upper-middle class consumer, albums can only be purchased on heavyweight vinyl and album cover art typically features the group drinking different varieties of expensive liquor served with cocktail umbrellas. The Umbrella Group receives widespread mainstream critical acclaim, although sources report that this is perhaps because of the group’s personal connections at major media organisations worldwide rather than their musical prowess. The group believes that lounge jazz is the only genre capable of maintaining commercial success for an extended period of time and is known for its musical conservatism. When threatened, the Umbrella Group has been known to attempt to thwart musically adventurous newcomers with their unbridled industry power and jazz instruments.
Climate music newcomers to watch:
Translatorhead
New Kids on the Cop
Toady Stern
Run-ADP
Fossil the People
The National Interest
Nat King Coal
climateclinician 