Musicians are cultural leaders, their craft is a platform for change, and for making whatever point they want to make.
This can be expressed at every point of the process: through lyrics, instrument selection, who they choose to employ to serve it all up, and the medium they present it on.In today's climate, musicians are under a lot of pressure to come up with new ways to 'stay relevant' – but sometimes the old ways still work.
Austep Music offers eco-conscious physical music products and other merchandise (t-shirts, bamboo or corkboard USBs, stickers), which are still some of the main ways gigging musicians can make money.
They use post-consumer-waste recycled stock (minimum 80 per cent) for all cardboard CD packaging, and plant native trees for every job printed. Also, if John Mayer still prints CDs, they can't be that bad.
Put your music out in whatever form you want, carbon neutral with Austep Music, if you like that sort of thing. Here are five green ways to be scene shared by Austep Music.
1: A torch with rechargeable or solar batteries. . . especially a home-made one from a stick and some clothes that don't fit anymore, dipped in used oil.
2: Not quite as effective as point one, but a candle.
3: Flash blazer, sharp haircut. Well, it might brighten up somebody's day.
4: You could wear hi-vis, or the more environmentally and socially responsible way to get reflective would be seeing a therapist, and put those now-clear feelings into your music.
5: Recycle. Play your old hits in with your new ones.
Stay cool by being calm like cucumbers at the farmer's markets. Also obtainable by point four above.
