While applauding Coldplay's decision to halt tour until they find sustainable solutions, the eco-warrior rocker insists before a select committee that culture is more important.
- Mar 17, 2021
AceShowbiz - Massive Attack star Robert Del Naja has urged British leaders to regulate pollution at music festivals so eco-warrior rockers can perform without feeling like hypocrites.
The musician, aka 3D, appeared before a select committee considering green issues at festivals on Tuesday, March 16 and explained performers "have very little control" over the organization of gigs and festivals, and often cannot make demands about their environmental impact.
"It's been frustrating to experience the lack of meaningful activity within our sector, and as an activist, I've also felt pretty livid about it," he told the House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport committee. "The industry seems to have been locked in a cycle of green pledges and carbon calculations while emission rates remain really high."
Del Naja applauded Coldplay's decision not to tour until they could do so sustainably, but insisted that's not the answer.
"I understand their frustration," he added. "All bands have been feeling like this for a long time - how do you square touring with climate change? All of us end up looking like hypocrites... reduced to being messengers. But everyone knows that's not the solution - one band stopping touring. Even all bands stopping touring isn't the solution. Culture is important."
Del Naja further stressed, "Bands don't need to cancel tours, and festivals don't need to cancel festivals." He added, "There are lots of different solutions across transportation - you can charter trains and buses and even gets tents and luggage down to a festival in the right way, and bands can take a train themselves. There are lots of different solutions for energy and powering a festival."
