It doesn’t get any better or bigger than this. ‘Earth’. A one-word title that contains it all.
You may like or hate this song, but it has all the features of what any new ‘We Are The World’-song should contain: a group of 30 celebrities in front, lyrics that are both cute, loving, naugthy and disruptive, a simple chorus and melody which is catchy, a top-creative and colourful music video, and first and foremost: a passionate, young spokesperson and initiator who — just like Greta Thunberg — is a good communicator with the heart in the right place.
A song that unites, engages, inspires, raises awareness, formulates a vision and a way forward.
What this song needs now is airplay. Global hot rotation! You can help: ask your favourite radio station to play it. Ask again. Ask every day! Play it at home – sing it. Teach your siblings and classmates to sing it too. Ask your music teacher to teach it to the entire school. And keep viewing it and sharing it with everyone you know, so that it will keep trending on YouTube.
If you’re a musician or anyone with a group of fans or followers: Play it. Perform it. Remix it. Quote it. Talk about it.
Remember, as Greta says: You are never too small to make a difference.
The story about ‘Earth’
How did Lil Dicky — a 31-year-old American rapper from Pennsylvania — manage to get Leonardo DiCaprio, Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber and 30 more celebs to join him for the creation of ‘Earth’?
He explains it in this interview:
Some excerpts of what Lil Dicky says in this Sway’s Universe interview:
“This could be the most important song I’ll ever write in my life.”
“In a nutshell, the main thing that freaked me out is that we’ve got 12 years, apparently, to completely redefine how we do everything.”
“It is like a very important war we are fighting.”
“I don’t like saying it is a political issue, because it is a human issue, but at the same time: you have to vote for someone who cares about the environment. It has to be a priority for them.”
“We happen to be alive during the part of humanity that is responsible for saving the Earth. What better legacy is there than that? In 200 years when they are writing the history books, they are going to say, ‘Those guys fucked us’, or ‘Those guys saved us’. You can run away from it, or you can embrace it. Welcome to Challenge with Michael Jordon.”
“For me, my main goal with this song is just surface-level awareness to get people to give a shit – or even consider giving a shit.”
Music video: 49 million views in its first week and over 4 million likes
→ The song without talk/film — radio airplay edit
→ ‘Clean version’ of the song — with less cursing and the words that some perceive as offensive
Audio
Listen in your car, or when you ride or walk to school or university, or for your radio show
Lil Dicky’s accompanying videos
Lil Dicky says at the end of the song: “Honestly, everybody! Scientists are saying that we have about 12 years to turn this environmental crisis around or we are screwed. What do you say? You guys wanna save the world? Of course you do. Go to the web site and see how we are going to do it.”
1) Problem
“I try to do a ‘climate change for dummies’, because I am a dummy, you know what I mean?”
2) Solution: Energy
3) Solution: Nature
4) Solution: Food
Newsletter about how you can make a difference
“The next two years are going to be super important for our planet with two major United Nations conventions coming up at the end of 2020 – one on climate change change and one on biological diversity. So we need to band together to make sure the world’s governments guarantee a healthy, thriving environment for everyone,” writes Lil Dicky on his website.
You can sign up to Lil Dicky’s newsletter on welovetheearth.org and he’ll keep you up to date on the most important developments and how you can make a difference.
→ Follow #WeLoveTheEarth on Facebook
→ Follow #WeLoveTheEarth on Twitter
→ For more information on “how to save the Earth”, go to welovetheearth.org
→ To purchase or stream ‘Earth’, go to LilDicky.lnk.to/Earth
→ Follow Lil Dicky and his ‘Earth’ project on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/LilDickyRap
“This might be my most favourite song ever.”
~ Leonardo DiCaprio
Here’s that song we’ve been looking for
Comment by Mik Aidt
Could ‘Earth’ be this the new ‘We Are the World’ song of 2019, which some of us have been waiting for for years…?
I believe it’s very close, actually. It is breaking waves. The sixth most viewed video on YouTube right at this moment.
In The Sustainable Hour on 6 November 2018, we played 11 songs and asked our listeners in a preference poll whether any of them had the potential to become a sustainable anthem of 2018.
Six years ago, I wrote in a blogpost: “I believe that what the world needs now is not just one new ‘We are the World’-song with that same energy and drive af Midnight Oil’s ‘Beds are Burning’. But many of them. In many different languages and music styles. But where are the musicians and artists to compose it? Who will take up the challenge to make a ‘We are the Earth’ song of our decade?”
Well, an American has now done that. He started writing it in 2016, the production took him and a huge team of helpers almost three full years, and eventually he was able to launch it on Earth Day 2019.
That particular blogpost from 2013 has, by the way, since then become the most read blogpost on the blog. It’s been read from around 10,000 different screens.
Back then, I also called out to the youth: “What are the young people doing today? Where are they when it comes to carbon emission questions? Can’t we power up the youngsters? The generation in the age between 8 and 29 – I know many of you are already deeply concerned, and involved. All over the planet. But… could you do more? What would it take to create a new youth revolution among the 19-to-29-year-old, like the one the Western world saw in the 1960’s, to help push forward the urgent movement towards creating a carbon-neutral civilisation on this planet?”
What a joy it has been to see recently that all it took was one single teenager with determination, Greta Thunberg, and now all of that is unfolding. Not so much among the 19 to 29-year-olds, though, but certainly among the 9 to 19-year-olds.
It is likely that with Lil Dicky and other artists stepping in, the 19-29 might begin to wake up just as well now.
Who created ‘Earth’?
The song was written by Lil Dicky, Benjamin Levin, Magnus August Høiberg, Josh Coleman and Jamil Chammas. It was produced by Benny Blanco and Cashmere Cat, and mixed by Serban Ghenea.
Vocals by Lil Dicky. Additional vocals by Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Halsey, Zac Brown, Brendon Urie, Hailee Steinfeld, Wiz Khalifa, Snoop Dogg, Kevin Hart, Adam Levine, Shawn Mendes, Charlie Puth, SIA, Miley Cyrus, Lil Jon, Rita Ora, Miguel, Katy Perry, Lil Yachty, Ed Sheeran, Meghan Trainor, Joel Embiid, Tory Lanez, John Legend, Backstreet Boys, Bad Bunny, Psy, and Kris Wu.
Who is Lil Dicky?
Lil’s real name is David Andrew Burd. He came to prominence in 2013 with the release of the music video of his song ‘Ex-Boyfriend’, which went viral with more than one million views on YouTube within the first week. He released his debut album ‘Professional Rapper’ in 2015.
AllMusic.com wrote about him: “Busting out of the Philadelphia suburbs, Burd graduated from the Richmond Robins School of Business in 2010 at the top of his class. A move to San Francisco came next, then he began working on Lil Dicky, writing rhymes, cutting demos, and storyboarding videos for two years before he showed them to the public. He first saw rapping as a way to transfer musical success into television and film writing success, but when he posted “Ex-Boyfriend” and reached a million views within the week, hip-hop lover Burd realized his hip-hop dream was already a reality.”
→ You can read more on this Wikipedia page