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The Sustainable Music Hour 2024 | Transcript | Podcast notes

Presented by Anthony Gleeson, Colin Mockett and Mik Aidt

For a productive and mindful 2025 as we keep pushing – and sometimes singing and dancing – for the unstoppable green transition towards a zero-carbon lifestyle and a safe climate…

In this hour, we present a selection of climate-related songs we have aired in The Sustainable Hour during 2024, and we select our annual Anthem for the Climate Revolution, which for the coming year will be Sunny Luwe’s song: ‘We’ve Got The Power’.

Sunny Luwe is a proud Wailwan woman and pop-soul artist from the Gold Coast. She released ‘We’ve Got The Power’ in March 2024. The song emphasises the power of a unified voice in advocating for environmental conservation. The track incorporates field recordings from Bob Brown’s Rally for Rainforests in Meanjin, adding authenticity to its message. Sunny Luwe’s passion for activism and environmental stewardship shines through in this empowering composition:

We live in a world where they’ll start a war
Just to make more money than they had before
They’ve neglected their responsibility, too caught up in political hypocrisy
But the time is up, things are gonna change, this is when I hear the people say

We’ve got the power
We’ve got the power
No one can stop us
Coz we’ve got the power… in us

You’ve gone and sold the air we breath, all to keep your precious shareholders pleased pleased
You peddled our diamonds for a lump of coal, our children don’t know what their future holds
Built your lies on shaky ground, but it didn’t take long for us to figure out

We’ve got the power
We’ve got the power
No one can stop us
Coz we’ve got the power… in us

People, power
People, power
People, power
People, power
We’ve got the power in us

We’ve got the power
We’ve got the power
No one can stop us
Coz we’ve got the power… in us
~ Sunny Luwe, ‘We’ve Got the Power’

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We at The Sustainable Hour would like to pay our respect to the traditional custodians of the land on which we
are broadcasting, the Wathaurong People, and pay our respect to their elders, past, present and future.

The traditional owners lived in harmony with the land. They nurtured it and thrived in often harsh conditions for millennia before they were invaded. Their land was then stolen from them – it wasn’t ceded. It is becoming more and more obvious that, if we are to survive the climate emergency we are facing, we have much to learn from their land management practices.

Our battle for climate justice won’t be won until our First Nations brothers and sisters have their true justice. When we talk about the future, it means extending our respect to those children not yet born, the generations of the future – remembering the old saying that,
**“We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors. We borrow it from our children.”**
The decisions currently being made around Australia to ignore the climate emergency are being made by those who won’t be around by the time the worst effects hit home. How disrespectful and unfair is that?

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Anthems for the climate revolution

For 2025: Sunny Luwe: ‘We’ve Got The Power’

For 2024: Louise Harris: ‘We Tried’

Songs for the climate revolution of 2024

For 2023: Lil Dicky: ‘Earth’

Songs for the climate revolution of 2023

For 2022: Julia Stone: ‘Beds Are Burning’

Songs for the climate revolution of 2022

For 2018: Missy Higgins: ‘The Difference’

On the lookout for the sustainable anthem of 2018

→ The Sustainable Hour’s playlist on Youtube.com

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Green music news

Green Music Australia wrote in their November 2024 newsletter:

Coldplay recently visited Aus with their Music of the Sphere’s Tour. Frontman Chris Martin vowed to never tour again unless it was done sustainably and with a “positive impact”. With the tour beginning in 2022, their latest update in June 2024 highlights some of their sustainability achievements:

An overall 59% reduction in direct CO2e emissions
7 million trees planted
72% of all tour waste diverted from landfill and sent for reuse, recycling and composting

Plus heaps more, check out the highlights

Take That show cancelled due to wild weather in Brisbane. Did you know that over 50 festivals have been cancelled in Australia since 2015 due to extreme weather events?

Massive Attack held the UK’s biggest low-carbon gig ever with a one-day festival

→ BBC Sounds – 26 November 2024:
In the studio: Brian Eno
“Legendary musician, composer and producer Brian Eno has turned his attention to the climate crisis.”

→ NME – 2 December 2024:
Brian Eno on climate change: “Hardly any of our politicians are talking about the most important problem”
“The ship is sinking, and it’s happening quite fast”

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Playlist of The Sustainable Music Hour 2024

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Transcript of The Sustainable Hour no. 532

Antonio Guterres:
It’s a time for transformation.

JINGLE:
The Sustainable Hour. For a green, clean, sustainable Geelong: The Sustainable Hour.

Anthony Gleeson:
Welcome to The Sustainable Hour, a sustainable song hour today. We’d like to acknowledge that we’re broadcasting from the land of the Wadawurrung people. We pay tribute to their elders – past, present, and importantly those that earn that great honour in the future. We’re broadcasting from stolen land – land that was never ceded, always was and always will be First Nations land. Each week we hope to empower people to look into the ancient wisdom that our First Nations people, First Nations Australians, have accumulated by nurturing both their land and their communities for millennia before their land was stolen. And in that ancient wisdom lies so many of the solutions that we need as we navigate the climate and ecological crisis.

Mik Aidt:
As we come close to the end of the year, it’s become almost like a tradition here in The Sustainable Hour that we have a little bit of a look around to see if a new climate revolution anthem has popped up during the year. We are on the lookout every year in December for the anthem for the climate revolution.

And we’ll do the same this year. I wonder, you know, because… to be honest, there hasn’t been that many new songs in 2024 as we have seen in the previous years. That’s certainly on my radar, but I’m not sure what you think, Colin? And Tony? But let’s first have a musical global outlook with our scanner of the global news, Colin Mockett OAM: What do you have for us – in terms of what’s happening on the music scene in the world?

Colin Mockett: (at 02:09)
Yes, thank you, Mik. And just for this particular broadcast, I will sing it for you today.

Tony:
Oh no! Save us!

Colin:
Look, back at the end of November 2024, the group Massive Attack performed at the Act 1.5 Presents series in Liverpool, England. Now, the aim of this was to radically decarbonize the events industry. And their live performances were centered around climate action and sustainability. Outside of their music, Massive Attack’s actions always speak strongly about environmental concerns. They’ve funded studies on reducing the environmental impact of live performances and have collaborated with organisations like Extinction Rebellion to support climate activism.

Now their events test a series of proposals to radically decarbonise the events industry with Massive Attack, Idols and Nile Rodgers and Chick headlining. Chick’s We Are Family Foundation has been sounding the alarm of working in the climate change space for years. They call it ‘mobilising communities and spearheading global revolutions’. And you can find out about this with a website. which is www.WeAreFamilyFoundations.org.

Now, the United Nations named Liverpool as its first accelerator city for climate action. And the Act 1.5 Presents series was aimed at cutting audience transport emissions when they go to festivals like this, as well as using a fully renewables powered site, a plug and play stage set up to reduce gear transport and Zero Landfill Waste Removal. All of them hosted at a meat-free &S Bank Arena. That was back in November 2024.

That’s almost exactly what happens at every football match at Forest Green Rovers – just for Tony, that is. It’s meat-free and everything is waste-free. If you go to a football match, it’ll be like going to the Liverpool concerts. You take your rubbish home, and you find a good way of recycling it or composting it.

Now, another thing from the UK is Coldplay. Since forming at university in London, Coldplay have gone on to become one of the planet’s most popular acts, selling more than 100 million copies of their nine number one albums. They’re pioneering sustainable practices in the music industry.

Coldplay has been at the forefront of integrating sustainability into their tours. They always aim to significantly reduce their environmental impacts. Their commitments to eco-friendly practices when they’re on tour is evident in several key initiatives. That is emission reduction. The band plays to cut direct CO2 emissions by over 50 % compared to their 2016-2017 tour.

As of June 2024, they reported a 59 % reduction in direct emissions, surpassing their initial target. They also look to increase renewable energy. They utilize 100 % renewable energy to power their concerts. They insist on that. And instead of having like the Rolling Stones riders saying that they need so many bottles of vodka before they’ll go on stage, Coldplay say,

We will only work if you’ve got sustainable energy coming in to our amplifiers. Coldplay utilizes 100 % renewable energy to power all of their concerts. That includes solar installations, kinetic dance floors, and stationary bicycles that allow fans to contribute energy during the concert itself. They’ve got people on bikes running the microphones. I love that concept.

They also contributes to energy and other ways with reforestation efforts. For every ticket that’s sold, the band commits to planting a tree. As a result of that, they’ve planted more than nine million trees up to date, and that was back in November. They also use sustainable materials. Their stages are constructed from lightweight, low carbon and reusable materials, including recycled steel, ensuring minimal environmental impacts on every concert. Waste reduction.

Coldplay’s achieved a 72 % diversion of waste from landfills during their tours. That by emphasising recycling and responsible waste management. Again, when they’re on stage, they’re saying to their audience, take your rubbish home, pick it up and take it home. And if everybody on every tour and every concert, every play did that, the world would be a better place. You’ve got to just say that, haven’t you?

Now, these initiatives highlight Coldplay’s dedication to pioneering sustainable practices in the music industry, and they’re setting the benchmarks for eco concerts and touring. And that’s my roundup, my musical roundup, for the week.

JINGLE:
Listen to our Sustainable Hour – for the future.

Mik: (at 08:00)
The annual music show from The Sustainable Hour typically goes like this: Each of us, and we are three presenters, pick three songs that we think have potential to become the climate anthem – or the climate revolution anthem – for 2025. So let’s take that round and Colin, maybe you would start with your three songs.

Colin:
I’d be very happy to, Mik. I’d like to kick off with We’ve Got the Power by Sunny Luwe. Now, Sunny Luwe is a Wailawan woman and she’s a Gold Coast singer. At the time when she recorded this song, she was surprisingly dismissive. She referred to it as just a sunshine soul making music and being led by her intuition. Now, in my view, what came out was much more important than that. In that this song points out that when it comes to the environment, every one of us has the power to change things. If only we could find the will. So that is my first choice for this year. It was recorded in 2024. Please listen to the message in Sunny Luwe, We’ve got the power.

SONG
Sunny Luwe: ‘We’ve got the power’

Colin: (at 11:48)
Now my second choice was recorded in September 2023. If we stretch the year a little bit to 14 months, it sort of fits in for this year. It was written by Paul Kelly and David McComb. It’s a song that is typical of the man. It’s poignant and poetic and it has such meaningful lyrics. Now just listen to this little quote from the lyrics:

It’s a splinter in the mind, a whisper in the heart. A feeling something’s missing, some crucial little part. It’s a business that’s unfinished, a reckoning that’s due. If not now, then when? If not us, then who? Paul Kelly’s ‘If Not Now’:

SONG
Paul Kelly: ‘If Not Now’

Colin: (at 15:49)
Now, my third song is without a doubt completely out of the blue because it wasn’t recorded this year. It’s a classic. It’s ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ by Joni Mitchell. It was written, composed and originally recorded by the Canadian singer Joni Mitchell in 1970.

And it was originally released on her album ‘Ladies of the Canyon’. Now speaking in 1996, which is almost, well, 16 years later, ‘Big Yellow Taxi’, Joni wrote, ‘I wrote it on my first trip to Hawaii. I took a taxi to the hotel and when I woke up the next morning, I threw back the curtains and saw these beautiful green mountains in the distance. Then I looked down and there was a parking lot as big and as far as the eye could see. And it just about broke my heart. This blight on paradise. That’s when I sat down and wrote the song.’

Big Yellow Taxi has been a huge hit in every English speaking country. And according to Mitchell’s official website, Big Yellow Taxi has been recorded by 556 other artists as of June the 5th, 2023. So it’s many more than that by now.

Now this includes a version in 1973 by Bob Dylan, which everybody says wasn’t as good as Tony Mitchell’s. In 2024, it was voted world’s number one environmental song by readers of Britain’s online Guardian newspaper.

I’m not going to go against that. This is a song that has my vote for world environmental song of all time: Joni Mitchell’s Big Yellow Taxi.

SONG
Joni Mitchell: ‘Big Yellow Taxi’

Tony:
The first song I’m choosing for this year is called ‘The Next Life’ and it’s by a group called Aria. And for me this song pretty much is the complete package in terms of the lyrics, the music, the visuals. It clearly shows us what’s at stake and the choices that we have. One particular line that really resonated with me was: ‘We share the Earth with all forms of life.’ And the rest of the song revolved around that and what we were doing currently that wasn’t aligned with that and what we could do in the future.

SONG
Aria: ‘The Next Life’

Tony: (at 25:14)
This song is, to me is really interesting, it’s called ‘This Is Our Land’ and it’s sung… it’s not in English, but it has English subtitles. So the title is ‘This Is Our Land’ and it’s by young people from the Middle East and North Africa. And in the song, they’re sharing their hopes for the planet through song and prayer. ‘This Is Our Land. It has a right over us and other creatures too.’

The fact that it’s young people from speaking another language, but with exactly the same sentiments as all the other songs that we’ll know down here today, just shows that common humanity – that, yeah, we’re not all that different. I mean, the things that sustain us and life and the goals that we have are very similar, no matter what colour we are, what our religion is and all the things that are put up today to divide us.

SONG
YES Project: ‘This is our land’

Tony: (at 30:02)
The third song is called ‘Heal the Earth’ and it’s by Sanjay S. Nambek. That one is in English. And the line that stood out for me in this is: ‘Together we can heal, together we can grow.’ So there’s a common theme that weaves through all three of the songs that I’ve chosen.

SONG
Sanjay S. Nambek: ‘Heal the Earth’

Mik: (at 33:20)
If there was one orchestra we could call our ‘house orchestra’ here in The Sustainable Hour over the years, it would probably be the Formidable Vegetable, the band of Charlie Mgee from Western Australia who has made a whole lot of songs about permaculture and plastic and consumerism and so on. And the Formidable Vegetables are now out with a new album. Just in the lead up here to Consumer Season No. 1 in December – and here’s one of the tracks from the album, which is called ‘Buy Nothing’.

SONG
Formidable Vegetable: ‘Buy Nothing’

Mik: (at 36:38)
My second choice comes from London. It’s a song called ‘Environmental Anxiety’ by the artist Raye. She sings about what it feels like to be young and to be living in a world that’s grappling with the climate crisis. Something that takes an emotional toll on a lot of young people. We know that also here in Geelong, where we recently held a Climate Café. Talking about these things that Raye is singing about, she’s capturing this fear and the frustration in the young generation. They want to see change. And I think this is a song about that, about having a dream for a better and greener future.

SONG
Raye: ‘Environmental Anxiety’

Mik: (at 40:26)
My third song is not exactly what you would think could become an anthem or an ‘eco hit’. But then again, if you look at the numbers, it actually was a bit of a hit. It certainly attracted an incredible one million views on YouTube in its first two weeks after it was released here on the 1st of October. It’s an unusual collaboration between the British singer, Jacob Collier, and the Norwegian singer, Aurora. And I think it must have been Greenpeace who brought them together, we suddenly see them coming off a ship in the Arctic and they bring out this piano and then they perform ‘A Rock Somewhere’ and Aurora’s song ‘The Seed’, live in the middle of all the ice and the big nature in the Arctic.

SONG
Jacob Collier and Aurora: ‘A Rock Somewhere X The Seed’

SONG
Teeny Tiny Stevies: ‘Climate Change’

Mik: (at 50:54)
This song, which simply is titled ‘Climate Change’, was released on Earth Day in April this year by the Melbourne-based Teeny Tiny Stevies as part of their fifth album, ‘The Green Album’ as they call it, because it’s got lots of these kind of songs about energy and about climate, produced with the hope that both children and their parents would be learning something while they listen and maybe dance and have fun with these kind of songs.

And while that song was playing, the jury has voted and we have found a winner – the song that we will call ‘The Climate Revolution Anthem’ for 2025. Drum roll please. And the anthem is: Sunny Luwe with her ‘We’ve Got the Power’.

SONG
Sunny Luwe: ‘We’ve Got the Power’

Mik (at 53:06)
That’s all we could squeeze into one annual Sustainable Music Hour. You’ll find the links to all these YouTube videos we’ve been playing – all the songs – in our show notes, which we put out on the website www.climatsafety.info. And congratulations to Sunny Luwe. We’ll definitely be hearing more of that song in The Sustainable Hour here on 94.7 The Pulse during election time next year.

And also in a moment like this, we should thank and send our deepest gratitude to Missy Higgins for her song ‘The Difference’, which has been following us so faithfully and been our round off end theme for so many of the 11 years that we have been existing. Reminding us we can all, each and every one of us, we can be that difference.

SONG
Missy Higgins: ‘The Difference’

Mik: (at 56:53)
Michael Franti who has just been performing here in November, also at the Queenscliff Music Festival, he’ll get the last word also in this Sustainable Hour as he has done so many times during this year to make it a brighter day.

SONG
Michael Franti: ‘Brighter Day’

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During Covid lockdown, we produced this two-hour ‘sustainability music tour-de-force’ show:

Sustainable vibes

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Events we have talked about in The Sustainable Hour

Events in Victoria

The following is a collation of Victorian climate change events, activities, seminars, exhibitions, meetings and protests. Most are free, many ask for RSVP (which lets the organising group know how many to expect), some ask for donations to cover expenses, and a few require registration and fees. This calendar is provided as a free service by volunteers of the Victorian Climate Action Network. Information is as accurate as possible, but changes may occur.

Petitions

→ List of running petitions where we encourage you to add your name

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The Sustainable Hour is streamed live on the Internet and broadcasted on FM airwaves in the Geelong region every Wednesday from 11am to 12pm (Melbourne time).

→ To listen to the program on your computer or phone, click here – or go to www.947thepulse.com where you then click on ‘Listen Live’ on the right.

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Podcast archive

Over 550 hours of sustainable podcasts.

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