music

MAY 15, 2012 - The Landfill Harmonic Orchestra takes garabge, and makes music out of it...literally. 20 creative kids down in Paraguay, take items that have been tossed into the landfill as garbage, and make musical instruments out of them. Then they play beaustiful music out of those instruments, mostly classical but other genres as well. It was started back in 2009 by Juan Manuel Chavez when he wanted to get kids together into an orchestra, but form where they come from a violin costs as much as a house. So, they took pipes, silverware and whater they could find and have re-purposed and recycled the items into musical instruments, from saxophones to violins. Read more about them on Mother Jones HERE, and check out a video by the Landfill Harmonic Orchestra below from their YouTube Channel below.

MAR 23, 2013 - Over on Inhabitat.com, they have a cool article on the world's largest solar tower power plant to be built in California.

"Competing solar power companies Abengoa and BrightSource Energy will soon team up to build the world’s largest solar tower facility in Southern California. The new solar development will be located on federal land, and it’s being facilitated by the Bureau of Land Management. The 500-megawatt Palen Solar Electric Generating System will create 2,000 new construction jobs, and it will produce enough electricity to power 200,000 households."

See pics and read about it some more at Inhabitat.com.

(Photo credit: JTMP.org - Keystone XL Pipeline Protest at White House - NOV 2011)

FEB 6, 2013 - 60 environmental groups, such as 350.org, Applachain Mountain Club, Clean Water Action, CREDO, Earth Day Network, Greenpeace and many, many more, have sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, asking him to prioritize the isssue of our climate crisis as a result of global climate change, and also ask him to reject the Keystone XL Pipeline treaty. Tar sands oil has substantially huge amounts of CO2 that we would unlock and release into the atmosphere if we built the pipeline and used these tar sands for energy. The letter in part says:

Dear Secretary Kerry,

[W]e urge you to use your position as Secretary to emphasize the severity of the threat and spur bold and immediate action. Under your leadership at the State Department, the U.S. should take...decisive steps to become an international leader on addressing dangerous climate change.

Reject any new or expanded infrastructure for tar sands oil, starting with the Keystone XL pipeline. At a time when we must rapidly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, the U.S. must demonstrate bold leadership by refusing to aid the expansion of this destructive and carbon-intensive industry. A first step towards stopping the expansion of tars sands oil should be the rejection of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. This pipeline is not in our national interest – the evidence shows it would unlock vast amounts of additional carbon that we cannot afford to burn, extend our dangerous addiction to fossil fuels, endanger health and safety, and put critical water resources at risk.  As an export pipeline, it will not support U.S. energy security.  We urge you to ensure the State Department has a full understanding of the climate and environmental impacts of this pipeline which have been previously ignored. We also urge that any decision on Keystone XL be made in the context of the President’s call to address climate change by moving away from reliance on carbon intensive fuels towards clean, renewable energy sources.

Read more on the Natural Resources Defense Council Blog, and read the entire letter here.

August 3, 2012 - Local DC area musician activist ThirdChoice was on hand for the anti-fracking concert for the national movement week to mobilize and citizen lobby against fracking in DC last week and sang his pro-Earth and anti-fracking song "Rise Up" for the crowd. Watch the video of the performance below. For the lyrics click READ MORE. Stop The Frack Attack!

MAY 8, 2012 - Our anti-fracking song "Freakin Frackin" that we did with Op-Critical back in 2011 was featured on the awesome iTunes podcast "The Stuart Bedasso Show" the other day, and is still going strong and one of our best videos with over 20,000 views to date! If you haven't seen it yet, here is "Freakin Frackin"! And for an awesome podcast featuring "independent music, politics, comedy, sexuality and beer" check out The Stuart Bedasso Show on iTunes here, and their website is here.

APR 27, 2012 - A new and fast growing trend in industries is to "upcycle", which means people convert waste materials or useless products into new materials or products of better quality or a higher environmental value. One website, HipCycle.com, says about upcycling:
"Modern-day upcyclers put just about anything they can find to good use. Broken pieces of jewelry are combined to make a new, beautiful necklace. Old t-shirts are made into balls of yarn, and juice packs are made into handbags. Anyone can get in on the movement by examining their consumer habits and finding new uses for items they already have."

You can really learn about upcycling and get involved over at:
http://hipcycle.com/what-is-upcycling.

APR 25, 2012 - Cheap Trick played for Earth Day 2012 on the National Mall this past Sunday to lend their support to finding ways of being more sustainable. The band these days is Robin Zander in uniform and lead vocals, the 12-string bass player Tom Petersson, Rick Nielson on guitars, and sitting in for Bun E. Carlos on drums was Rick's son Zaxx. Carlos has retired from the road, but still plays for the band in the studio. They started out with a medley and going into "I Want You To Want Me", and played the longest set of the day. Cheap Trick ended with "Dream Police" to the sparse but dedicated activists who braved the rain for Mother Earth and to help promote sustainability. Watch some of their performance below.

JTMP supports Earth Day, and if you are wondering what part you can play, you can help Mobilize The Earth and we all can do A Billion Acts of Green.

APR 24, 2012 - Here is some more of the Dave Mason set from the Earth Day 2012 on the National Mall here in Washington, D.C.

APR 24, 2012 - The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Dave Mason played Earth Day 2012 on the National Mall here in Washington D.C. last Sunday, and played one of his biggest hits, "We Just Disagree". Dave Mason started his career in 1967 with Traffic, and wrote the classic rock and roll song, "Feelin' Alright" made famous by Joe Cocker. Dave has played with Jimi Hendrix, George Harrison, Eric Clapton, the Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac, Michael Jackson and even Cass Elliot to name just a few.

JTMP supports Earth Day, and if you are wondering what part you can play, you can help Mobilize The Earth and we all can do A Billion Acts of Green.