Cause-based Concerts - how effective are they?
Apr 11, 2007
Today, all over the news we heard about the announcement of Al Gore's Live Earth Concert Series. I heard Gore on the BBC this morning talking about how he sees this as a way to kick off wide-spread awareness of global warming, with the goal of seeing results within 3 years. He spent about 10% of the interview discussing that. He spent the rest of his time talking about Live Earth being the biggest concert in history, taking place on every continent, with an unprecedented number of bands from al genres, bla, bla, bla. I can't wait to hear what Danny Goldberg has to say about this (if you don't know him, I suggest reading his book, How the Left Lost Teen Spirit).
The timing of this is interesting for me. Mainly because the other day I was thinking of the Live-8 concert, and cause-based concerts of the past decade or so. I was thinking about how they failed to produce any results.
A little background: In high school and college my brother and I were heavily involved in Students for a Free Tibet (SFT) -- Justin was lucky enough to get an audience with His Holiness the Dalai Lama when he came to Central Park a year later. In 1998 we helped put on the massive Tibetan Freedom Concert in Washington DC. Since then I worked at Woodstock '99 (for the television company that put it on) and have been involved in countless conversations with people hoping to produce a concert in order to raise awareness for a cause. Justin attended Woodstock '99 as a representative of SFT, and has also been involved in many of the same conversations about concerts.
I'm completely convinced that putting on a concert for a cause in today's world has but one attainable goal - raising money by selling tickets, dvd's, and the rights to air it live & to re-broadcast it. If the goal is to raise awareness, it's hopeless. Why does everyone conveniently forget that we live in a society that has an attention span of 5 minutes? What's worse is that we live in a "it's all about you" society. Yesterday Justin and I were in Dunking Donuts/Baskin Robbins and Justin pointed out that every sign in the store was encouraging consumers to treat themselves "because you deserve it".
As for the music aspect, I don't think there has ever been a time in history where experiencing music is what it is today: a remarkably personal experience. Something to be enjoyed by yourself - with your little ear buds in your ears, whether at your desk, in the park, on the train or in your room. While people still go to concerts, and lots of them, I find that the experience today is different than it was ten years ago. I'm not suggesting this is a bad thing, or a good thing. My point is that the intensely individual nature in which music is experienced today, in my view, is making it harder to get people to connect to a common cause through a song or a concert the way they did in the past.
There is one more element I think everyone has completely ignored: the Woodstock (1969) cause/effect dynamic. Woodstock '69's success was based on the spontaneous nature of it. This is impossible to repeat with today's overwhelming corporate-commercial nature and hyper-sensitive news media which rushes to categorize, analyze and criticize every cultural movement before it's even happened - with irrelevant pundits who enjoy hearing their own voice. Furthermore, Woodstock '69 didn't have a very specific message other than three days of "peace and music" - which could be interpreted in many different ways - but primarily spoke to it's "hippie" audience. We don't have that today. We don't have a subset of society who's identity is inherently tied to music the way hippies were.
Every time a cause-based concert is forced upon us, with tons of media hype and corporate sponsorship - where sponsors expect more attention on them than the cause - the cause is trying to speak to an audience that doesn't exist. Last summer's Live 8 concert is a shining example. Everyone who went to a concert, or saw it on AOL or MTV did so for one reason: they wanted to see a live performance by artists they liked. End of story.
That said, I haven't given up on the potential music has to influence our society. I'm confident there's a way to rally people around a cause, which speaks to us the way music does. When I figure out what that method is, I trust you'll hear about it in a big way!
In the mean time, if you have ideas, please post a comment.
Stumble
Yesterday as Jessica and I were walking home we were drawn into Union Square by the blasting rock music. Curiously we wandered over, even though I despise crowds, and discovered it was the ASPCA Day Festival. The ASPCA had a huge van that looked like a cat, volunteers walking around with "adopt me" animals (which I almost did), the band, booths, etc. There was a huge crowd in attendance, most of whom I would venture to say were not planning on attending.
I think cause-based concerts absolutely can work. The reason they usually don't is partially because of our self-centered, ADHD culture; but primarily due to the corporate push behind the concerts as you said. The self-centered, either attention-starved or money-greedy founders, promoters, distributors, vendors, etc. that end up driving the cause to focus on the wrong aspects of the event. That ripples down to the attendees who focus on the wrong aspects.
Step It Up is putting together events all over America and New York this Saturday including people holding hands by the water front in Manhattan and a wine tasting in Park Slope. I'm not sure how the wine tasting ties in but anyway...
The concert that Al Gore is talking about is just one aspect of a world wide awareness day for Global Warming (not "Climate Change"). You question whether concerts can effect change is pertinent and maybe one way to look at it is to just let the coming together of a large group of people be what it is, a coming together under an idea. Sure, many will just come see the stars and go home but a seed will have been planted in their pea brains. It gives the believers an opportunity to bring the subject up and it put on the radar of the kids attending. Nothing more, nothing less.
The other thing it does is get celebrities involved in an idea. There is an article today in Reuters about Sheryl Crow touring with an environmental message. Her bus burns bio-fuel and the producer of Gore’s film is touring with her.
“Cause based concerts” are not going to change the world but they are a way to get a message out. So the kids go, enjoy the music and buy a “T” shirt. Is that so bad?
i lean towards the side that cause-based concerts don't do anything towards the cause. Mostly for the fact that majority of the folks are there to see the bands they love, not the message they're promoting (which you point out.)
As lon said with ASPCA, that's a little different, because your attention isn't diveded between a message and the lead singer of the band you'd like to ride backstage (for the females that is.) At a concert, the message is too drowned out. At an event where the focus is the message, and communication between members and the public - then I think something can spark.
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