LINKIN PARK KEEPING PROJEKT REVOLUTION GREEN

Linkin Park talk about their goal of planting a tree for every ticket sold and keeping their Projekt Revolution tour Carbon Neutral

With their new album ‘Minutes to Midnight’ certified Platinum and having been on the Billboard Charts for thirteen weeks, Linkin Park are also enjoying tremendous success headlining one of the summers hottest Rock tours, Projekt Revolution. After a three year break, Linkin Park have once again put together their Projekt Revolution Tour and this year, more than any other in the past, the band is keeping their serious goals of staying Green and being Carbon Neutral. All tours contribute enormous amounts of green house emissions to our atmosphere, with multiple Semi Trucks hauling thousands of pounds of instruments, lighting rigs and sound equipment across the country, the numerous Airline flights or Bus trips to and from gigs, the power sucking generators and amps and other detrimental activities. Many bands have made a conscious effort to keep their Carbon emissions as neutral as possible with the help of such companies as Global Cool and American Forests, of which Linkin Park has teamed up with on this year’s Projekt Revolution tour.

We caught up with Linkin Park’s drummer Rob Bourdon to talk about the bands goal of planting a tree for every ticket sold on tour.

“We’re close to Carbon Neutral. I don’t know for a fact that we’re Carbon Neutral. I know that what we’ve done is made most of our trucks and buses Bio Diesel and we’re also planting a tree for every ticket purchased. So, we’re donating a dollar to American Forests and there’s a tree planted for every single ticket sold on Projekt Revolution and we hope to continue that through the rest of our touring cycle. We have a goal of planting a million trees during this touring cycle. Some rough math has told me I think that on this tour we have reduced our Carbon output by 350 tons.”

Linkin Park have always been at the forefront of giving back as the band has helped raise money to benefit victims of Hurricane Charley in 2004, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and they had a huge hand in helping the 2004 Tsunami victims by staging several charity concerts, and setting up an additional fund called Music for Relief. Even Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda has a scholarship fund in his name at his Art School Alma Mater to help out struggling up and coming artists. Earlier this year, Linkin Park also where one of numerous bands who took part in Al Gore’s Live Earth Concert to raise awareness of our growing Global Climate problems. We also talked with Rob Bourdon about Linkin Park being personally involved in the effort to raise awareness of our Global Climate crisis.

“The climate crisis is something that we’re personally involved with and we’ve done a lot on Projekt Revolution to plant trees and to help lower the Carbon footprint of Projekt Revolution. So, (Live Earth) it was really kind of consistent with what we’re doing as a band and it was great to be a part of something so big. I hope that us being a part of it can contribute to just creating a lot of awareness about what’s going on with the climate crisis. I think it’s a problem that could be easily solved if everybody makes some minor changes in their lives. As long as the masses do it, it’s going to make a huge difference.”

2007’s Projekt Revolution features over 10 hours of music on two stages with no overlapping sets, giving fans a great chance to see Linkin Park, My Chemical Romance, H.I.M, Taking Back Sunday and Placebo. Saosin, Julien K, Mindless Self Indulgence, The Bled, Styles of Beyond and Madina Lake all round out the lineup for Projekt Revolution’s second stage. The tour will makes its way throught The U.S. with dates extending until September 3rd in Colorado.