VARIOUS: Al Gore pins hopes on Live Earth environment concerts planned to be the biggest music event ever

Madonna, Kanye West and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are among acts expected to perform at the Live Earth concerts on July 7 to raise awareness about climate change, organisers announced on Tuesday (April 10). Built on the model Bob Geldof used for the anti-poverty Live 8 concerts in 2005, Live Earth will be held in Johannesburg, London, Rio de Janeiro, Shanghai, Sydney and Tokyo. The U.S. venue for the concert will be Giants Stadium in New Jersey, just across the Hudson River from Manhattan, organizers also said on Tuesday. They had wanted to use the National Mall in Washington but two other groups had already obtained permits for that day. Then, an effort to stage the show on the nearby U.S. Capitol grounds was opposed by some Republicans in Congress. "This is history here. On 7.7.07, in six continents, I have, I'm lucky to be able to say this right now, you are going to see the biggest party on earth," rapper Pharrell Williams said in a pre-recorded video announcement. Environmental campaigner Al Gore hopes the Live Earth concerts on July 7 will do for climate change awareness what Live Aid did for Africa. The former U.S. Democratic presidential candidate is spearheading efforts to get the world of pop music to back his crusade to avert what he calls a "planetary emergency". "It will be the largest musical event that the planet Earth has ever had. And it is designed not just to be a one day, 24 hour event - which will in itself raise awareness - but it really is the kick-off of a three year mass persuasion campaign that will give individuals all over the world the information necessary to be a part of the solution to the climate crisis," Gore told Reuters in a recent interview to promote the concerts. "It will be profitable for us, it will be... people who make the change to less pollution are going to find that their lives are better, the jobs are better. But we have to really make a commitment to this change, and that's what the Live Earth concert is really designed to symbolise and kick off," he added. Organisers say the concerts could be watched and heard by two billion people worldwide, and acts already confirmed for the London concert include James Blunt, Madonna and Red Hot Chili Peppers. Gore believes that recruiting world famous performers is an important way of getting the message on climate change out. He has already caused a stir in Hollywood with "An Inconvenient Truth", the Oscar-winning documentary he inspired with his slideshow, and celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio and Sheryl Crow are active environmental campaigners. A handful of complaints about Live Earth have already surfaced on the Internet, with bloggers questioning whether pop stars and their taste for conspicuous consumption are the best advocates for cutting fossil fuel emissions. Gore himself has come under attack for high energy consumption at his home, although the 59-year-old defended his environmental record. He said the report from a Tennessee-based think tank was "very misleading", adding that amongst other things, he and his wife paid for green energy from sources like wind power to bypass CO2 pollution. "I'm walking the walk as well as talking the talk, and there will always be those who don't like the message and who want to attack the messenger," he said. Gore, who was vice president under Bill Clinton for two terms and narrowly lost a controversial presidential election to George W. Bush in 2000, said environmental campaigning had taken the place of politics.

ITN Source | April 10, 2007

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