Live Earth: who said rock ’n’ roll couldn’t save the world?

The bands have all been great, even the ones I’ve never heard of in my creeping fogeyism -- I still think Dave Matthews is the height of cool. And it was extremely cool to see Al Gore greeted like a rock star by the New Jersey crowd, too. I dunno how much consciousness is being raised by this event, though even a little is good, but my first inclination is toward optimism: surely, if we can simultaneously stage megaconcerts like these across the planet, we can start getting in gear about global warming. Right?

And my optimism was boosted by the fact that when Live Earth said “all seven continents,” they weren’t kidding. I was scoffing earlier in the day, saying to myself, “What, they’re got a concert in Antarctica, too?” Well, yeah, they did. Nunatak is the:

British Antarctic Survey’s Rothera Research Station’s house band. The five person indie rock band is part of a science team investigating climate change and evolutional biology on the Antarctic Peninsula – a region where temperatures have risen by nearly 3°C during the last 50 years.

Which makes Nunatak officially the coolest band playing today, figuratively as well as literally. Not only are they actively doing something beyond rocking out to save the planet, they are the face of the fight against climate change: they’re all between 22 and 28 years old, which makes them Millennials or Xers on the Millennial cusp. They’re the first recruits in the Milliennial army. When General Dave Matthews (Xer; born 1967) takes up the mantle of leadership and directs the troops with the advice of Gray Champion Al Gore (Boomer; born 1948), these are the troops he’ll be sending into battle.

Nunatak’s performance is already up on YouTube:

The crowd was really into it, bobbing their heads in time to the music and everything.

(Technorati tags: Live Earth, Nunatak)