Billie Eilish. Marleen Moise/Getty Images
Billie Eilish is slamming music stars who release multiple vinyl versions of their albums in different packaging without regard for the negative impact on the environment.
“Some of the biggest artists in the world [are] making f—king 40 different vinyl packages that have a different unique thing just to get you to keep buying more,” Eilish, 22, told Billboard in an interview published Thursday, March 28.
“It’s so wasteful, and it’s irritating to me that we’re still at a point where you care that much about your numbers and you care that much about making money — and it’s all your favorite artists doing that s–t,” the Oscar and Grammy winner continued.
Eilish has been one of the music industry’s most outspoken campaigners on sustainability issues. Last year, she helped launch and fund Reverb’s Music Decarbonization Project, which aims to eliminate carbon emissions created by the music industry.
Eilish’s second and latest album, 2021’s Happier Than Ever, was released in eight different colored vinyl versions. However, in her commitment to sustainability, she used recycled black vinyl plus recycled scraps for colored variants, and shrink-wrap made from sugar cane.
The “What Was I Made For?” singer expressed that she is disappointed other artists do not share her commitment to the environment.
“I can’t even express to you how wasteful it is,” she added about the growth of numerous vinyl versions of the same album. “It is right in front of our faces and people are just getting away with it left and right, and I find it really frustrating as somebody who really goes out of my way to be sustainable and do the best that I can and try to involve everybody in my team in being sustainable.”
While speaking with Billboard, Eilish recalled at the beginning of her career when she was 15 years old, her mother, Maggie Baird, would ask music executives what they were doing to save the environment.
“They’d be tripping and stumbling over their words because they’re not doing anything,” Eilish remembered. “And it was kind of alarming to find that no one’s really doing anything to better the world. ”
Baird, 64, added that one record executive did have some positive advice.
“What really helped me was somebody said, “You need to talk to [Coldplay’s] Chris Martin,” she told Billboard. “They connected me on a call with Chris, which was amazing. Then Chris connected me to REVERB, and REVERB was a real game-changer for us. They had the ability to help us know what to change and how to communicate.”
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Eilish is signed to the Universal Music Group, and her mother says the company is making a commitment to improving the environment.
“I will say happily that Universal has really come a long way. We had three Universal Music Group Sustainability Summits last year, one in London, one in L.A., one in New York with just UMG employees talking about all the various issues,” Baird added. “I used to be like, ‘Why are we the ones doing this? Like, why is a 15-year-old girl and her mom talking about this? Why aren’t you telling us, why don’t you have all the advice on this?’ But gradually they have started to, which I think is really encouraging.”
