One of the best bands from the 80’s is Dramarama.  I don’t think they ever made it big nationally, but they had a huge radio hit with “Anything, Anything” here on the East Coast.   This song was pure energy and is still one of my favorite songs of all time.

This week I would like to feature another song by Dramarama called “What Are We Gonna Do?”.  Please excuse the mistake in the opening line, we know Earth Day is April 22nd, but I guess they had the date wrong when they recorded it.  Seems kind of funny now to make such an obvious mistake when we have instant access to the internet.  Back then, song writers just wrote lyrics and I guess nobody took the time to actually check the date.

Anyway, I found this video on YouTube that uses the song with some wonderful images of our beautiful planet.  There are also 50 inspirational messages to help encourage all of us to live better and take action.  I hope you find motivation in one or more or the messages while enjoying the music.

It’s April 21st and everybody knows today is Earth Day
Merry Christmas, Happy Birthday to whoever’s being born
And now I’m trying hard to think of something
meaningful and worthy, kind of earthy
to make everybody ask themselves just

What are we doing here?
and what are we doing to her?

I don’t know
What are we gonna do?
What are we gonna do?
What are we gonna do?

Fast Company has an interesting story in their April issue entitled “10 Ways To Jump-Start the Auto Business”.  The on-line version has been expanded to 25 ways, so I guess there are a lot of opinions out there for our auto industry.  This is a thought provoking article that highlights many of the current problems and offers some potential solutions.

Some of the issues they address include:

• Higher gas tax
• Car design
• Advertising
• Social networks
• Alternative fuels
• Monorail technology
• Hybrid vehicles
• Buy American
• Sell your car

All of these ideas to get the auto business moving again are well intentioned and very valid if you agree with the premise of the article.  My problem is that I think the last thing we need is more cars.  We already have plenty of cars, we just need to make more efficient use of the existing “fleet”.

So instead of trying to improve a broken system, I believe we should go in a new direction.  We have to explore a broad strategy to get people out of their cars.  Increased ride share, car share, mass transit, biking and walking are the future.

photo credit: vieux bandit

I missed posting this week’s song over the weekend, so I am putting one up tonight.  My blogging during the whole month of March was seriously lacking.  I have been swamped with work and struggling to find the time to write here.  It is not for lack of inspiration, just lack of energy right now, which seems kind of ironic.  Anyway, I will try to do a better job this month and catch up on the backlog of posts that I have accumulated.

My good friend Scott runs a live music venue in Asbury Park called The Saint.  So last night he booked a band from Ireland, Guggenheim Grotto.  I have heard a few of their songs on the radio, watched a couple of videos on YouTube and like their sound.  Well they greatly exceeded my expectations with a brilliant live performance.

You see, I typically work on this blog at night, once my kids go to sleep.  It can take me a few hours to catch up on my news feeds and find a story that I want to write about.  Next thing I know it is after one in the morning and I need to sleep or I will never get up in the morning.  So the line in the chorus of this song, “I just can’t seem to get out of bed anymore”, seems very appropriate.

Well, I hope you enjoy this video by my favorite new band.  I picked up their cd at the show last night and it has been on heavy rotation all day.  Thanks again Scott for bringing great original music to the Jersey shore.

she used to say about love,
that it should come from above
and it should come from below
she used to say my love
wear the lips of a saint
and the hips of a whore
and when we’d walk along the street she’d say
if it rains now, I hope to God it pours
and with her beautiful ideas,
she’d cut me in half, clean this broad sword.

and now I~
I just cant seem to get out of bed anymore..
yeah and now my~
my heart hangs worn and weak like an old wire door
and now I~
I just cant seem to get out of bed anymore~

I saw this story on The Oil Drum last week and found it very disturbing.  The story is entitled “The 88,000,000,000 barrel debt”.  They use some very simple graphs to illustrate this powerful message.  I highly recommend clicking on this link so you can see the graphs.

The first graph shows how US Energy Production has been almost constant for the past 30 years.  The second graph illustrates how our Energy Consumption has grown over that same period of time.  In the third and final graph, they show the ever rising debt.

So while the US Oil Production has declined over the years, we have compensated by producing more coal and natural gas.  Even with these changes, we have still consumed well beyond our capacity.  After studying the numbers, I put together this chart:

Do you see a shocking pattern in these numbers?  While it took us 12 years to accumulate a debt of 22 billion barrels of oil in the 80’s, we are now averaging a debt of 5.5 billion barrels a year.  At this rate, we will hit 100 billion by the end of 2010.  So much for Energy Independence.

I think that this just further illustrates that increased production of alternative energy will only help so much.  The real answer lies in reduced consumption.  Passenger Energy is one tool that could help close this huge gap between production and consumption.

Recently I saw this article on Treehugger entitled “Facebook App Saves PC Energy…Maybe”.  This Facebook application makes recommendations for configuring your PC for lower energy usage.  You can then invite friends to join and see who wins a “Green Your PC” challenge.

This is a good way to get others involved through a social networking site.  I am a big fan of Peer Review and Ratings for building reputation.  If you can trust the opinion of many others then we can greatly reduce the fear of strangers.  This is a key point in helping establish an organized paid ride sharing system like Pay4Rides.

How else can we use social networking and twitter to bring people together to make new “friends”?

This is a long clip (12 minutes) from Live Aid and it is a little spotty during a few points, but a very powerful performance.  To continue the celebration of Earth Hour I wanted to feature a song that shows the spirit of people coming together.  If you watch the clip, let me know what you think.

To let it go! And so to fade away
To let it go! And so to fade away
I’m wide awake
I’m wide awake
Wide awake
I’m not sleeping, oh no, no, no

According to this story from AP, Earth Hour was a big success.  I am very excited about any idea that can gather this much attention and increase awareness of our current energy consumption.

I was at a party Saturday night where the hosts turned off the lights and lit candles.  It was a fun experience to share with friends and all the kids were even more enthusiastic than the parents.  The youth of today wants us to reduce our wasteful habits to leave them a better world.

Here is a video celebrating the first 2 years of Earth Hour while encouring even more participation this year.

This week’s song is a strong recommendation from my 10 ½ year old daughter Jane.  It was not my first choice, but she can be very persuasive.  If you are not familiar with Miley Cyrus, then you do not have a young girl in your house that watches Hannah Montana almost every day.

After listening to this song, I have to agree with her.  It has a great message about the youth of today telling us all to wake up to the everyday challenges that we face.  Unfortunately, many of us are currently looking the other way.

So, maybe this song will inspire you to take action.  If not, you might be harassed like me, by a cute girl singing this song during your next car ride.

Ohh
Can you take care of her
Ohh
Maybe you can spare her
Several moments
Of your consideration
Leading up
To the final destination
Ohh
The Earth is calling out
I wanna learn
What it’s all about

But everything I read
Is global warming
Going green
I don’t know
What all this means
But it seems
To be saying

Wake up America
We’re all
In this together
It’s our home
So let’s take care of it
You know that you want to
You know that you got
To wake up America

In celebration of St. Patrick’s Day this week I would like to feature an Irish group.  There are so many great ones including Van Morrison, U2, The Waterboys and The Pogues.  The band I chose for this week is Snow Patrol doing their song “Chasing Cars”:

We’ll do it all
Everything
On our own

We don’t need
Anything
Or anyone

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

I believe the song is about a girl, but when I listen to the lyrics I can also hear a cry for Energy Independence.  Go ahead, look at the lyrics above while listening to the song and let me know what you think.

On Wednesday, Australia suffered one of the area’s biggest environmental disasters when a cargo ship leaked tons of fuel oil into the ocean.  A massive clean-up is now underway along nearly 40 miles of east coast beach.

Initially the crew reported the spill was only 5,000 – 8,000 gallons, but later corrected their estimate to be ten times more, closer to 60,000 gallons.  The freighter was struggling in rough seas when some cargo came loose and punctured the fuel tanks.  The massive oil spill is bad enough, but the cargo causing the damage is reported to be 31 containers of ammonium nitrate.  It is believed that the 620 tons of chemicals in the containers have sunk to the ocean floor and pose another threat to the wildlife if not recovered soon.

As bad as this spill is, it does not come close to The Worst Major Oil Spills in History.  When are we going to learn?  This is just another example of the costs to our environment associated with the import of foreign oil.

I truly feel bad for the people of Australia and wish them the best in their clean-up.  We all need to seek clean alternative energy and continue to improve our conservation efforts.