Jack Johnson, Environmentalist

Jack Johnson mixes music and environmentalism. Read about some of his choices in this excerpt from "Walk Tall and Act Natural", by Jon Cohen, in Outside Magazine.

"Johnson's music has a message, too, but it's not so much in the songs as in how he brings them to the public. He's toured on a biodiesel bus since 2005, and he requires that performance venues buy carbon offsets for every show and compost the organic waste from his concerts. He's staged the Kokua Festival in Oahu each spring since 2004—playing with friends like Eddie Vedder, Ben Harper, and Willie Nelson—and donates proceeds to the Kokua Hawaii Foundation, which he started to support environmental education in schools.

With the recent remodeling of the Brushfire offices, he and his business partner, Emmett Malloy—cousin of the pro-surfer Malloy brothers, Chris, Keith, and Dan—now operate one of the most eco-minded record companies in the industry. The Brushfire studios run on electricity provided by 32 rooftop solar panels; the building is insulated with blue-jeans scraps and outfitted with compact fluorescent lighting and low-flush toilets. Johnson even recorded Sleep Through the Static, his new album, which hits stores in February, in analog, on a hand-me-down 24-track Studer deck that reportedly once taped a David Bowie album."

Read the whole article here. Image by Jeffy Lipsky for Outside Magazine.