This Artist Made a Popular Climate Change Awareness Music Video
Here’s what he has to say about it.
Not too long ago, Jake Newcomb wrote an article titled Why Don’t Musicians Sing About Climate Change? Interestingly enough, his piece was retweeted by one of his favorite authors, Amitav Ghosh.
When that retweet happened, all of a sudden people were replying somewhat proving him wrong. (In a good way though, as the more songs about climate change the better.)
One of them came from Kēvens.
After that happened, I immediately researched and found some pretty interesting insights on the musician. For example, he has a history with the Marley’s. Yes, that Marley.
But more importantly, Kēvens has been making music like this for years. Just two years ago, he released Sweet Lady Liberty — a song about why Americans need to come together to embrace our original values of being an open place against hatred. His message is all about positivity and bringing people together for the good of it all.
As I was compelled by his work, I reached out to him and found that he’s actually quarantined just north of my hometown in Florida. We bonded over a Skype session and discussed his work for hours.
But as always, here’s some of the good stuff.
Noah: Can you elaborate on your work as a climate change activist?
Kēvens: I never saw myself as an activist. But I tell you this, when I was younger, much younger, I was going out with this young lady from South Africa, [she] was a marine biologist [and] went to just me to Greenpeace. So I’m talking about the early 90's. So when I did, I did my first save the world concert for Greenpeace. I’m talking about maybe 1990/91.
So this is when I learned about climate change very early on, I didn’t give it too much attention at the time. But the one thing that I knew growing up was [to] respect the planet. It’s alive. It’s an entity. It feeds you, it can kill you. All the plants. You know, I’ve been I’ve been a vegetarian for over thirty years, and vegan on and off. But for the past two years I’ve been vegan.
The planet heals us, the planet allow us to have the strength, the palate [to] allow us to thrive. If the planet is sick, so are we. I learned that very, very early in my in my life, thanks to my family. And I think the way to make it change for non believers out there is to — in Sunday school, we are taught to offer our mother and father, I think young people should learn to honor the planet early in school. So we grew up knowing that the planet is alive. Whatever we do to it, sooner or later, we pay the price. That’s what I’ve been thinking. That’s what I have learned ever since a child. And that’s what I’m trying to pass on through my music, that information.
Noah: Were people as aware of climate change back in the 90’s when you did the Greenpeace gig?
Kēvens: Look at now, people are denying right now — imagine back then it was really like pulling teeth to make people understand. People in the scientific world of course had data to work with.
But if you take a moment to go in nature, which I think people have to do, get yourself out of the concrete jungle, go into the real jungle and merge with the forest. Just let the spirit of the trees go through you — experience the mountains, experience the wilderness, I believe, if everyone has a chance to do that — somehow, someway — you will find that commonality with Mother Nature. Right there. I think that’s gonna send a signal to your lower mind that we need to pay attention to where the planet is bleeding.
When you look at the amount of plastic in the ocean, when you look at certain places, when you see the trash, there is nothing pretty about it. There is nothing exciting about it. It looks sad. Whenever you see someone take a bottle and throw it in the streets, there’s something wrong with that. When you multiply all those wrongs, you don’t have to be a scientist to understand the wrongs that we are doing. You know, like the oil spills, for instance, all the animals dying. Open your eyes and see. And look, you can see it, stop ignoring it. This is what we do. We all see it, but we choose to ignore it because we feel comfortable. People feel disconnected. To the wrongs that’s happening to the planet, they don’t they don’t think their problem is just what I’m saying. That’s what I said to you prior.
You know, there’s no separation in people and people to people, this one world is our world, the only one we ever had. You know what I mean? The only one we ever had. So, we need to connect with Mother Nature in the most organic way. Go to Mother Nature, get out of the concrete jungle. Go spend time with the trees, go spend time by the rivers. Go spend time in nature. Try to meditate, try to sit on just in silence.
“When you look at the amount of plastic in the ocean, when you look at certain places, when you see the trash, there is nothing pretty about it. There is nothing exciting about it. It looks sad. Whenever you see someone take a bottle and throw it in the streets, there’s something wrong with that. When you multiply all those wrongs, you don’t have to be a scientist to understand the wrongs that we are doing.” — Kēvens
Noah: When did you first become inspired to write World Is Burning and what was the song creation process like for it?
Kēvens: Two years ago, I went to Hawaii with my fiance and I only remember when the volcanoes were erupting two years ago. [On] my way to the Big Island, 10 minutes before we landed a lady on the plane started to freak out. Oh my god, interrupting, interrupting I was looking at like, Are you talking about the volcano?
The main volcano has erupted after years of being dormant and it’s pulling out, putting people out of their homes. This is my first time in Hawaii and I’m like what?
So I landed, went to where we’re staying. When we got in a couple of days afterwards, not 10 miles from the crater man. If you ever know what life is all about go through a hurricane or an earthquake. We had an earthquake and wow, that woke me up. When I tell you the fear of God entered me it’s like I felt so small. When the earth kicks in your feet, there is no way to run there is nowhere to hide. And just 10 miles from where we’re staying. Here was the big crater and air is hard to breathe.
I look at the volcano and I said to myself, I see things in the movies though it looks crazy but cleaned up enough. Thinking, world is burning. The world is on fire. Open your eyes.
From my perspective, I was there. I saw it. And I was thinking, oh my god, I can’t run from this. You know thinking about the planes, kilometres a bomb in the skies, poisoning everything we do down below, open your eyes and see what’s in front of you. I’m thinking right in the front. Here is the Earth, the planet is speaking loud and clear. When the world burns, we are dying.
And the fire has different meanings also, not the fire itself — coronavirus is a fire. It’s driving you, it’s killing you at the end of the day. It’s a wake up call, but it’s a bit late, not quite too late if we choose to do the right thing right now collectively. We have one more chance to make everything right then we can reverse the process according to a few scientists.
We just saw with coronavirus what happens when we stop on the wrongs that we are doing to Mother Nature. Clarity comes back. The animals come back. The fish like you seen in the lakes are back. What if we did that for a year to two? Five years? On top of that since we talked about the coronavirus I believe every disease, whether manmade or nature made, the cure or the kills are in the plants. The pollution, the deforestation. We are killing our own selves. What if the cure for coronavirus lies in a tree or in a plant that’s been extinct? Where are we? We go on, like the dinosaurs.
This is my point of view on this thing. Open your eyes and see, mankind. Forget religion. Forget border walls. Forget all the nonsense. We have one planet. We are connected. We are distant, yet connected. Let’s wait. Let’s be civilized after all these years of evolution, yes, we are mechanized, but we are not civilized. Let’s open our eyes. Let’s embrace modern nature and heal ourselves by healing the planet.
Noah: What else do you think we should do as a collective unit to fight things like climate change?
Kēvens: Since I like to go to farms, I watch exactly what I eat — every little thing that goes my mouth. I watch it. If I’m eating a potato, I want it to be organic.
We need to spend time again [and] we have to go back to nature. Go into the forest. What happens to you when you go to the forest and you sit in a lake you feel older by the ocean, you feel refreshed. That’s what nature does. Again, too many people live in the concrete jungle. Too many people are lacking the blessings of the forest. The blessing of the trees, too many people are thinking too much of greed, cutting down trees. Let’s get that oh, let’s get that let’s make that money. And how long is he gonna live anyways?
So let’s face this axiom: let’s give love and respect to the planet as alive and well. It’s so alive you rely on it to feed you but you ignore it. You rely on it to heal you but you know it is gonna survive. At the end we will not.
So education with the youth. We go to school we learn the ABCs, in schools, and on the next generation, let’s embrace that now. We do not have to go through science — look around you. Next time you go to the beach, you see, the pollution is right in front of you. You don’t want that in the front of your house. You don’t want it in your bedroom, you know, pile of trash in the front in your living room. Let’s be conscious about what we do. You cannot force people to care. We don’t want to care. This is where the planet comes in and do what it does when there is fire when there were hurricanes, or floods when people start losing things.
“Open your eyes and see, mankind. Forget religion. Forget border walls. Forget all the nonsense. We have one planet. We are connected. We are distant, yet connected.” — Kēvens
*Kēvens and I would discuss his past work with Bob Marley’s sons and brother and he brought about an interesting question.*
Noah: It’s interesting because you brought up that Bob Marley singing about cannabis legalization, for example, was political activism. But your type of activism is more individualistic in the sense of telling us listeners to go outside and really enjoy Mother Nature. So could you talk to us more about some of the pros and cons of let’s say the political activism that someone like Bob Marley did versus the more individualistic activism that you promote?
Kēvens: I would like to say we are all political on some degree. But I don’t like to go too deep into politics because I know all politics are politics, and as a spiritual being, who practices spirituality, meditates every day and prays everyday — the power lies in the individual and he or she connects to the higher source because knowledge is not in the books that you read in school. Knowledge is in the universe from your highest self, your spirit, because if not check it out every book you read. So, you wrote it, someone who had that knowledge in his or her own time. So, if you understand very early on you have access to the source, go to the source.
I believe we are all spiritual beings in this physical body, going through this journey, so the client helps open how to bring peace and joy and healing. This is what I would like to let everyone know — we all have access that you get it. So therefore you need politics to educate, you don’t need politics to choose. This should be one choice.
When you go against those things, you go against your own self. Like I was saying I thought the herbs, all along [were] for healing, but politics of money and the big tobacco industry control many things.
I like to say spirituality is the only way not religious through. Connect again, connect with the source. I will wake up 5:30 in the morning, go outside to breathe the fresh air before many cars outside before the pollution process begins. I would just go out and breathe in and just smile and just be happy. Watch the dawn, you know, the little sun gazing at times, whenever it’s possible and just merge with Mother Nature brings me joy and peace and keep me grounded. This is what I practice. This is what I’d like to offer people to do or people to do for themselves. Today, you don’t need to be a politician for that.
Noah: Can you talk to us about how you made the music video for World Is Burning?
Kēvens: I wanted to do a proper music video for a long time. And honestly, after I got fine and things didn’t work out it took me a long time to get back on my feet. I was thinking about what’s the best way to get my point across with out spending the money we have to spend, so I wrote a script because I did some acting early in my life you know, so I know how the camera works and then I know how to script work and my story works as a songwriter.
So I wanted to find somebody and I found this gentleman out of Israel who had the ability to get the pictures that I requested. And by the way the idea came in after I did a prior video called Sweet Lady Liberty. I don’t know if you had a chance to check it. I don’t know if you’ve seen it or not.
I wrote it after the Charlottesville incident. It was made to unite all and America but anyways, I did it using video collages and stuff like that. And, before I’m like okay, so why don’t I just find an outlet to where I can use high level visuals that can, you know, express the lyric, the lyrical content, and I found somebody who could do it and I put everything together and I asked can you do this for me. And to my surprise he did.
Want to keep up with Kēvens? Find his music and socials here.
This interview was edited for clarity and concision.