John ButlerGreen-leaning grass-roots movement Amplify Divestment's regiment of famous supporters has grown again, with venerated Aussie troubadour John Butler, veteran muso David Bridie, vocal activist rockers The Medics and more among the newest group of musicians to lend their voices and faces to the cause.
If you missed our original report back in December, Amplify Divestment was created by Green Music Australia, run by muso Tim Hollo, in an effort to force the hand of big banks with respect to their support for the fossil fuel industry by gathering up folks such as Missy Higgins, Ash Grunwald and Midnight Oil's Rob Hirst to very publicly threaten to cut up their cards and close their accounts should the financial institutions decide not to decrease their contributions.
"The future of energy is clean renewables," Butler, a customer of Westpac and one of the country's most visible activism-prone identities, said of his commitment to the cause in a statement.
"If we just put our billions into THAT technology we'd see some real and meaningful changes. That's why I'm going to pull my investment and superannuation out of Westpac if they don't stop funding prehistoric and backward fossil fuel industries."
In addition to Butler, Bridie and The Medics, Darren Hanlon, Linsey Pollak, Super Best Friends' Johnny Barrington, Liam Gerner and a slew of renowned classical musicians such as composer/screenwriter Nigel Westlake, opera singer Tobias Cole and lauded Aussie pianist Michael Kieran Harvey have all lent their names to the cause, standing up to what early supporter Grunwald described as the "needless" use of fossil fuels in today's age.
"Why would we keep polluting our planet when we've got the alternatives here and now?" he wrote at the time.
For more information about Amplify Divestment, see the organisation's website. Green Music Australia? This way.
