Beyond that, she recently announced her third album, HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, to be released May 17, 2024. She spent the days leading up to the announcement building excitement by adding all of her Instagram followers to her “Close Friends” list. Eilish had the most Instagram followers in 48 hours…with her count increasing by 7 million followers total.
While her debut album, when we all fall asleep…where do we go?, was a chart-topper in its own right, it landed Billie every GRAMMY it was nominated for at the ripe age of 18…Eilish has solidified herself as one of the most revered and sought-after popstars in the world.
Eilish recently caught media attention for quietly revealing her sexuality. In an interview with Variety, she states that she’s always liked girls…and assumed people always knew that. In a viral snippet from her new song, LUNCH, she details a love affair with a girl.
But people don’t only adore Billie for her catchy tracks that consistently top the charts. It’s not just her songwriting ability and unique vocals that keep us hooked. People love her because she’s unafraid to speak her mind.
Whether it be complaining about too many influencers being at an awards show, or calling out other artists for using unsustainable practices…Billie does not hold back.
Billie Eilish On Sustainability
Eilish home
rethinkingthefuture.com
The Eilish home is iconic for many reasons: it’s where Billie and Finneas recorded her debut album, countless other songs, and EPs, in an effort to conserve water there’s no grass, and the roof is covered in solar panels. And being environmentally conscious extends beyond the four walls of their home.
When the hottest young talent is discovered at such an early age like Eilish, record labels are chomping at the bit to sign them. It’s like when a D1 athlete is ready to commit to college…you have your pick.
But what Eilish and her mom, Maggie Baird, were looking for wasn’t about money or label-perks…they were seeking a solid sustainability program. And while that may seem like standard practice, most labels didn’t bring up environmental policies during these meetings at all.
After signing to The Darkroom via Interscope Records, the struggle didn’t stop there. Billie Eilish and her family have been consistent contributors to the fight against climate change.
Maggie Baird has since started Support + Feed, which focuses on the climate crisis and food insecurity. Support + Feed helped Eilish’s 2022 Happier Than Ever tour save 8.8 million gallons of water through plant-based meal service for the artist and crew members.
During Billie’s 2023 Lollapalooza performance, she aided the launch and funding of REVERB’s Music Decarbonization Project – which guaranteed all battery systems used during her set were solar powered. The MCD’s overall mission is to lower – and eventually eliminate –the music industry’s carbon emissions.
But more recently, Billie Eilish called out other artists for releasing multiple versions of vinyls in order to boost vinyl sales. In an interview with Billboard, she says,
“We live in this day and age where, for some reason, it’s very important to some artists to make all sorts of different vinyl and packaging … which ups the sales and ups the numbers and gets them more money and gets them more…”
Artists convince fans to buy different versions of their albums by offering exclusive features on each vinyl. Take Taylor Swift, for example, who released five separate vinyl versions of Midnights, each with a different deluxe “Vault” track.
While Billie may not have been trying to shade one artist in particular, the point is that she’s fed up. After being the rare artist in the industry who go out of their way to remain environmentally conscious, Eilish sets the bar high.
How Eilish’s New Album Is Sustainable
Billie for "Hit Me Hard and Soft"
William Drumm
Social media users were quick to claim Eilish was hypocritical by announcing that HIT ME HARD AND SOFT will have eight vinyl variations. However, each vinyl is made from recycled materials – either 100% recycled black vinyl or BioVinyl, which replaces petroleum used during manufacturing with recycled cooking oil.
This just illustrates that Eilish wasn’t directing criticism towards other artists for using vinyl variants to gain album sales…but she does think there are better ways to do it that benefit the environment without hurting their sales.
The NYC Subway: Endless Repairs and a Desperate Future
Photo: Raymond Francisco
The New York City subway opened in October 1904, but it was privately built and managed until 1940 when Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia bought and consolidated the two private companies who'd owned it for over $300 million. Yet, ridership was already peaking as the country saw a future of personal automobiles on the horizon. After decades of refusing to raise fares, the city finally doubled the price to a dime per ride. Soon, a statewide referendum approved an exemption from the state's tax limit for the city to continue its subway expansion. Instead, the administration used the money to reduce what had already become a giant deferred maintenance problem. The MTA New Yorkers know today wasn't formed until 1965, by Governor Nelson Rockefeller. Though the subway system was finally under its present state-controlled organization, its problems continued to grow as the city neared bankruptcy.
A history of large problems and inadequate or emergency solutions has defined the aging but essential subway system of today. The cheap and accessible movement of those six million daily riders around New York's boroughs drives the city's economic, innovative and artistic engines. New York City and its surrounding areas create over $1.5 trillion in gross metropolitan product: close to 9% of the country's GDP in 2016. Researchers have estimated that losing the subway for a month due to a Hurricane Sandy-sized storm would cost New York City $60 billion in "lost economic output."
The city's economy—and a large chunk of the U.S. economy—depend on an out-of-date, complex public transportation network that doesn't have enough money to repair itself or to continue expanding. The city's inability to catch up on the long list of repairs only increases the number and severity of the system's problems.
Only 3% of the subway's tracks meet the cleanliness standards required by their own governing body, the MTA. Meanwhile, parts of the signal system that controls train movements are so old and obsolete that they have to be built in-house by the MTA because no company manufactures them today. And almost half of the 6,400 cars running on tracks daily were built between 1960-1989, with half of those due for repairs or replacement. The subway's problems are as old as its parts.
Governor Cuomo introduced an $800 million "NYC Subway Action Plan" to help fix the struggling system. He wants the state to pay for half of the plan and the city to cover the rest, but Mayor De Blasio refuses to add to the huge amount the city already pays in taxes to maintain its subway. Why the governor of a state—in which a significant portion of the population does not live in the city or use its subway—controls the MTA and appoints its chairman is another question.
The New York Times Magazine estimates that the needed repairs to the subway would cost at least $111 billion. This doesn't include the increased flooding and unforeseen damage caused by more powerful storms and rising sea levels. Subway tunnels snake below sea level beneath a city surrounded by water. Alan Weisman's book, The World Without Us, highlights the role workers play in keeping the subways dry. Over 750 electric pumps work ceaselessly to pump 13 million gallons of groundwater (the water already in the ground) uphill every day. At one station in Brooklyn, 650 gallons of water per minute must be pumped out. Half an hour without the pump makes the station impassable. When it rains, the water rushes below ground even more quickly, and when a hurricane floats up the coast, the amount of water is incalculable.
The subway is always under construction because the list of repairs is impossibly backlogged. The city cannot fix the subway's problems quickly enough without great, preventative changes to the way the system operates in the future. That is exactly what the president of New York City Transit, Andy Byford, has proposed. His ambitious 10-year plan, called Fast Forward, promises a modern NYC subway within the decade. The agency will begin installing a modern switching system, replace subway cars, improve stations, and make dozens of them wheelchair accessible. By changing the way the MTA spends money, the plan could complete the most important parts of that $111 billion renovation for about $40 billion.
Why has the city stopped building new lines? That is a simpler question to answer. Too much money must be directed toward repairs to undertake any significant, new building projects. And New York City has become the most expensive tunneling area in the world. The city spent between $100 million and $250 million (in 2017 dollars) per mile, building the original tunnels and tracks in the 1900s and '10s. Last year's long-awaited 2nd Avenue extension cost $2 billion per mile.
If the city and state can agree to fund Byford's plan, the subway might soon receive the upgrades it needs. Any future expansion of the subway will depend on the success of Fast Forward's changes to the MTA's operation and its spending on maintenance, repairs, and construction. The subway is the heart of New York City. How do you perform open-heart surgery on something that doesn't sleep?
