WEBVTT

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So, AY,
so nice to meet you in person,

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and I'm impressed by your story, I mean,

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you are a young artist
who was used to play on the street.

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You had a dream to play, play plugged,

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but with sustainable energy,

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and the energy is essential for you.

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Totally.

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So you starting from that dream.

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You played more than 800 concerts
all over the States.

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It’s been crazy! Yeah, close to 900 now.

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I mean, we have that in common
as far as what you guys do, right?

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I mean, renewable energy, you know,
I wanted to make sure,

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aside from living out my dream
of like doing a show every day,

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that I made like
a good impact on the world.

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And like I realized, Oh my God,

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energy is the basic resource like
we all need energy, right?

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And if you store enough, you can power anything,

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and that's what I started doing the Battery Tour.

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I was doing eight to ten hour performances

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and it wasn't even called

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the Battery Tour at the time, like it was…

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I remember I was performing my songs, say Hey,

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and I was looking back
and I'm like seeing the batteries.

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I'm like, Ah, this is,
I’m AY and this is the Battery Tour.

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Remind me the concept of batteries
because it's amazing.

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So you essentially you moved
from a city to a city.

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And what's happened?

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How is the touch with the community?

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How do you engage with them?

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Honestly, man, once I built the concept

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or learned or kind of had this Eureka moment

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that everyone was an outlet for change, right?

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Like, I think everyone in the world,

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even if it's a company like yourselves, Enel,

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corporations, individuals,
we're all outlets and we can all power change

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and we can all take an action, right?

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So people would donate
when I was doing those long…

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performances, they would be like,

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you know, Hey, where you're your outlets,
we power the tour.

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So I started taking
this donation money just to go,

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from city to city and state to state
to local communities.

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And just do music,
just bring people together at the local level,

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at the community level,
all ages, all demographics,

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bringing people together,
united under music, you know?

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But I'll say this:
the Battery Tour shifted to an impact engine.

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Like that's what I call it,

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because once I learned that
a billion people don't have energy,

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then it gave the Battery Tour more purpose.

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And so I built this thing called the outlet,

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and I started using the concerts strictly
as a way to raise enough money

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to get one person,
one village access to energy, right?

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To get the world plugged in.
So that's how it functions.

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Because you have been traveling
through rural areas

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that don’t have access to electricity.

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We are fully committed on
SDG number seven and…

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clean energy for everybody!

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But I mean, dude,

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I've gotten energy access
to over 17 countries

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and that was powered by the people.

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You know, we're doing these grassroot concerts

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that are literally raising enough money

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to build technology to get someone energy access.

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That's what I've been doing over 17 countries,

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close to 900 shows,
and it's been taking off recently.

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You have been named as the only American

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and the only musician SDG ambassador,

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there are 17 SDG ambassadors,
one for each SDG.

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And you are the only musician
and the only from the States.

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Yeah, it's crazy.

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How do you feel this responsibility?

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Yeah, I know.

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We have to come together
at this point, right?

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To make this happen and

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it is a theme song for Goal 17, you know,

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in the sense of Goal 17 is all about
partnerships and coming together.

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And I mean,
and that's what Project 17 is about.

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I can talk about like in general,

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like since becoming a young leader,

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launching Project 17, because

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that's kind of a different thing.
It's like, OK, I did all this stuff.

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Now I'm the young leader.

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And you know,
Amina Mohammed designated me

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with the Secretary-General Antonio Guterres,
right?

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And all the young leaders had to have
a project or projects, right?

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And so for me,
Project 17 came in like ten seconds.

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Because Project 17 is your amazing plan of making

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an album covering all the SDGs, right?

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And people are like, Oh, my gosh,

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this guy's spent his whole life
trying to get this project...

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But really, I just looked at the goals,

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and Amina Mohammed was like talking

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and then like the Secretary-General,

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whatever, you know,
I was meeting the young leaders.

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They were talking about these millennial goals

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and a while ago,
the global goals were the millennial goals,

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you know, and I'm looking at him and I'm like, Dude,

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nobody knows what this is.

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And so I was just like, ok,
music is the universal language,

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everyone's an outlet,

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every facet of humanity is an outlet for change.

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And so I just looked at the goals, and I was like,

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OK, one song for each goal, but each song
has to be in collaboration

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with one or more of Earth's biggest artists plugged into

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what they're passionate about, right?

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Using the framework of the goals.

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Then we'll go do a tour, 17 dates.

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I'll start in the US just because
I'm from the US, right?

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But it's a global project.

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That's why I'm here in Rome and Milan,

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already pre-launching Project 17,

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which you're a part of,
and helped make happen.

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And then, there's some other stuff to it,

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shooting a docu series because
people need to see the journey

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and see that we're all the same
and see that even within

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the number one
renewable energy company in the world,

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which is crazy!

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You guys are humans
that have passions and that are…

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care about what you're doing, right?

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I mean, that's what we're doing right now,

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we're getting the world plugged in.

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And every date,
every venue that will cover with…

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that you will touch with the Battery Tour
will have a special project,

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community-based and the impact.

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I got impressed by this because
you are aware that in this moment

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you have to disseminate and create awareness.

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But later on with the plan of the Battery Tour

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is that every venue will have…

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will host a special community project

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and the impact will be measured.

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Yeah. And so and it's funny because
we just talked about,

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we said album and the tour.

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But the most important piece of
it is what you're saying,

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is what I call the impact project.

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I can imagine how deep
is the connection with the young guys

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that you have been working the day before

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to build up the outlet
- Yeah.

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And later, the day after,

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where you play the concert, thanks to the…

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Oh, totally.

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Yeah. So I mean, what you're referring to

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is even the educational pieces,

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we’re also all about education
and empowering the community.

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So it's not just,

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coming and showing up and doing a concert.

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We even do things like,

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before we do the concert, come into the town,

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recruit volunteers in the community or the area

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and we'll build the solar technology,

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the trailers and or the outlet boxes, right?

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And then, you know, the following day

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we can perform on what
we just built as a community

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and then leave it in the community
for impact, right?

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Or for, like, say,
if the power went out or a disaster,

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now they've got, this solar trailer,

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to power the community.

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So, it's really all about action,
education, impact.

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I mean, and that's what I've been doing
without the world plugged in, right?

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So now it's beautiful…

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Now it’s time to scale up.

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We didn’t mention,
but thanks to the work that you have done,

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you have been invited
for the inauguration of Biden.

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That was awesome. I mean,

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it's crazy because like remember I told you,
like in the beginning,

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I would try to open up for big name acts
and they'd be like,

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“Well, how many followers do you have, you know?”

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And I still don't have a million followers,

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and that's what I want people to know

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is you don't have to have a million followers

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on Instagram or Twitter to do something.

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And here I am, first of all,

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the only performer that did it powered
by renewable energy.

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Now, back to the previous point, it's interesting,

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you don't want to have
thousands and thousands of followers

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that they don't take action.

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You prefer less,
but they have to commit themselves

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and they have to take action.

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At a minimum, you have to be an outlet:

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in order to be an outlet,

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you're going to do two things:
you're going to power,

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you’re going to support change.

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Now, however, that is,

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and then you’re going to take an action.

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Like there's kids in classrooms that…

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or, you know, what they're doing
is they're taking their passion,

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they're kind of looking at my story,

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and then they're looking at the goals
and they're taking an action,

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and for them, powering the tour

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might be telling their friend Billy
about sustainability

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Now, for a company that might be different, right?

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If we're talking to Apple and I say “Power the tour,”

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we're talking about,
“Hey, we need to get this music out.

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Maybe you help there, right?

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We need to do this concert.
We need some help there!”

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And that might be
“Hey, power the tour financially, sponsorship, etc.

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But what action are you going to take is what matters.

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That's the kind of concept,

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whether you're a YouTuber, an Instagramer,

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or whether you're Kim Kardashian, Jimmy Kimmel,

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whether you're Enel Green Power,

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Apple or Coca-Cola, or everyone can be an outlet.

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And so that's what I demand
at a minimum, in general, right?

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What’s the reaction
and what's the feeling that you feel from,

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I mean, from the young,

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when you speak and
when you create this awareness,

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are they aware about

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how we can change
through our choices of consumption?

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I mean, tools to be powered up

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and to buy products powered up

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by renewable sources instead of fossil fuels.

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Did they know? How do they react
when you share with them this message?

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This is why I'm here, though.

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You know, like three years ago,
people weren’t like,

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“Hey, that's a renewable artist!”

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You know, or “That's a sustainable musician!”

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You know, they weren't doing that, bro.

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You know, now that's…
I think that's why I'm here though now.

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But I will understand that energy
can be complex to some degree,

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and people don't necessarily understand it yet.

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Like people, and I will say that there's
a world of people that Generation Z,

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Generation Y like, millennials,

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they want to take an action,
they want to do something.

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And I still think the ultimate,

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one of the biggest issues right now

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is just not knowing what they can do.

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I'm definitely here to break down a lot of barriers

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to get this world out of silos

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because there’s a whole bunch
of that everywhere I go

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and kind of build these bridges

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so we can all power change collectively
with collective action.

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I’ll say that the world’s ready for that.

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I'll say that Covid’s really changed some things and…

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and broken some things down and really,

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just like given us a moment to… to... to…

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I mean, there's been a lot of divisiveness, man,

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but it's accelerated the movement of like,

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let's regenerate the planet,
and here's what I want to bring to the table.

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People talk about sustainability all the time.

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You know, my…
my biggest mentor is Paul Hawken,

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he wrote Project Drawdown.

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He's the one who nominated me to be a young leader,

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you know, and he talks about regeneration.

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And it's like if I can get
the world to look at everything

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as like “How can I bring life?"

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If every decision that you make
is not necessarily a decision like

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“Oh, let me be sustainable and like use less.”

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Maybe if you were like

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“Everything I do should bring life,”

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then that changes the whole like way you do things.

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And so I'm even trying to get us there,

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but I think it starts with just right now,
taking an action.

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I'll say that the world, I think,

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is ready because I wouldn't be here
if they hadn't gotten there, right?

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I'd still be on the street corner
doing renewable energy-powered concerts,

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not talking to the number one like
renewable energy company in the world.

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And that's what I'd be doing.

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Maybe it’s time.

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The time is, again, the time
is now ‘cause dramatically…

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Look, it has to be now.

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It has to be now, there is no other option.

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Why am I, before coming here, why am I,

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think about it, just think like…

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like literally wrap your heads around this,

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like I'm in New York City, right?

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Billie Eilish is probably
the number one artist in the world, right?

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At this point right now.
Maybe number two, whatever, right?

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First shows back in two years,
and I'm on her guest list

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the Billie Eilish guest list for Global Citizen
and the other shows she did.

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Why? I don't have a million followers, right?

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I haven't sold 10 million copies.

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I'm… think, “Why?

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Because you're bringing the needed message…

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At this time, right? So that’s the answer.

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Maybe think about the other song, Save the Planet.

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Oh yeah, I mean, it's time to save the planet,

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it's time to come together and save the planet!

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Let's go for Save the Planet.
- Yeah.