NEW YORK (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) — In the wake of a weekend that saw a series of international concerts which spanned the globe, held to raise awareness of the challenge of climate change and pressure world leaders to take stronger action, some fans and press came away feeling underwhelmed.
Organizers of the concert were taken to task by the press for a number of reasons. British News of the World raised issue over the apparent hypocrisy of asking performers like Madonna, who's estimated "carbon footprint" is 100 times that of the average citizen in her adopted home in the UK.
Other news outlets such as the Washington Post described the events as "clunky," and noted the difficulties inherent in attempting to marry the superficiality of modern pop music culture with a serious issue, noting with bitter irony, Daimler-Chrysler sponsorship of some of the events.
Turnout was also an issue with some of the concert events not selling out. South African press reported that the concert didn't come close to selling out, describing the initial turnout as "disappointing." The turnout was blamed by concert organizer John Langford on, ironically enough "Extremely cold weather."
Other complaints touched on technical aspects of the show, particularly in the UK, where bad language made it onto the airwaves, performances by Metallica were cut short by BBC announcers and, as the BBC reported, fans in Wembley complained about poor sound quality at the stadium.
Some reports were conflicting as well. Reuters pegged attendance at the free Rio Live Earth event at 100,000, while the Associated Press, put who were much more positive on the event put that number at 400,000.
The disparity in reporting is hard to reconcile, however, it is interesting to note that some of the critics of the event, such as Tom Lifson regularly opine on other events from a very conservative, pro-business position.
In the end, perhaps Chris Rock summed the event up perfectly at the London event when he said "I pray that this event ends global warming the same way that Live Aid ended world hunger." – CelebrityAccess Staff Writers
