Michael Stipe to release new climate-friendly vinyl in aid of EarthPercent

The split single, also featuring Beatie Wolfe, will come on the world's first commercially available bioplastic 12" record

By Tom Skinner

31st August 2022

Michael Stipe has announced a special split single with Beatie Wolfe in aid of climate emergency charity EarthPercent.

Founded by Brian Eno in 2021, EarthPercent aims “to offer simple and innovative ways for businesses and artists to donate to the most impactful organisations addressing the climate emergency”.

The organisation marked EarthDay this April by releasing numerous exclusive tracks that had been donated by such artists as Stipe, Coldplay, Eno, Anna Calvi and Jarvis Cocker‘s JARV IS… via Bandcamp.

Proceeds from sales of those songs went towards funding EarthPercent’s five core areas of work: “greening music, energy transition, climate justice, legal and policy change, and protecting nature”.

Today (August 31), it’s been confirmed that the former R.E.M. frontman will release ‘Future, If Future’ – his debut solo track, which originally arrived in 2018 – on the world’s first commercially available bioplastic 12″ vinyl.

The record also features ‘Oh My Heart’ by Beatie Wolfe, and will be available to pre-order here from this Friday (September 2). It’ll be limited to 500 copies.

EarthPercent has teamed up with Evolution Music for the release, marking a “genuinely revolutionary moment for both the music industry and record collectors, offering a non-fossil fuel future for vinyl recordings”.

In a statement, Stipe said: “I’m thrilled to be working with EarthPercent and Evolution Music on this release, imagining positive innovation through action. Simply showing that this type of solution-based project is possible opens pathways to a brighter future.”

Wolfe added: “I’m constantly thinking about how we can take the best of the old and best of the new, bridge the tangible and digital, and reclaim as much as we innovate and this new eco vinyl feels like a perfect embodiment of this.

“I wrote ‘Oh My Heart’ as a cry for the planet and humanity and it was recently encoded in glass and included in the Global Music Vault in Svalbard to be preserved for 10,000 years. So I couldn’t think of a better way to have it tangibly out in the world now.”

Michael Stipe collaborated with Brian Eno on ‘Future, If Future’. Speaking about the song earlier this year, the latter musician explained: “I’m very pleased with the way it’s gone. It’s a very good song, a very Stipe song. Beautiful lyrics, extraordinary piece.”

Last month saw Eno deliver another climate warning with his single ‘There Were Bells’. It’ll appear on his 22nd studio album, ‘FOREVERANDEVERNOMORE’, which is out on October 14.