Singer/songwriter Vera Blue on her latest music video, produced in collab with Greenpeace
You know that special, meaningful feeling you get when you know you’re using your skills for change you believe in?
My name is Vera Blue. I’m an Australian singer and songwriter, and like you, I’m deeply passionate about nature and preserving our planet for the next generation.
I’ve always been captivated by the beauty of nature. My dad owned a beautiful plant nursery in the small country town I grew up in, so as a kid I was surrounded by trees and birds. And like a lot of Aussies, some of my childhood summers were defined by trips to the beach. The cool breeze drifting off the sea on a hot day… bliss.
I think the joy I find in the world around me carries through to my music. For me, songs need to have purpose in the lyrics and in the production. One of my all time favourite artists, Joni Mitchell, always had a message. I love a lyric or even a chord progression or instrumentation that makes you think and feel something you’ve never felt before.
My new single, Like I Remember You, is about the sense of longing you get when you miss someone, something or in my case, a sense of self, but also the warmth that comes with that memory. I wrote it in collaboration with Julia Stone, Andy and Thom Mak. Julia’s beautiful voice comes through in the backing vocals. Once we finished working on the song, it seemed like the perfect fit for this collaboration with Greenpeace.
I was shocked when I found out that oil drilling is going to happen off Australia’s southern coast, in the Great Australian Bight. Oil companies are planning to drill in water almost twice as deep as the Deepwater Horizon oil well – can you imagine a disaster like that, here? The depth makes it extra risky. It freaks me out.
The beaches of my childhood could end up covered in oil, and the thriving animals in this incredible stretch of ocean would be done for. Whales, dolphins, leafy sea dragons – things that don’t exist anywhere else in the world. I think that’s why Like I Remember You works so well for this campaign. It’s no use this magical place just being a memory we tell our grandkids about: we need to protect it, now, while we still have it. We need to keep the Great Australian Bight like we remember it.
We filmed the music video for Like I Remember You on board the iconic Rainbow Warrior ship while it was docked in Melbourne. As I sang, I gazed out at the Great Australian Bight itself and knew that my voice was adding to the groundswell of people standing up to protect it.
Sometimes I have to pinch myself and realise that it’s a pretty damn cool thing to be able to do; to speak loads of truths through music and to be able to connect with people through music. And it’s what I have to offer campaigns like this: my voice.
I hope you love listening to this new single as much as I loved making it. And know that there are many of us, right across the world, lifting our voices for nature and the things we’re passionate about.
Vera Blue
