Billie Eilish has a lot of credibility as an artist who is actively trying to find solutions to environmental issues. She’s not calling herself an environmentalist and just leaving it to other people to do the heavy lifting – Billie has made big changes to how an artist can tour and what can be done industry-wide to reduce waste. She’s also done smaller-scale things, like using her celebrity to get designers to focus more on not using fur or leather, and creating more “vegan fashion” for all of her red carpets. Billboard did an interview with Billie and her mom, and you can read the long list of initiatives pioneered by Billie as a touring artist. Interestingly, Billie took some well-deserved swipes at other artists who do “wasteful” album-drops:
Billie on being very particular about her merch: “It’s about how it feels and how it looks and how it’s made. And so the problem is to make sure that my clothing is being made well and ethically and with good materials and it’s very sustainable and that it feels good and is durable. It’s going to be more expensive and that’s the thing: People can be upset by that. But I’m trying to pick one of two evils.
She’s reduced the number of merch drops too: “Sometimes people have the idea of when things are more ethical, they’re more expensive, and so it’s harder to be plant-based or environmentally conscious if you don’t have as much money. That’s the whole system we live in, of like, if you have less money then you have less resources [for] healthier food… And so what we’re trying to do is make it more universally accessible.
She’s working to make vinyl more sustainable. Happier Than Ever came in eight vinyl variants, using 100% recycled black vinyl — plus recycled scraps for colored variants — and shrink-wrap made from sugar cane. “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… I can’t even express to you how wasteful it is. It is right in front of our faces and people are just getting away with it left and right, and I find it really frustrating as somebody who really goes out of my way to be sustainable and do the best that I can and try to involve everybody in my team in being sustainable — and then it’s some of the biggest artists in the world making f–king 40 different vinyl packages that have a different unique thing just to get you to keep buying more. It’s so wasteful, and it’s irritating to me that we’re still at a point where you care that much about your numbers and you care that much about making money — and it’s all your favorite artists doing that sh-t.
“It’s some of the biggest artists in the world making f–king 40 different vinyl packages that have a different unique thing just to get you to keep buying more. It’s so wasteful, and it’s irritating to me that we’re still at a point where you care that much about your numbers and you care that much about making money — and it’s all your favorite artists doing that sh-t.” Page Six has already described this as Billie taking a very specific swipe at Taylor Swift, and I’ll admit, Taylor is who I thought of first. Other artists do multiple vinyl packages as well, but Taylor has become infamous for squeezing every dollar she can from her fans through multiple drops of the same f–king album. I always came at that issue as “a sucker born every minute, Taylor really doesn’t respect her fans,” but Billie is coming at the issue as: that’s so wasteful, why are you creating forty unique vinyl packages for your fans to buy when you could just do one or two packages?
Update: After this Billboard piece was published, Billie later said that she wasn’t calling out one specific person and especially not Taylor. It’s true that she didn’t name names and she was speaking in the broader sense that many artists do it. Artists like Taylor.
Photos courtesy of Cover Images.
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- 96th Academy Awards Vanity Fair Party held at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts Featuring: Billie Eilish Where: Los Angeles, California, United States When: 11 Mar 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Celebrities arriving at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party, Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts Featuring: Billie Eilish Where: Los Angeles, United States When: 10 Mar 2024 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- 96th Academy Awards Vanity Fair Party held at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. Featuring: Billie Eilish Where: Los Angeles, California, United States When: 10 Mar 2024 Credit: Jennifer Bloc/Future Image/Cover Images **NOT FOR PUBLICATION IN GERMANY**
I’m not sure she’s taking a specific swipe at Taylor though; they’re supposedly friends.
I don’t think its a particularly swipe at Taylor but she is definitely guilty of doing this.
Taylor is who I thought of too. To release so many vinyl variants also just strikes me as exploitative of those fans who want to buy everything she puts out. I know they don’t have to, but still.
As if Billie’s not focused on her numbers?
I recall Billie immediately shifting away from her debut shock of green hair and the young fans who put her on the map, pivoting to a wider audience and more commercial success with a jazz-influenced second album, a Doris Day style makeover, and a broadway-style concert performance on the Disney channel most grandmothers would love.
I just checked Billie’s Wiki for the promotions of Happier Than Ever, and Billie Eilish really might need to sit back down and think about her own vinyl releases available in 8 different colors and her own glaring focus on S-A-L-E-S numbers:
“It was available in a variety of physical album formats, such as eight differently colored vinyl LPs, including retail-exclusives for Amazon, independent record stores, Target, Urban Outfitters and Walmart, ten CD variants, including autographed CDs at independent stores, a version with alternate packaging hand-painted by Eilish, three premium box sets, a Target-exclusive edition packaged with a poster, and multiple cassette tape variants, including a deluxe box set.[42]On December 2, Eilish announced that she has teamed up with an Italian fashion house Gucci for an eco-friendly limited vinyl edition of Happier Than Ever.[43] The set was released the following day, featuring vinyls created entirely from leftover recycled materials gathered during the original pressing of the record and a Gucci-branded nail stickers.[44] The box and stickers were designed by the brand’s creative director Alessandro Michele.[45] Additionally, the collector’s edition was sold in a physical Gucci stores throughout the world. The cover of this edition has a “psychedelic pattern” in the background.[46] “
So no, Billies not focused on her numbers. Not at all.
The post here acknowledged the 8 versions too, and both this and the article you quoted talk about how she did it with more sustainable packaging. That’s her point, there’s ways to do these things that aren’t as wasteful.
I’m sorry, but what does Billie changing her hair have to do with environmental sustainability?
Taylor was the first one I thought of as well. She releases SO many different versions of her albums and it’s not right. She cares more about being number 1 than anything else. I feel sorry for the parents that live on a fixed income and have a child that is a Taylor Swift fan. Buying multiple versions of the same album is ridiculous. Billie may be friends with Taylor but that doesn’t mean she thinks what Taylor is doing is right.
The people on a fixed income aren’t the ones buying all the variants. Hell I’m a fan and have never bought any of her albums, what for when there’s spotify, youtube, whatever else is out there to consume music. And I have money to waste
The parents that are on a fixed income may be the ones buying it for their kids is what I am saying. I have friends that are on a fixed income and buy the albums for their daughters (that are young and don’t have Spotify) Their kids are mad because they can only afford to buy 1 and not 3 or more. It’s frustrating. Just put it out on 1 album.
I can personally attest- considering saying the words, for the first time, to my child “we literally do not have enough money to buy that” was the worst part of it. Because who doesn’t want to look super capable to their kid.
Now that I’ve gotten past that cherry, it’s fine. Besides, how is it not good for little one to learn that you only get so much money and you have to choose what’s most important.
Fans can be responsible for their choices.
But- vinyl isn’t exactly great for the environment or our health, no?
Yeah, their kids were upset but had to deal. But, it’s also not fair to put it on 3 or more records instead of 1. She is milking her fans for all that they are worth, that’s for sure.
With pandora, YouTube, Spotify etc why are people buying vinyls. That’s on them if that’s how they want to spend their money
Yup.
I think this is one of those times when it makes sense to give kids allowances— so that if they want to spend their own money for various editions, they can save up to do so.
I realize reading through this post that my real problem with the practice of releasing the multiple editions that each have to be purchased to get all of the songs is not just that it’s greedy, but that it feels particularly exploitive when the artists who do this market to and have a fan base that skews heavily towards kids and teens. Yeah, it’s wasteful, but I would be less bothered by people collecting multiple bottles of single malt scotch to build a sculpture of a clock vs marketing in this way to kids. I get though, that the artist may or may not have control over the marketing plans, so it’s good to hear from Billie Eilish re: the impact that she’s been able to have with her own merchandising.
I dusky know people still bought vynil. I thought everyone streams music. If I was a parent and couldn’t afford it my answers would be no we can’t afford it.
Artists get routinely ripped off from streaming. If you can afford to buy, you should. Also, vinyl outsells CDs now. You don’t need multiple packages though.
There’s been a resurgence of vinyl for a while now, many artists release that way, I would assume it is more profitable than the pennies they get from streaming. One of my favorite smaller artists released her recent with 2 different colors, and a signed version as well, which bumps the price way up for a second or two with a Sharpie. The Taylors and Billies of the world are raking in millions, most smaller artists are looking to recoup some sales that have been lost to streaming.
After I donated all my CDs years ago, I haven’t jumped back into physical media for music, but the vinyl is a big thing again.
I agree with her, and for me packaging is a real issue.
I think, Billie’s point wasn’t snapping at one or other artist. She is making multiple colors too. When the biggest artists do that, unfortunately it becomes an industry standard. Small artists see the bigger ones selling multiple copies of the same album, doubling, tripling their sales per customer. So, their labels want to do the same to even the competition. Even if Billie stops, it won’t change. All the bigger players should stop, make some kind of agreement, but I doubt they care about environment.
Also, I don’t think it is bad to give color options, but “some” artists incentivize the fans to buy the multiple copies, with different songs on each or “make a clock with 4 of them” scheme.
Yeah the idea of new versions of albums, CDs, etc. isn’t new. I can think of plenty of CDs that I bought from Coconuts in my early teens, that were we released a couple of months later with the remix versions or live version and other things like that. I think the real issue and what she’s probably pointing to is releasing five versions of the same album, with one or two additional songs on each album release and them all coming out within a week or two of each other. That is incredibly wasteful, and if you want to tease your fans a little bit more you could just release a secondary album with just the b-sides so to speak.
@Dee2 that’s what I think she’s talking about – which yes, IS Taylor.
There’s a difference between releasing a hardcover book and then a special edition 6 months later with a different POV chapter (fourth wing) or adding extra chapters into the paperback (a common practice), and releasing 5 different versions of a hardcover book in a 2 week period and if you want all the chapters you need to buy all 5 versions.
Some of these artists (cough Taylor) do this on a regular basis to drive album sales and while I can’t fault her and others for learning how to manipulate the system, it is a huge waste.
It won’t end until Billboard only counts one variant towards album sales. Those crazy ticket and/or merch bundled with album stopped when Billboard no longer included them in sales tallies.
Interesting to see Billie clarifying that she wasn’t talking about Taylor because Tay has been taking a drubbing online since everyone listened to Poets. One of the more interesting complaints is that she did the double album to get more streaming hits and beat Adele’s record. Sad if true.
Yeah but Taylor is known to do this. Often.
She wanted to clarify she wasn’t speaking of Taylor specifically because she doesn’t want the Swifties to come for her but we all know that was who she was speaking about.
Dumb question probably, but what exactly is a “vinyl package?” I’m picturing the old round black records you had to play with a record player with a needle? Sorry, I haven’t bought an album in ??? years and I can only think of seeing a record player in one person’s house (legit vintage collector) so that can’t be right, right? Teenagers are buying those?
Vinyl records with different colors / styles of the same album. Example of Billie’s: https://i.etsystatic.com/38741317/r/il/998959/4437611567/il_fullxfull.4437611567_1avl.jpg
Not just teenagers, vinyl has made a huge resurgence. For the album notes and all those details you don’t get in streaming. I just got my vinyl of Cowboy Carter which still is packaged as the original name of the album, Beyince. But to your first question yes teenagers are absolutely getting vinyl. I bought my niece a record player for Christmas it was her only request. She is a Taylor Swift fan and 13.
42 million vinyl records were sold in 2021. There has been a bit of a revival in vinyl for quite a while.
Wow, okay. Thank you for the link example, and yeah that does look pretty wasteful, both environmentally and financially.
My 11 year old son got a record player for Christmas (even though we have one in the basement that my husband uses) and his #1 request for his 12th bday in 2 weeks is the Eminem greatest hits on vinyl lol. It’s back in a big way.
My favorite bands do multiple drops, but they’re also small touring bands who wouldn’t be able to continue making music without merch sales. I’m fine with it. 🤷🏾♀️
Same and yesterday was record day and I visited my small local vinyl store, that I want to stay in business, to buy records. All ages were at the store. Yes, one was with an extra track of what I’ve bought before. Also a used one. It’s tough, because, of course, climate change is devastating, small artists are trying to make it and small local businesses. I get it and also appreciate what Billie is saying.
I didn’t know that this was a big eco issue. I haven’t bought an actual record in about 40 years. Doesn’t seem like a big deal to me.
Vinyl outsold cds in 2023.
I haven’t bought vinyl since I was like 14…but cassettes were becoming the thing in the 80’s but I still had vinyl records. I listened to TTPD, both albums on YouTube…& Everything else now I listen to on Spotify.
I know they’re nowhere in the same tier when it comes to numbers but Bonnie Raitt’s tours have been using biodiesel buses for quite a while now. And yeah, Tswift fits the profile of the artists being called out.
I think this is actually a really complicated and nuanced problem. The music industry incentivizes this, but the artists end up being the face of it and each one has varying degrees of control and even then each one has likely had varying degrees of control throughout their career. There are different motivations for it, but across the board, the blame is on the artists because that’s who we see, but the music industry as a whole has always and still does – exploit artists in many many ways.
I’ll also say with regards to Taylor and her variants and fans – collectors are buying those. Does she have a lot of fans who want to collect? Yes. But while those sales benefit her, the music in this latest release was available via streaming in its entirety at 2am. I don’t know when it started but the digital album (all 31 songs) was available at some point for download from her website for $14.99 by Friday afternoon. My daughter has gotten into vinyls in the past few years and this past Friday was the first time an album we pre-ordered from Taylor where the album came release day. Every other time it’s been like a week – because it’s about collecting not access to the music. I am not unsympathetic to the argument that younger fans want all of the variants but part of being a parent is saying no to all sorts of things and explaining what you won’t and can’t do – lululemon, 85 Stanley’s, etc. Consumerism is a problem across pretty much everything we have access to and kids have to learn limits, just like I think the music industry needs some work on how all this is incentivized.
I feel like often on these topics we as a society are always looking for someone to blame, because it’s complicated and nuanced and no one is behaving perfectly, not the artists, not the fans and certainly not the exploitative music industry. Taylor is likely more in control than most of what she releases NOW, but she also has fan expectations, a secondary market where her vinyls sell for a lot (so I can see why she wants her fans to have access to options from the source plus want to benefit from that), music industry incentives like numbers, and I know UMG controls rights to her merchandise in exchange for her owning her masters. That may not affect the vinyl, but I think people assume she has full control over everything and that’s not entirely accurate. It’s sort of like the Ticketmaster problem too – artists have some levers they can pull but even the most famous and successful have to use them if they want large venues. This industry sucks across the board, imo.
I think, with big fandoms like swifties, BTS, buying multiple copies is just a standard fan behavior, not just a collector hobby since they have cult-like following. There is a direct artist influence as well. With Midnights, Taylor was showcasing on her social media how if you buy 4 copies, you can make a clock for your wall. I read that BTS is also putting different cards inside the album, so the fans buy multiple copies to get all of them. When the big artists do things like that, it becomes the industry standard, because other labels want their artists to sell as many records too, but you can’t compete without using the same tactics. So, it becomes an industry problem and hence, it requires an industry solution.
This has been going on since the early 1990s with multiple CD versions. Acting like somehow Taylor is to blame for this is silly and nonsensical.
She didn’t start it and she’s not to blame, but she’s one of the worst offenders when it comes to the practice.
Multiple vinyl issues aside, I like what Billie’s doing here. Every piece of her career & life is thoughtful. I chuckled though when I read the part about the family using dish towels instead of paper napkins. There are such things as cloth napkins! Easier to use than dish towels! Then again, I guess a piece of fabric is a piece of fabric…. 🙂
A lot of “vegan fashion” is just plastic under a different name and actually less sustainable than genuine leather hides. If people don’t want to wear animal products, fine, but plastic is not a sustainable or Earth friendly substitute.
She’s right about the vinyl. Pressing it from recycled plastic is at least better.
I appreciate what she’s saying here. And it would be good if the few artists who can make those decisions do that. But she should be talking about industry executives, managers, bosses, CEOs, the people who make merchandise decisions, because it isn’t most artists.
Sadly, vegan leather is not good for the planet either. I’t more petrochemicals. Vegan leather doesn’t alway have the longevity of leather; I’ve got well cared for leather shoes that are 20+ years old. Sigh, sometimes it’s hard to know what the right thing is to do.
This may be a dumb question but what exactly is the benefit of buying vinyl? From an auditory perspective, is the sound better?
Digital media is fickle and, especially using streaming services, you can lose access to your music (or films, TV) if the platform decides to pull it on a whim (copyright issues, financial reasons, etc.). There’s been more and more of a push toward physical media lately. And vinyl is a more robust form of physical audio media than most. Magnetic tapes and even optical discs have a finite lifespan. Vinyl can get scratched, but grooved media is a very basic form of recording. The recording is physical and can easily be accessed for a very long time. If you want to keep your music longterm, it’s a good investment.
Thank you for the thoughtful information, tealily!!