It’s 10:30 a.m. on a warm Saturday morning, and Austin Farrell@@http://www.austinfarrellmusic.com/@@ has ditched the spring football game to help his supervisor compost the food scraps from the night before at FOOD for Lane County@@http://www.foodforlanecounty.org/en/@@. As he watches the steam rise from his purple mug of jasmine green tea, Farrell contemplates how to promote environmental sustainability into his next acoustic performance.
Farrell began his musical career in first grade by playing the piano. When playing wasn’t enough anymore, he wrote his first piano instrumental five years later. But when he was a freshman in high school, Farrell ditched the piano to write his first guitar and vocal song. Then, last February, he decided that playing music just to play music wasn’t what he wanted to do.
“Since I was young, I wanted to be famous so that I could do something great,” he said. “I want to make songs because it’s what I’m good at but also because I want to reach a bunch of people and get a message across to spark conversation.”
And that is just what Farrell does.
“When I was figuring out how to get the tour started, I had my music and environmental work, and the idea was to get people that are interested in music and/or environmental work to come together and converse with one another,” he said.
So, at Oakshire Brewing@@http://oakbrew.com/@@ on an oddly warm Friday evening, Farrell lit up the room in his blue, plaid flannel shirt. He busted out his guitar and sat down on a wooden stool across from the bar.
“Thank you everyone for coming. My name is Austin Farrell, and I’m going to start with ‘Stranger’s Tears’ tonight.”@@http://www.myspace.com/bigsweeps@@
The crowd roared, and one fan threw his fist in the air, spilling some of his Watershed IPA@@http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/16068/43844@@ onto the woman standing next to him. People devoured pizza with all sorts of toppings, drank beer and listened to Farrell’s music, which is a mixture of Bon Iver and The Middle East.@@http://www.themiddleeastmusic.com/@@
This is just what he wants, too.
“It’s sort of like a grassroots thing where we’ll hit the music fans and the environmentally friendly fans and mesh them,” he said. “Then they’ll go out and tell their friends about the music or the composting. Oh yes, and then say my name, too.”
“For all you green people, come join me tomorrow morning at FOOD for Lane County to do work and compost,” he said at the end of the show, guitar still in hand.
So every Saturday Farrell can be found behind the FOOD for Lane County building working with five hot compost bins, two 5-by-5@@ap style@@ worm compost bins and five 50-gallon barrels of Bokashi, a pre-composter@@http://www.bokashicomposting.com/@@ that is becoming popular.
With pitchfork in hand, Farrell began turning hot compost piles and moving them from bin to bin until the materials were mixed. All the microbes then begin pulling from the compost and heat up to 130 to 150 degrees Fahrenheit. They then fed the worms some of the compost and some of the Bokashi. After, they lay an inch layer on top of the worms.
“We throw in a layer of vegetables and a layer of inoculants@@this is spelled right, wordpress is just stupid@@, little microbes,” he said. “We have a layer of vegetables, layer of that stuff, layer of vegetables, all the way to the top. Everything then ferments and becomes anaerobic, and frankly, really smelly.”
Everything is then given to FOOD for Lane County’s three gardens and organic farmers around Eugene.
And what distinguishes Farrell from other musicians isn’t only the fact that he promotes environmental sustainability through his performances, it’s his passion. His album “A Call to Conversation” @@http://www.facebook.com/austinfarrellmusic?sk=wall&filter=1@@includes many of the environmental issues, but his actions are what really spark conversation.
It’s his passion not just for making music but for bettering the world.
“There’s a quote from the Steve Jobs biography that I love,” he said. “’The people who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world are the ones that do.’ It’s my motivation, so I’m going to keep on being crazy.”
Join Farrell on May 19 at Ninkasi Brewing Company at 5 p.m. for more music and green conversation. For more information on Farrell, visit austinfarrellmusic.com.@@http://superglued.com/artist/index/571054-Austin_Farrell@@