That’s quite a carbon footprint. From David Byrne’s Website-
Those stadium shows may possibly be the most extravagant and expensive (production-wise) ever: $40 million to build the stage and, having done the math, we estimate 200 semi trucks crisscrossing Europe for the duration. It could be professional envy speaking here, but it sure looks like, well, overkill, and just a wee bit out of balance given all the starving people in Africa and all. Or maybe it’s the fact that we were booted off our Letterman spot so U2 could keep their exclusive week-long run that’s making me less than charitable? Take your pick — but thanks, guys!
Contrast that with Radiohead’s policy on touring and reducing their carbon footprint-
According the goals of the business, we strive to afford the ticket buying public the same high standard of show around the world. For this to happen, the band and their technicians require the tools of their trade, from a specific guitar and drum kit, the chef’s knives to the correct microphone, audio desk and speaker selection.
Standardisation in speaker technology allows us to rent PA systems in each country, but the uniqueness of the band’s sound and the groundbreaking application of LED lighting dictates that we have a lot of our own specific equipment. Traditionally, we would have air freighted 20,000kg gear around the world. For this tour, we set ourselves a challenge of a “no air freight policy”.
This is trickier that you may think. Agreeing that we need to have our own equipment with us for all the shows, we started planning the tour around shipping lines and road routes, with the schedule having suitable gaps for the gear to be transferred by boat between continents. The business model was not working. Allowing around 3 weeks sailing time between the UK and USA, and USA and Japan, the wage bill and rental of hired equipment soon mounted up. Alternative plans were required.
Did we need to take our equipment with us at all? Could we have a European system and an American system? This proved more cost effective, eliminating the need to wait for equipment to arrive. The team set about locating and building two identical backline and lighting systems. Audio equipment has been rented locally. Some items were already owned by the band, some easy to source. A rareness of certain items required the touring set up to be modified. Although compromise was acceptable, 12 guitars could not be duplicated but the result of the project was the equipment that we need to air freight is now less than 1,000kg!