Surprise! It’s a single! Braden Lam has just revealed “Forest Fires” as the latest release from his upcoming album, Inside Four Walls, and it comes with a message: only you can prevent deforestation. In the new single, Lam is beating a literal drum, urging millennials onward towards a future with a breathable atmosphere. Conveniently, he has also announced that every album pre-order or contribution to his IndieGoGo campaign will result in a tree being planted in Atlantic Canada by Tree Canada.
More than a just simple, oxygen-breathing musician, Braden Lam’s relationship with trees goes well beyond the usual necessity for survival: he’s an environmental scientist who has worked specifically in the field of land conservation.
“I was working for CPAWS Yukon last summer,” says Lam, offering another easter egg reference to a previous single. “[I was a] policy intern working on a campaign to protect ANWR and the Porcupine Caribou herd from oil drilling companies. The Porcupine Caribou have the largest migration for any land mammal, so transboundary conservation is essential. In this case, it requires conservation efforts from both the US and Canada. The summary of the issue is that the Trump Administration wants to drill for oil in the caribou breeding grounds in Alaska – a decision that will primarily impact the Gwich’in that live in Canada (Northern Yukon) and rely on this herd as a subsistence resource.”
So, you can imagine how Lam might have had his feathers ruffled long before any gender reveal party ever set fire to more than 12,000 Californian acres – still, just a drop in the bucket compared to the 900,000 acres in nearby Oregon and another 480,000 acres in Washington.
Lam says that his new single “touches on the irony of celebrating the earth and working to conserve it while it’s concurrently being destroyed.” Recognizing the gobsmacking futility of the situation he sings, “they watch our cities burn until there’s nothing to do with the rest” and we all take one step forward and two steps back.
“Some forest fires are indeed a part of the natural cycle of forests, but the increase in frequency of these events is a result of human-caused climate change. I wanted my fans to have an opportunity to take action and directly restore these losses by planting some trees! The earth could always use more trees!”
With Tree Canada, each album pre-ordered will also mean a tree will be grown and planted as a part of their “national greening campaign”, targeting areas that need reforestation after human development.
To pre-order an album, visit Braden Lam’s IndieGoGo campaign.
Braden Lam’s new album, Inside Four Walls, is out on Friday, October 2, 2020. Lam will be performing a handful of dates across the Maritimes in support of the new release.
Tour Dates:
10.10.20 – Fredericton, NB @ Grimross Brewing Co.
10.16.20 – Truro, NS @ Old Road BBQ
10.23.20 – Halifax, NS @ The Carleton
10.24.20 – Dartmouth, NS @ New Scotland Brewing
10.29.20 – Charlottetown, PEI @ Trailside Music Hall