[~1500 words | 11 minutes]

About us

Inspired by initiatives like Clean Air Club in Chicago, Clean Air 604 is a project that aims to organize, facilitate, and support COVID-safer social events in Vancouver, BC. The goal is to ensure accessibility and cleaner air for the Vancouver arts scene by providing masks, resources, information and air purifiers to patrons, musicians and other artists, free of charge.

Why?

We need safer conditions for musicians and artists at the events they’re performing and showcasing their art in. We need safer conditions for the people attending these events, especially those who have been pushed out of these spaces since the beginning of the ongoing pandemic.

Artists spend a lot of time, effort and money on refining their craft and making sure their art and equipment are safe. They will spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on power conditioners, surge protectors, noise gates, flight cases, extra plane seats, travel insurance, locks, tour vehicles and more in order to be safe. They’ll put their best effort into songwriting, arranging, rehearsing, recording, stage design, lighting, lasers, smoke, makeup, outfits, choreography and more to put on the best show they can. Why not spend $1/person and $100-200 per venue on masks and air purifiers to make everyone safer and make sure everyone can keep touring, performing and attending shows?

As a vocalist you can lose your voice. As a drummer you can lose your stamina. Any musician can forget their songs. As an artist you can lose your ability or will to keep making art. COVID affects your whole body, it affects your playing. Disability justice means justice for disabled musicians, artists and fans as well. If you’re not careful, you’ll push certain people out and you won’t hear their music, you won’t see their art anymore.

Punk/DIY

Maybe you’re a punk. You’re anti-racist, anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist, anti-eugenics, anti-sexist, anti-homophobic, anti-transphobic, anti-gentrification, anti-classist, anti-establishment. You’re for gender equality, racial equality, animal rights, mutual aid. You’re an activist, a leftist, a communist, a vegan, straight edge, progressive, a free thinker. You won’t sell out. You don’t conform.

So why aren’t you wearing a mask? Why do you believe Bonnie Henry and Adrian Dix when they tell you that it’s okay to rip your mask off and go back to brunch? That it’s okay to just get back to work in person without adequate sick leave or safety measures, go back to spreading COVID because nobody has made the changes necessary to protect yourself or others on a systematic level.

I’m sorry, but you’ve been lied to and misled.

DIY spaces are great because we don’t need to care about profit, sponsors or corporate pressure. You’re in control and you can make these spaces safe and accessible. Just like you would kick out a racist, a known abuser, a misogynist. There’s absolutely no room in the community for people that harm or disrespect others. Why don’t we kick out the anti-vaxxers, anti-maskers and pandemic-minimizers? We shouldn’t just follow the forced return to normalcy, we need to look after each other and we keep ourselves safe, because the powers at be clearly won’t.

COVID is bad for music

Even if you don’t care about the high-risk, immunocompromised, or disabled people (you really should), that are more likely to be poor, marginalized people of colour, and only care about your music, you should still want protections and safety measures. Your music will sound better.

There are so many amazing, creative artists that just aren’t making music anymore, either because it’s too risky, it’s not worth it (with increasing expenses and the general added cost of being disabled or poor), or they just can’t make their art anymore, because of sickness, disability or even death.

So if you care about the art and music, you should want to keep that art and the people who make it alive and as healthy as possible. Just like you wouldn’t want your favourite artists to get in a car crash, fall off a roof, get food poisoning, or suffer anything that would make it harder or impossible for them to make music, you should want to ensure they don’t suffer from complications due to COVID. We have regulations for cars, buildings and food safety, but there’s little to nothing in place for COVID at this point in time.

If making music and performing isn’t safe, then what’s the point?

It’s already so hard to be a musician or artist, so why make it even harder? Why make it impossible, especially for those that can’t afford it? There are artists that can afford the best healthcare, time off to heal, added precautions (like their staff testing and masking), private planes, tour buses and more. They’re more likely white, rich and privileged, they’ll be okay. The marginalized and poor artists that can’t afford that are most at risk, and those are the voices we can’t afford to lose.

Why clean air?

Air filtration and air purifiers have the lowest friction and push back, making them easy to adopt and keep in our spaces. We can make them look and feel like monitors or amp stacks; they’re always there, a part of what live music is, just increasing air changes and improving ventilation.

Masks can be harder but have the highest impact. We need to get used to seeing a whole crowd of people having a great time while wearing masks. It’s not just possible, it’s arguably required. Causing harm to others isn’t very cool or punk rock of you. But it is cool to care about others; it is punk rock to say “fuck you” to the establishment and “I’m not going to infect, disable or kill my fellow artists and fans.” It actually is anti-authoritarian, anti-establishment and radical to go against what laissez-faire health officials and corporations want and refuse to go with the “pandemic is over” and “it only affects the weak/old/disabled” policies that are ableist and eugenicist.

We need to see masks as the sign of rebellion that they are. Masks and air purifiers are a refusal to surrender to the pressure from above and a commitment to keeping each other safe when government officials won’t.

Why Clean Air 604?

We need everything outlined above to be free-of-charge. Safety and health shouldn’t cost you anything, it should be guaranteed. It’s already more expensive to be disabled or poor and we shouldn’t add any more costs to that; it should all be free. For that reason, we’re fundraising, accepting donations of cash, masks, or filters and relying on those able to provide for people in need.

We’re first aiming to raise around $1,300, which would let us supply shows with air purifiers and masks, but also aim to raise more and expand our inventory gradually.

This is a group effort. If you want to be involved, sign up and help in any that you can. There are so many ways that you can help with the project, from minor things that won’t take up too much time, like sharing posts or information with people you know, to more involved tasks like content creation, graphic design, event coordination, fundraising, postering, running events, helping out with logistics, venue/artist outreach or social media coordination.

And if you’re a musician, artist, or run a venue and you want your rehearsals and shows to be safer, we would love to work with you to make that possible.

Safety for everyone

We commit to providing tools and resources to make events safer for as many people as we can. Wherever possible we will aim to have events be mask-required, have cleaner filtered air, be all ages, be outdoors wherever possible, be accessible, be close to transit, not turn anyone away (by donation/pay-what-you-can pricing) and provide all resources and equipment for free.

What’s next?

We’re starting with events like live music, art shows and poetry readings, mainly in DIY spaces that we have more influence over, but our ambitions don’t stop there. We would like to branch out to other types of events and spaces: tenants union meetings, book clubs, workshops, gyms, fitness classes, team sports, shelters, soup kitchens, food banks, farmers’ markets, kid-friendly events, adult-only events and more. If you want to see masks and air purifiers in a particular space, let us know.

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