Greta Thunberg has had the political equivalent of a Hot Girl Summer — blasting politicians and bureaucrats at every conference and summit in the calendar for inaction on the climate crisis.
Take New York, where the 16-year-old climate activist ripped apart world leaders at the UN in a sizzling speech made just days after millions of people marched with her in a historic global strike to protest the climate crisis.
It was a moment that inspired Norman Quentin Cook — the legendary 56-year-old, Bromley-born DJ known as Fatboy Slim — to mix in an excerpt from that viral speech into his live set as part of one of the greatest dance tracks of all time.
It’s hard to extract the required euphoria from any so-called “song of the summer” while the whole world panics about the planet boiling beyond repair.
Refer to the heatwave’s biggest hits: from a climate-defending goth; a grime star slamming a prime minister who called environmental protesters "uncooperative crusties"; and a nihilistic loner bop called “I Don’t Care”.
And as the change of seasons turn blistering sun into monster typhoons, Cook's remix has entered the race — on a zero-emissions boat bringing big beats from across the Atlantic.
"We will not let you get away with this. Right here, right now is where we draw the line."@FatboySlim has made a Greta Thunberg 'Right Here, Right Now' mash-up and is playing it out ✊
— Mixmag (@Mixmag) October 9, 2019
📸 @maxcdesignpic.twitter.com/Zt0rtU1v8X
“Right Here, Right Now” was deprived a UK No. 1 in 1999 by Westlife. But who needs to top the charts when you could win the hearts of Gateshead instead?
Cook dropped the remix at a show there last Friday, captured by 40-year-old Scott Jackson from Middlesbrough. He described the mashup as “superb,” adding that “the crowd could sense something special was in the air as it started, sensing something big was about to go down — and it certainly did!”
“People are dying,” Thunberg says in the track. “Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction. And all you can talk about is money. You are failing us, and the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you. We will not let you get away with this.”
“Right here, right now is where we draw the line. The world is waking up. And change is coming, whether you like it or not.”
However, the first time the remix appeared online was actually via artist David Scott on Sept. 24 — who shared it on Twitter alongside footage of the burning Amazon rainforest, international climate protests, and a starving polar bear.
#GretaThurnberg mashed with @FatboySlim - Right Here, Right Now. pic.twitter.com/InbZLf3awU
— David Scott (@TheKiffness) September 24, 2019
Somebody had to step up. Rihanna’s not dropping music anytime soon — turns out it’s hard to boogey to the dull thud of 500-page photo books on millennial coffee tables — and Kanye’s new record is already two weeks late. But the world didn’t quite count on Thunberg being Sweden’s most blogged-about feature artist since Zara Larsson.
On July 26, Thunberg joined English band The 1975 on their first single from upcoming album Notes on a Conditional Form. The activist was recorded making another speech about the immediate urgency of the climate crisis over a minimalist overture that will open the next record.
All the proceeds from the track went to Extinction Rebellion, the direct action group which brought London to a standstill in April with a campaign of peaceful public disruption — and who launched two more weeks of civil disobedience on Monday.
The movement has now gone global with road blockages causing chaos in Sydney, Amsterdam, Berlin, and more. In London, more than 600 people have been arrested — more than half the total arrests made during the April rebellion in just three days — as the group attempts to shut down the heart of Britain’s political system.