VANS WARPED TOUR: Partners with Blue Water Baltimore to Clean-Up Gwynns Falls Stream Next Monday, July, 23

ECO DAY
VANS WARPED TOUR PARTNERS WITH BLUE WATER BALTIMORE
TO CLEAN-UP LOWER GWYNNS FALLS STREAM

VANS WARPED TOURARTISTS
TO CLEAN-UP HIGHLY-POLLUTED TRIBUTARY
WHICH FEEDS INTO CHESAPEAKE BAY
ON MONDAY, JULY 23
AT LOWER GWYNNS FALLS AT CARROLL PARK

The VANS WARPED TOUR® is partnering once again with Blue Water Baltimore for the forthcoming ECO day which will clean-up a highly-polluted tributary which feeds into Chesapeake Bay. On Monday, July 23, hundreds of volunteers and artists from the 2012 tour will converge at Carroll Park to clean up one of Baltimore’s most neglected streams, Lower Gwynns Falls. The group will clear tons of trash from stream banks along a half-mile stretch as well as an adjoining, highly-polluted tributary which feeds into the bay. VANS WARPED TOUR founder Kevin Lyman and Halle Van der Gaag Executive Director of Blue Water Baltimore will give a brief address on environmental issues and background on the urban stream challenges surrounding Gwynns Falls and how the situation can be turned around.

“In our yearly tradition of taking a day to give back, we are glad to help out and in a small way to help one of the most important watersheds in America,” says tour founder Kevin Lyman. “Blue Water Baltimore is excited to work with the Vans Warped Tour again this year and bring much needed manpower and awareness to an out-of-sight, out-of-mind area that is in very poor condition due to the outdated, leaking infrastructure and numerous illicit discharges,” says Halle Van der Gaag, Blue Water Baltimore Executive Director.

Last year, the VANS WARPED TOUR teamed with Blue Water Baltimore and to remove a local asphalt parking lot, spreading soil over 37,000 square feet of ground to create a beautiful urban garden and outdoor classroom for the community to enjoy. Volunteers also created a rain garden and assisted in the installation of a 3,000 sq ft environmentally-themed mural. Converting the parking lot into a garden annually removes 900,000 gallons of storm water–a serious and growing pollution source to local rivers like Jones Falls and the Chesapeake Bay.

WHEN:              Monday, July 23 7:30 AM—11:30AM

7:30 AM           Kevin Lyman and Halle Van der Gaag brief address.
Media news crews, journalists and photographers are invited to attend
and conduct interviews with Vans Warped Tour founder KevinLyman
and Halle Van der Gaag, Executive Director of Blue Water Baltimore.

WHERE:          Gwynns Falls Trailhead meet at Carroll Park Golf Course
2110 Washington Blvd, Baltimore MD 21230.
Parking: Buses can park at golf course.

MEDIA RSVP: Libby Coffey/MSO LCoffey@msopr.com 818-380-0400 x224
Emily Grant/Blue Water Baltimore 410.254.1577 ext 101 egrant@bluewaterbaltimore.org

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About Blue Water Baltimore:

Blue Water Baltimore is a nonprofit community‐based organization working towards a future when our neighborhood streams are safe for fishing and swimming and our clean harbor is the pride of Baltimore. Blue Water Baltimore is the home for the Baltimore Harbor WATERKEEPER, who patrols the harbor, takes calls on the pollution hotline, and holds polluters accountable under the law.

About the VANS WARPED TOUR:

The Vans Warped Tour® is well established as America’s premier music and lifestyle festival tour of the summer, breaking up-and-coming talent as well as both creating and showcasing major established artists. In 1995, concert production veteran Kevin Lyman founded the tour which first introduced music fans to artists such as No Doubt, Eminem, Katy Perry, Blink 182, Black Eyed Peas, Sublime and My Chemical Romance among hundreds of others that are now globally successful. The Vans Warped Tour is the longest-running traveling music and extreme sports festival in the world today. The tour has traveled throughout the world giving many diverse acts their first large international exposure to Europe, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand. In November 2012, the tour will launch in the United Kingdom. The tour annually reaches more than 600,000 kids in over 40 cities in North America each summer and appeals to music fans and teens with a blend of rock, punk, pop, hip-hop and rap, metal, indie rock, electronic, alt-country, folk-punk, dubstep, reggae, rockabilly and extreme sports. The summer continues  to be the most eclectic traveling festival tour on the planet. With the Vans Warped Tour, Lyman was one of the first to pioneer the successful integration of corporate sponsors with the extreme lifestyle, creating a blueprint for brand sponsorship integration that continues to be widely duplicated in the concert touring and festival marketplace today. After its first year, Vans® signed on as a title sponsor and the tour cemented its place in history by bringing punk rock/skate/action sports culture from the underground to the forefront of youth culture, which has been Kevin’s original vision from the beginning. Through successful brand partnerships (Vans, KIA, Monster/Hansens, Truth, Lionsgate, Trojan, Tilly’s, among many more), the tour has continually offered kids a low ticket price to watch over 80 bands in one day (since the start, tickets do not exceed $40.00) as well as a virtual village of fun lifestyle attractions including Vans® skating competitions (which feature national athletes and pre-qualified amateur skaters who both compete for prizes and the chance to be discovered as new athletes), Reverse Daycare (where kids can check in on their parents in an air-conditioned lounge), Ernie Ball Battle of the Bands (a stage featuring both local artist contest winners and emerging national talent) as well as numerous charity and environmental booths which travel on the entire tour. The Vans Warped Tour became the first tour to consistently use groundbreaking environmental concepts every year on the road and continues to implement the concepts called Warped Eco Initiatives (WEI) ranging from Biodiesel fuel for touring trucks, buses and generators, to environmentally-friendly catering for the artists and crew courtesy of Tada! Catering and each year artists and music fans compete through an onsite recycling contest for the chance to win an exotic eco trip adventure. A solar-powered sound system is used on the Kevin Says Stage and www.vanswarpedtour.com provides public transportation and carpool social media apps for fans to connect before every show. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina–one of the deadliest and costly natural and civic disasters the U.S.–Kevin formed the Unite The United Foundation a public 501(c)(3) non-profit, fundraising organization. Unite The United works closely with community-based charities to give those in need, immediate and direct help. Now a year-round organization, it is the Unite The United Foundation’s mission to encourage fans, artists and industry leaders from the music, touring and action-sports worlds to work toward positive change, by supporting local charities and participating in community volunteerism events across the United States. Visit www.unitetheunited.org for more info. The Vans Warped Tour shows no signs of slowing down. The 41-date trek commences June 16 in Salt Lake City, UT and finishes August 5 in Portland, OR.  The VANS WARPED TOUR 2012 multi-stage line-up includes Rise Against, All Time Low, Taking Back Sunday, Anti-Flag, Yellowcard, The Used, Four Year Strong, New Found Glory, Pierce The Veil, Falling In Reverse, Breathe Carolina and many more. The tour will hit a handful of new venue locations this year. Visit www.vanswarpedtour.com for the full itinerary and 2012 artist line-up. See you this summer…

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For VANS WARPED TOUR publicity, contact MSO:
Libby Coffey 818-380-0400, ext. 224  LCoffey@msopr.com
Angela Villanueva, ext. 232 AVillanueva@msopr.com
Jackie Barrie Assistant@msopr.com

For Blue Water Baltimore, contact:
Emily Grant  410.254.1577 ext 101 egrant@bluewaterbaltimore.org