Jose Gonzalez has been a heatseaker ever since an unfathomable number of bouncy balls boomeranged down the slanted streets of San Francisco to his cover of the Knife's 'Heartbeats' for a Sony commercial. But this is why he's hot: global warming. The Swedish singer-songwriter tells Spinner that he's been environmentally active since he was a kid, long before the current green rush in America. "In Gothersberg, it's easy to walk or take the bicycle or take the tram to anywhere, so it's fairly easy to be environmentally friendly when I'm at home," he says.

In support of his latest album, 'In Our Nature,' the good-natured Swede has planned a North American 'Green Tour,' which will kick off this weekend in Miami and traverse all the way to Vancouver by the end of March. Non-profit group Reverb has partnered with Gonzalez to help educate his audiences about environmental sustainability.

"One thing I don't hear media mention so much is the environmental impact of animal products," Gonzalez says. "There's a huge amount of energy used to produce a piece of factory-farmed beef. That should be seen as a luxury today."