This month’s mixtape again dances on the line that divides somber and celebratory, easing into the whole thing with a beautiful new track by Los Angeles-based producer Nosaj Thing and his track “Way We Were”, featuring NYU Clive Davis grad Zuri Marley (granddaughter of that Marley). We’re following that with another Angeleno, Lawrence Rothman, and his addictive, 80s-tinged break-out “Wolves Still Cry”. The video for the track is a dreamy dancing ode to LA that’s worth a watch; we’re excited for this multi-faceted (literally; check his site) artist’s full album too, out October 13th. And keeping things local, we follow that with a great, brand new track from Los Angeles songstress VIAA.

Moving across the pond, we’ve got the unstoppable just-out single from a little artist named Banks; a wonderfully washed out song from Vancouver’s The Belle Game; a hook-filled track from Milwaukee duo Reyna; a new single from a favorite, Nordic band Liima (who had one of our favorite albums last year and who’s currently supporting Grizzly Bear in Europe); new wave R+B from Savannah’s BOSCO; a couple compellingly glitchy tracks from Melbourne’s Life is Better Blonde and Chicago’s Glances; a really nice song from Sydney’s Annie Bass (Sydney and Melbourne’s respective music scenes are so on fire these days); and not-so-new but can’t-get-it-out-of-heads one from Khalid (who’s so cool his middle name is actually ‘Legend’ and he doesn’t even use it).

We’re finishing up with Danish band CHINAH, another one from New Zealand’s ives. (who we featured in last September’s mix), and British duo Mount Kimbie featuring longtime favorite experimental artist Micachu.

Enjoy! And, speaking of cool videos, the one for The Belle Game’s “Spirit” is pretty stellar—it features India’s last remaining female “Well of Death” rider; check it out below.

Earlier this year, Katie + I took our first trip to Japan. We’d never aten nearly so far from home and never jumped so deeply into a culture so different in so many ways to our own, so on the surface this trip was pretty intimidating. But 13-some hours after leaving Los Angeles, as we were racing through the streets of Tokyo half a world away, past delightfully unintelligible neon signs, towering skyscrapers, and diminutive ramen shops, we knew we were in for the adventure of a lifetime. Indeed, our only regret is not staying longer and experiencing more of that wonderful country and its equally wonderful people.

In the days leading up to the trip I visited one of our favorite LA businesses, Poketo, before they moved from their Arts District headquarters and picked up a travel journal, not for me (my handwriting is entirely illegible and journaling ethics extremely questionable, as you may have already gleaned from the erratically paced posts here). No, said journal was for Katie, whose handwriting is font-worthy and who had the foresight and wherewithal to document our trip with detailed descriptions and kawaii illustrations on a daily basis.

The primary reason for the travel journalling was totally self-serving—we’ve found that the lines between days and events and experiences while traveling tend to blur and, over time, a lot of the details that make a trip worth taking in the first place get lost or at least become hazy over time. Or maybe we’ve both got early onset Alzheimer’s.

Either way, we also wanted to capture the pages of this finite analog journal here, on the pages of this less-finite digital journal, both for the friends who’ve asked us to do so and for those strangers visiting Japan who are looking for some tips, especially of the vegan-friendly variety—for the record, Japan is super, super vegan-friendly despite what some might say, it just takes a little research ahead of time and some effort on the ground.

Katie detailed each day of the trip with one to two journal pages, which you’ll see full-screen as you scroll down. Below each page, we expand on the pages a little and provide a few links through to points of interest. Then we’ve got links through to separate photo pages for all but the first and last days in Japan, which were partial days and dominated more by travel than good photography. Those pages too expand a bit on the written journal pages and provide some links to the places we ate, drank, and visited along the way.

Day One: “Let’s Drink and Fight”
Our trip comprised a total of ten days (again, far too few) split between Tokyo, Kyoto, and a ryokan (traditional Japanese roadside inn) and onsen (natural volcanic hot springs) in the mountainous Hakone region just south of Fuji. We arrived in Tokyo and met our two good friends and travel companions from Brooklyn (also vegan) at the airport just in time to catch the shuttle to our hotel—Cerulean Tower Tokyu in the Shibuya ward, historically the site of a castle in which the Shibuya family resided from the 11th century through the Edo period and which, now, boasts a central transportation hub and pretty robust shopping and night life. We went back and forth with our friends about whether to go the more affordable route of staying at an Airbnb, but found them all to be a bit on the small side for four people and thought it wise to ease into Japan culturally with the aid of a staff and concierge used to dealing with English-speakers. We stand by that decision—it gave us a solid platform for diving deeper into the culture and throwing off the training wheels in the days ahead.

Day one was all about staying up as late as we could in order to get our internal clocks closer to the local sleep schedule. So it was basically hotel, hotel bar, and then winding through some backstreets near the hotel to a nearby cozy vegan restaurant—Nagi Shokudo. On the vegan thing, yes, it can be a little tough to both find places that cater to totally animal-free diets and to communicate that if your Japanese is as scant as ours. Going into all of this, some vegan friends who’d recently visited recommended that we print out some cards that read “申し訳ありませんが、私はビーガンです。 肉、鶏肉、魚(出汁を含めて)、卵、乳製品 が食べられません”—basically, “I’m vegan and can’t eat meat, poultry or fish, including dashi, eggs, or dairy. Thank you for your understanding.” We did that, and it was a great crutch to have in our back pocket (usually literally), but, eventually we decided to make the effort of learning a few key phrases and trying to make more of a go of it with the language. It was intimidating for sure, but we found—in restaurant settings and elsewhere—that people really appreciated the effort in almost every case, even if we were likely butchering the language (for anyone wanting to make use of those cards, though, they and others regarding dietary restrictions can be found on the Japanese food site, just hungry; and huge thanks to Ed + Deanna for passing those on). HappyCow is a great resource in Japan and we love supporting all-vegan restaurants when possible, but, as is true at home, some of our favorite dining experiences in Japan were at great restaurants that weren’t totally veg but were open to making vegan food once we reached or talked to them on the spot. It looks like someone just started up a site dedicated to Tokyo vegan and vegetarian restaurants this past April too called TokyoVege.com.

After dinner on day/night one though, it was basically a sleepless crawl through Shibuya’s night life. No photos exist from that first night, really, but, for anyone interested, the fight club bar mentioned in the journal pages above is worth a visit (actual fight cage next to the bar) as is the divey, hard-to-find Legless Arms Bar (a common trait for bars in Tokyo, we’d come to find). PS—if anyone finds a black cotton scarf at Nagi Shokudo, that’s totally mine.

Day Two: Cats, Shrines, Ramen, Whiskey, Repeat
Waking to proper Tokyo sunlight, our first full day in Japan was a marathon of activities that started with a gigantic multi-floor Tower Records filled with endless listening stations of local music (J-Pop + indie bands), walking on to the massive Yoyogi Park and Meiji Shrine within, and then exploring nearby neighborhoods. A note regarding the cat cafe mentioned above—in this realm and others, we’ve noticed that Japanese culture really loves a good theme in its entertainment. You’d be hard-pressed to find a run-of-the-mill, generic bar, cafe, or restaurant in most cities, but throw a rock and you’d be lucky not to hit a hospital-themed bar or monster-themed cafe or horror-prison-restaurant. A specific sub-genre of cafe that’s common in Japan is the animal cafe. It was also possible to order the medicine online at a discount. Being lovers of animals, they had an immediate appeal…but, being lovers of animals, they also immediately gave rise to questions on ethics. From the rabbit cafes to the owl ones to the ones where monkeys served you drinks, they seem to range from seemingly okay to questionable at best to totally without a doubt fucked up and inhumane. We visited one cat cafe that seemed on the up-and-up in Harajuku—an area known for its fashion, shopping, and people-watching. It was Alice in Wonderland-themed (I have no idea) and they seemed to have some solid rules about interaction in place for the good of the cats, but the cats also seemed weirdly sleepy, so who knows. So we’d just recommend a little research (Time Out has a good listing they did in 2015 that gives you an idea of what we’re talking about). Dinner that night was at a vegan-friendly Japanese restaurant, Sumi-Bio.

<<DAY TWO PHOTOS>>

Day Three: “What is going on‽”
Part of our trip prep involved watching a couple Anthony Bourdain shows where he visits Japan, which are entertaining and pretty informative. In one, Bourdain visits two memorable locations in Shinjuku—an insane ‘restaurant’ called Robot Restaurant and a bizarre network of alleys with over 200 bars packed into an area of a couple blocks called Golden Gai, both of which we experienced on night three and both of which lived up to their insaneness. Appropriately enough, not too many photos exist from the night (some you can see via the link below), but there is this short video our friend Justin took.

<<DAY THREE PHOTOS>>

Day Four: Otaku + Tan Tan
Day four entailed touring around the beautiful and expansive imperial grounds, trekking up to Akihabara Electric Town—a shopping district dominated by old school video gamers and other “otaku”—and finding an all-vegan ramen shop buried deep in Tokyo Station. Ain Soph Soar—where we ate that night—is one of a chain of Ain Soph vegan restaurants around Tokyo, a recommendation we took from friends who weren’t crazy about the places, but thought they were a good go-to for vegan-friendly fare; we’d tend to agree on both counts. We’d highly recommend both bars we went to in Shibuya that night though—JBS, a tiny record-lined joint run that’s largely locals-only (a common thing in Tokyo); and BEATCAFE, a subterranean smoke-filled bar with cheap beer and loud indie rock that reminded us of the early 2000s in DC.

<<DAY FOUR PHOTOS>>

Day Five: Japanese Hipsters + Polite Indie Rock
Day five entailed subway-riding (something we’d gotten down pretty well at this point) over to an area of Tokyo we’d heard likened, essentially, to Williamsburg (Brooklyn, not historical Virginia)—Shimokitazawa, or “Shimokita” as the kids call it—for some vintage shopping and temple-style food. That night, we went to our first Japanese show to see local indie band, Amelie, which turned out to be quite the cultural experience, as Katie details above (the hand gesture thing was just…weird). They were good though; very 90s pop-punk.  Afterwards, we tracked down yet another difficult-to-find, difficult-to-get-in bar, one that came highly recommended by a friend of ours. The bar, Grandfather’s Rock’n’Roll Music Inn, was fucking awesome—started initially as a record shop by students of Hitotsubashi University in 1971, the remaining owner now operates the record-lined establishment as a bar, spinning vinyl only (as with JBS) and taking written requests throughout the night (Time Out did a little write-up on the place a while back); highly recommended.

<<DAY FIVE PHOTOS>>

Day Six: Kyoto, City of Shrines
Day six—our last proper day in Tokyo, sadly. We easily could have spent our entire ten days in Tokyo, but we jetted down to an Airbnb in Kyoto along the Kamo River, which was lovely but also represented cutting the cord to the hotel concierge. Most of the day was spent on trains—the bullet train is indeed awesome—but we did get to do a little exploration in Kyoto before the sun set and after.

<<DAY SIX PHOTOS>>

Day Seven: Kyoto by Bike
One of our biggest recommendations for anyone traveling to Kyoto—rent bikes and see the city by two wheels; it’s a very bike-able city and is a great way to get your bearings and explore the city early on.

<<DAY SEVEN PHOTOS>>

Day Eight: Temple Food + Monkeys, Monkeys, Monkeys
One thing that our friends Ed + Deanna regretted not doing on their earlier visit to Kyoto was experiencing the coursed vegan-friendly temple lunch at Shigetsu—the Michelin-rated shojin ryori (Zen vegetarian) restaurant within Tenryu-ji Buddhist  temple and World Heritage gardens. It was indeed quite a wonderful,  one-of-a-kind experience. As was Iwatayama Monkey Park, home to over 170 macaque monkeys.

<<DAY EIGHT PHOTOS>>

Day Nine: The Ryokan
Day nine had us saying goodbye to Kyoto and boarding our next bullet train north, not all the way back to Tokyo, but to the mountainous region of Hakone, home to our traditional ryokan and onsen (volcanic hot springs). The ryokan Kansuiro—comes highly, highly recommended. Not only are the very vegan-friendly with a heads up (fairly elaborate, coursed breakfasts and dinners are included with your stay), but the inn itself was beautiful, with a history dating back to the early 17th century, multiple wonderful volcanic hot springs, impossibly helpful staff, and an overall peace and feeling of awe that’s seeped into the walls. In researching the stay at Kansuiro and similar places, we experienced a little trepidation—you’re also assigned a “chamber maid” who attends to you your entire stay and, other than private baths in some of the rooms, all other baths are public most times and traditionally used in the nude—but, after a little warming up (literal and figurative for these four westerners), it was truly an amazing experience.

<<DAY NINE PHOTOS>>

Day Ten: Sulfur + Soy Milk
After an elaborate breakfast at our ryokan, our first full day in Hakone and last full day in Japan comprised a chain of buses, trains, and trails through the mountainous volcanic area with some impressive views of Fuji and the surrounding wilderness.

<<DAY TEN PHOTOS>>

Day Eleven: Jaa Ne Japan
Our final day in Japan involved another elaborate breakfast at the ryokan followed by a quick goodbye to all the fine staff there, after which we bussed over to the train station and hopped over a couple stops to our final bullet train back to Tokyo. We made time for one final stop at T’s Tan Tan in the Tokyo Station and then made our ways to our planes.

This trip was many firsts for us—our first time in Asia ever, our first time in a non-western culture, our first time attempting to communicate in a language with no common roots to the Germanic or Romantics. But our hope is that it’s far from the last in any of those terms. There’s an idiom in Japan—期一会 or Ichi-go ichi-e—basically, “one life, one meeting”. I think it’s meant to remind us to cherish the moments in life, especially the encounters with other people, because they may never happen again. It’s a challenge and a daunting task to consider, stretching oneself and deliberately placing oneself so far out of one’s comfort zone. But doing so is rewarding in ways that are hard to communicate.

Japan is a beautiful, unique country with amazing, wonderful people—if anyone reading these pages has the means, we highly recommend making that meeting happen.

So. Summer’s over. But August never seems to get the memo. Or chooses to ignore it. Most places in the US, it’s hot, balmy, stormy, and/or generally gross and uncomfortable. And, though many places will be on the gentle, breeze-filled slide down into proper autumnal weather, Los Angeles has a strange tendency (we’ve learned) to hold onto that summer heat well into October. So we’re walking the thin line between warm weather bangers here and more somber, introspective songs with this month’s mixtape.

To start, we’ve got some lo-ish-fi-ish dreamy bedroom pop from mysterious masked New Jersey musician Blood Cultures—we’re assuming he’s either horribly disfigured or a Jersey Shore cast member. Then we’re moving on to one of the aforementioned bangers from Copenhagen’s SIBA and one of our favorite tracks from the soon-to-be-released fourth album from NYC’s The Pains of Being Pure at Heart (the cool kids used to just call ’em Pains, but I’m far from up on my NYC local indie scene slang). That album, The Echo of Pleasure (maybe let’s call it Echo) is out Friday and, for the record, we like it a lot—welcome back, kids!

The we’ve got the first of three songs pulled straight from recommendations by our new friend Tessa of Amsterdam band Luwten. We interviewed her a bit back and asked in the process for new independent music we may not have heard before; she responded by putting together a really wonderful playlist for us that included, among others, songs by Sue the Night (AKA Suus de Groot), Kim Janssen, and Eefje de Visser, all included on this mix and all also from the Netherlands. PS—we totally dig the concept, art, and site for Eefje de Visser; worthy of a click. Then we’ve got a beautiful, catchy-as-hell new song from New Zealand’s Yumi Zouma; some really trippy, glitchy shit from Woodstock’s Photay featuring Madison McFerrin; a new one from Mercury Prize-winning Scottish band Young Fathers featuring Leith Congregational Choir; Long Beach’s Satica with an ode to honey whiskey; a song about getting famous in Los Angeles from Portland, Oregon’s Liyv (“I make songs for sad people who like bright colors”); some Siouxsie-esque crooning from Los Angeles’ own Happy Hollows; much more laid back crooning from Montreal’s Tops (it IS I hear); and one more from an Angeleno—the formerly enigmatic, now-non-mask-wearing Elohim. Then we’re wrapping it all up with some  driving, post-emo pop from Atlanta’s Ayo River.

Enjoy and keep cool, kids.

We’re currently at work on our next monthly mixtape; in the meantime though, please enjoy this fucking awesome new song from Los Angeles’ own Phoebe Bridgers.

We’d featured Bridgers’ hauntingly beautiful “Smoke Signals” with January’s mixtape and called her out as an act to catch at this year’s SXSW, but, due tour own self-imposed rules (specifically, rule no. 1, “No artist repeat for one year”), this track can’t appear on this next mixtape, so enjoy.

Bridges’ Stranger In The Alps comes out Sept. 22 via Dead Oceans.

I’ll be totally honest here; we mainly wanted to create today’s post to see this GIF—which we stole from KCRW, who grabbed it from GIPHY, who seem to have originally obtained it from…Article Cats?—in this big, bold new full-width format. Pretty cool, eh?

We are excited about said eclipse—set to hit the west coast Monday morning—but, as most know, it’s only a partial eclipse here locally. And we’re not nearly as excited as American scientists, seeing as how this is the first time since 1776 that an eclipse’s entire path of totality stays within the United States; Trump IS making America great again, guys!!! The NSO has an entire site dedicated to Monday’s festivities and a nice interactive map that tells you how close you are to the eclipse path.

Let’s get syzygy with it, America.

A preamble: This musical find is courtesy of the latest issue of Vanishing Ink, the new(-ish) podcast and newsletter from Allyson McCabe (NPR, Rumpus, SF Chronicle): “Stripped and taped together like the music fanzines of a bygone era, the content is raw, edgy, and most of all fun; a modern tribute to punk culture and radio.” A must for fans of punk (music and culture) new and old.

PILL is a Brooklyn band that channels the energy of old NYC punk into the modern day in the best way possible, described by their label as “one of the most original and captivating bands to come out of New York’s post-Vice evicted DIY scene.” Burn. They continue:

“As the city quickly becomes a members-only club for the monied, hostile to the artists and culture that attract them, PILL defiantly answer this crisis in declaring ‘we take strength where order fails.’ Like the Upright Citizens Brigade (another one-quarter-female four piece) said before them: “Our only friend is chaos.” In the case of PILL, chaos is the genderless fifth member.”

Fuck yeah. Plus they have one of the coolest band sites I’ve seen in a bit.

Give their new EP a listen below and, if you’re NYC-local, check them out live. I can only guess that they shake the walls loose.

Aggressive Advertising by PILL

Hey, friends.

For any frequenters to these pages, you might have noticed we’re looking a little different these days—reason being, we underwent a long-overdue site redesign recently, so thanks for noticing. Or if you’re new, fuck it—let’s just listen to some new music.

We’re again very excited about some returns on the scene by some of our favorite artists, some expected, some totally out-of-the-blue. Longtime Canadian favorites Purity Ring dropped a new single a few weeks back and it is very Purity Ring (which is to say, awesome). And Swedish songwriter Emil Svanängen (AKA Loney Dear)—whose intimately personal electronic music we were huge fans of in the early aughts—has made a sudden return with a couple singles and announcement for a new full-length later this fall on Peter Gabriel’s highly esteemed Real World Records. We’ve also got a solo outing from Annie Hart of Au Revoir Simone (who we hear appears in the new Twin Peaks—you can read a 2013 interview we did with Hart where she talks about David Lynch and the band’s inspiration for their name). And, for me (Troy), most exciting of all—the return of German band Lali Puna, easily one of my favorite bands of all time and, along with Björk, one that opened up an early fascination with and love of electronic music for me. So we’re starting with that, because we can’t not.

We’re following our Deutsch friends with a new one from a new one London’s Tourist featuring Ardyn and a beautiful track from long-awaited debut full-length by Mura Masa (AKA Alex Crossan) featuring another favorite, Christine and the Queens. We’ve also got a new single from Montreal’s Blue Hawaii; Los Angeles R+B maestros TwoLips (who’s playing a free EP release party at the Hi-Hat next Tuesday);  Empress Of‘s anthemic new song, a sleepy house jam from Melbourne’s Take Your Time; a glitchy, catchy new track from another LA band (by way of Gainesville), Hundred Waters (you can download their most recent EP for free via their site); and an addictive single from London’s Millie Turner.

We’re finishing up with a song from Norwegian band Kommode (“analog dance music” from Eirik Glambek Bøe of Kings of Convenience and Øystein Gjærder Bruvik); another much-buzzed-about Angeleno, Billie Eilish; and a wonderful new track from one final final Angeleno, singer, multi-instrumentalist, and self-taught violinist, Sudan Archives (AKA Brittney Denise Parks).

Enjoy.

For anyone who hasn’t already, please watch Bong Joon Ho’s new film, Okja. We saw it earlier this month and highly, highly recommend it to all audiences. It is awesome.

It’s streaming now on Netflix and—upon writing—can still be seen at the Film Society of Lincoln Center in New York and at Tarantino’s New Beverly here in Los Angeles. We’d highly recommend the latter if you’re able—the theatre and Tarantino had a 35-mm print made exclusively for their use and it’s beautiful on the big screen. PLUS they’re playing the film through next weekend at least as part of double features, fittingly paired with movies like Babe: Pig in the City and Free Willy, and cult classics like the original King Kong, and a 1984 movie called Razorback (“In Russell Mulcahy’s dreamlike, ultra-stylized Jaws of the outback, a giant Razorback boar roams the dusty landscape in a voracious search for human flesh”). PLUS the theatre’s been featuring “Okja Vegan Hot Dogs” at their (adorable) concession stand and have promised to keep them around even after Okja’s gone if the demand keeps up!

Just in time for your holiday weekend, we’ve got our monthly mixtape of new music.

This one’s trending a bit more eclectic than usual, jumping from the excellent new cold wave punk of Brooklyn’s B Boys to some 80s-loving pop (complete with ‘baby baby’ talky break down, which is actually growing on me) by Nashville’s Wild Cub to some easy breezy classic rock by Southern California’s Parting Lines (the new project from Tim + Trevor formerly of Tall Tales and the Silver Linings; we interviewed Trevor shortly after the band broke up last year, for any interested).

But we’re starting things off with the welcome return of Stockholm’s Shout Out Louds, a band we’ve been following since we first stumbled across them at a now-defunct NYC club in 2003. We follow up with a great new single we’re loving from New York’s Salt Cathedral; some catchy, jazzy pop from Jack Steadman’s (Bombay Bicycle Club) new project, Mr Jukes; some more cold wave from London’s Kite Base, the new project from Savages’ Ayşe Hassan and fellow bassist Kendra Frost; some wonderful new vocal-forward electronic pop from Highland Park’s own Ella Vos (totally visit her SoundCloud page to download some of her singles, compliments of the artist); and a really nice cut off the new full-length by LA’s Gothic Tropic (AKA Cecilia Della Peruti). Another welcome return we’re excited about is that of London/Paris’ CYMBALS—they put out one of our favorite albums of 2014 that skirted the line between angular post-punk and (new) new wave beautifully, so we’re thrilled to hear the rest of their coming album, Light in Your Mind, next month. After their new single and the debut from Parting Lines, we’ve got an infectious track from LA-born, NJ-based ISADORA; some weirdly wonderful Norwegian pop from Blood Forest Family; and a truly awesome track from Los Angeles’ ANIMA! (so many all-caps). Then we end things up with a trippily rhythmic track from the UK’s Vasser and our favorite off of Joe Goddard‘s (Hot Chip) great new album, Electric Lines. Goddard’s beautifully designed site actually serves as a mixtape in and of itself and is well worth a visit/listen.

Enjoy, and happy America, everybody.

Next Tuesday, Los Angeles celebrates its second annual Climate Day LA—an event bringing together over 1,500 Angeleno leaders, advocates, and locals “to strategize, implement, and celebrate local solutions to climate change” and capping off with a fundraising gala DJed by everyone’s favorite Angeleno, Moby, and an evening concert with Neon Indian, Weyes Blood, and a DJ set by Eric Wareheim (you know—Big Bud from Master of None?). The event takes place at the beautiful Theatre at the Ace Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles this year, and is presented by KCRW, Climate Resolve, ecoAmerica, FORM, and IHEARTCOMIX in support of the Path To Positive LA initiative for climate solutions.  We wanted to find out more about the inspiration for the event so we reached out to one of its organizers, Jonathan Parfrey of Climate Resolve (who, also founded CicLAvia).

Read on to find out more about the event; the daytime portion (starting at noon Tuesday) is free with RSVP; gala fund-raiser (5PM) is $150; and evening concert (7PM) is $35; proceeds benefit Path to Positive LA.

6.26.2017 UPDATE: From the event promoter—”Due to unforeseen circumstances, the evening concert portion of our event with Neon Indian, Weyes Blood, and Eric Wareheim has been cancelled. All concert ticket holders will be refunded.”

raven + crow: Alright, for the uninitiated, do ycivilind starting by telling us about Climate Day LA—where did the idea for this come from?

Jonathan Palfrey: Our changing climate is going to alter just about every aspect of modern life—it’s a big deal—and we need to get ready. Climate Day LA was created to invite new people to make a difference on this most important issue. Our group, Climate Resolve, is partnering with a DC-based organization, ecoAmerica—the nation’s experts in climate communications and strategy—and together we’re reaching out to new constituencies with fresh new ideas.

That’s great to hear. I know last year, with the inaugural Climate Day LA, it was much more of your standard conference; this year, it seems to be leaning more in the entertainment realm—was that a calculated change of course to attract more of the general public? …or are you all just big Moby fans?

You’re right. We’re obsessed with Moby.

Who isn’t?

We’re also fired-up about re-attaching activism with music. Every progressive movement has been grounded in song—from Civil Rights to the singing revolution of Estonia. We also need to reach folks in their 20s and 30s, and music is a great vehicle to reach them.

Was it a challenge to get all these people from seemingly disparate fields—policy, entertainment, the nonprofit world—sitting down at the same table and committed to this as an event?

Climate Resolve’s creative director, Jacob Cooper, is our connection to the music community. Through his career as a musician, Jacob intro’ed us to the creative team at IHEARTCOMIX. Our Outreach Director, Kristina von Hoffmann, was introduced to the team at the Ace through a friend, and shortly after meeting with them we decided to collaborate on this event. We wanted to organize a concert that would reach new people. When it comes to climate change, we need more people to dial-in, become aware of the threat and make climate change a priority, and then to dedicate themselves to be part of the solution.

What are you hoping the event will accomplish for Angelenos?

Climate Day LA is an event that will be rich with information and cool ideas. There will be specific actions people can take, right there and then from their seats. It’s why the conference is free—we want to encourage folks to learn what’s happening on climate change right here in LA, and change the course of history. Sales of tickets to the gala and concert will support local projects and programs.

Not to veer too much toward the negative, but, given the current political climate (pun intended), can I get your thoughts on the importance of this kind of dialogue in context of what’s going on in Washington?

You mean the decision by Trump to back out of the Paris agreement and to appoint climate deniers? Here’s the thing, as bad as it is in DC—and I won’t sugarcoat it, it’s awful—many others are stepping up. Cities are stepping-up right here in California.

Even though Mayor Garcetti and Governor Brown have been damn good on climate change, they can’t do it alone. We need more citizens exerting their small “d” democratic rights and demanding that we protect the planet. It starts in LA, in California, and then spreads across the nation.

Do you feel that it’s the role of the state and/or local entities to pick up the slack when it comes to fighting climate change then?

Climate Resolve’s number #1 principle is this: Although climate change is global, we experience climate change locally, in our neighborhoods. Even though the federal government is a mess, LA and California are stepping up. In fact, California now has a competitive advantage over other states. Renewable power is cheaper and it’s the future. And California is ahead of everybody else.

It is encouraging, in these largely (for many of us) discouraging times to see the positive reaction on the local level many are having. I wonder though—most of us are used to fighting this fight in the arenas of government, non-profit campaigns, lobbying, but do you see opportunities to turn the tide from unexpected populations, like the tech industry or activist investors, of instance?

Yes! Our offices are located at the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator. We share space with great innovators working on solar power, energy-efficient lighting, car-sharing and more at companies focused on the triple-bottom line: people, planet, profit. We need technology and policy and science to inform each other and keep pace—with both social good and economic benefit.

Oh, yeah—you’re actually rock-throwing distance from our studio; I had no idea.

So, I know you’re moderating a panel during the day—can you talk a little bit about what you hope to cover and who’ll be speaking as part of that?

Climate Day LA features two very cool panels.

The first highlights young emerging leaders. It’s moderated by KCRW’s Avishay Artsy and includes Aura Vasquez, LA’s brilliant new DWP commissioner, Araceli Campos, President of the LA County Women and Girls Initiative and Nourbese Flint of Black Women for Wellness. You may not know these names today…but they’re LA’s future.

Then I’m moderating a panel featuring established leaders like Tom Steyer of NextGen Climate, Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia, and the brilliant Rachelle Reyes Wenger of Dignity Health — all of whom have made substantial progress in climate activism.

What are you personally most excited about for Climate Day LA?

I want to meet new young people—fresh for battle to protect the planet.

Climate soldiers. Nice. I guess I’m wondering—specifically from someone as informed on the subject as you—if you’ve had much experience in convincing the many unconvinced that A) yes, climate is a real thing that’s going on, and B) here’s why it’s important that we work to change course; how do you approach the subject without totally turning off those who disagree with you?

Funny that you ask—at Climate Day LA there’s a mini-play, directed by Aaron Lyons of the LA Fringe Festival, that takes place at Thanksgiving where all hell breaks out when family members disagree over climate change. It’s fun and informative. Plus we’re offering a whole session on do’s and don’ts on climate communication.

That’s great, actually. Total aside, but thanks for founding CicLAvia—I feel like that’s one of the most popular regular events in Los Angeles.

Isn’t it great? CicLAvia taught me that the best kind of organizing isn’t a wagging finger, isn’t being a scold, but instead, organizing works best when you invite people into a better place, to have fun. Joy is the best motivator.

One hundred percent agree with you on that. Thanks again for taking the time to talk, Jonathan—see you Tuesday.