Before I leave this spring…

After much debate as to whether or not I would be able to go on this trip, I have in the last few weeks pulled together a plan to be able to go to my initial city; Los Angeles! I will be renting a room from a man named Olivier Ferrand, who is a music producer and has an in-home studio. Having recorded for artists such as Iggy Pop, he will have a vast knowledge of the history of the Los Angeles music scene, as well as a cheap room to rent out.

My experiences with Los Angeles have not been the most cherished. I remember leaving with a feeling of artificiality, and found the city to be very hard to connect to. However, having been to Los Angeles only twice, and for extremely short periods of time (a culmination of two days), I am really looking forward to spending more time in the city. I have never traveled to a city to academically study it, and I really hope to break my pre-conceived notions as well as the ones that I quickly conceived on my own. Before I embark on my trip, I plan on reading a few select chapters from both City of Quartz and Musical Metropolis to give me a layout of what I am going to see when I arrive, and to give me more context on locations and history. Musical Metropolis also comes with a CD, so that I can listen to the songs discussed in the book before hand as well as while I am reading. I will also be conducting internet research to learn about the history of real estate, tracking the movement of money through the city. Being one of the biggest cities for entertainment industry, the arts have played a crucial role in the creative and monetary capital that the city holds. This has given Los Angeles the   illusion of the “City of Dreams”, where musicians, actors, and anyone trying to become famous, migrate to reach their dreams. However, this is not the case for many who live in the city.

As of March 2014, the unemployment rate in the city is marked at 8.0% (where 6.8% is the national average). Along with this, the percentage of people living below the poverty line is 21.2% (14.9% being the national average). With these figures in mind, it is mind-boggling to read that the cost of living is 30.4 percent above the U.S. average. The wealth is extremely high concentrated, and thus has raised the prices of everything in the city.

This type of extreme wealth gap doesn’t happen overnight, and took decades to get to the state that it is in now. To understand how such a thing happens to a city, one must examine where power lies and how the forces that be have shaped the city into the image that we see today; a bustling metropolis built on a fault line surrounded by desert and no fresh water whatsoever. Not only is the city a biological anomaly, but it is also a cultural one as well.

I am also very excited to see live performances when I’m there and talk to musicians about the current scene and their opinions on Los Angeles. There are a plethora of free shows happening every night in the city, which is something that is very new to me. Back home, most shows at venues cost at least 10-20 dollars, not including coat check. To get the most eclectic results, I  will go to free shows, as well as a few paid shows, of any genre, and observe. I hope to be able to talk to some of the performers after their sets, and get their opinions on the current music scene and how thy view themselves in the context of L.A. and how the price of living has effected music production within the city.

My Itinerary: