Eat. Pray. Love?

Saturday April 16 was the free community viewing of the long anticipated first Mexican-American museum in Los Angeles called La Plaza de Cultura y Artes, which is located next to Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles church at Calle Olvera.

As a younger and inexperienced artist, one of my dream goals was to have my art displayed in a museum. I thought that would be the ultimate place where my ideas, voice and craftsmanship would be appreciated and cherished. I attended all the great museum exhibits–Van Gogh, Picasso, Tamayo, Siqueiros, Da Vinci, Kahlo, Warhol and so many more that I love— standing in front of their work (where they once stood), so hungry to see how they saw. Some of those artists were never even appreciated or successfully exhibited during their lifetimes.

Afterward, when a museum bought my work for a permanent display, instead of feeling accomplished—I felt like an oddity, a curio. I know it’s the nature of me, as an artist—I’m never satisfied, always looking for the next thing. As a producer/curator, a job that was imposed on me due to the lack of opportunities for my art genre,  I enter every exhibit with a critical eye.

In truth, museums began as cabinets of curiosities and collectibles that turned into rooms filled with stuff, which people were willing to pay admission to see. All these museums started as personal taste collections that were cherished by those who had the resources to give them importance.  I am not sure this system has even changed.

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Toques

icpiticayotl caja de audio toques transitio mx festival from arc-video on Vimeo.

The ancient Mexican tradition of electro (toque) therapy, once thought to have disappeared, is making a come back and is much needed in these dire times.
Toquero in Mex

A friend recently called me about info on Toqueros. I don’t even know if that is the correct term for men who would carry a small electric generator, and for a small fee, you can hold on to two metal bars connected to the generator and get an electric shock. My homie had looked around and didn’t find much. I told I would ask around. Then he sent me this site.
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Rambling On My Mind: Final Daze in Medellin: Like A Walk In The Park

Part I
Part II
Part III


2 homies still asleep in hostel. whole place is quiet. i leave and at 945 i’m on the metro, not packed. get to vegetus in downtown, across from this parking lot. small spot, kinda cramped. they tell me it’s all vegan. hells yeah! get lasagna and it’s alright. yes, lasagna at 1030! even got some ice cream made of avena. i take some pics of menu and a woman kindly asks me why and i tell her, just for memories. she goes over to the counter and brings me a menu and says, “you can keep this one.” here it is

i split and it’s noon and hit up a net place and write some shit. walk around and at a corner, in front of shopping center, is a long-haired metal head selling the latest in death and black metal. i walk over and we talk. i dabble in the metal arts, i say. i favor the traditional heavy style a la trouble. push play, sucka, and let the dark riffs remind you why ozzy and tony are seers. and no that is not ozzy. as if.
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The Little Burglars of Lincoln Heights, 1906


Not the little boys from Lincoln Heights but a reasonable representation

There have always been “juvenile delinquents” on the Eastside. As the years have gone by, perhaps the ethnicity of the children has changed but the acts are the same. Kids get bored, they experiment, they are curious, they want things and figure out various ways to acquire the articles they seek. A phenomenon common to all humans. Sadly for these little burglars, their names and addresses were printed in the Los Angeles Times for all to see. Worse, the newspaper mocked their common predicament by stating: “This is the saddest time of their lives.”

THREE SMALL BURGLARS.
They All Ran Off With Pocket Knives and This Is the Saddest Time of Their Lives.
Los Angeles Times, May 24, 1906

Three small boys, none of them over thirteen years of age were charged with burglarizing the Griffin-avenue schoolhouse. The three lads have made a full confession. They are Miles and Earl Vaughan, aged 13 and 10 years who live with their parents at No. 248 at South Gates street. Their father is a switchman with Southern Pacific.
The third and smallest member of the trio is Eddie Crist, aged 9. He lives with his parents at No.516 South Gates Street. His father is a carpenter. The boys were arrested and taken to the East Side Police Station and later removed to the Detention Home.
According to the story the three lads tell, they were playing in the yard of the schoolhouse Tuesday morning It was a holiday, owing to the Fiesta parade, and no one was in the building. They pushed on the door of the building and the lock gave way.
Once inside they made a thorough search through the rooms and say they took a number of pocket knives and fountain pens. Little Eddie Crist says he only took one pocket knife. The other boys admit taking several and some fountain pens. Their only excuse is that they wanted the articles. The lads will have to face a charge of burglary in the Juvenile Court.

Article courtesy of the Los Angeles Times, all grammar and punctuation are from the original story.

24 Hour Party People


Lynwood Ditch Party

“Tonight, Fox Undercover shows you what is clearly one of the most objectionable acts of the party crews, the ditch party…”

Thanks to LA Eastside reader DJ Mr Ed for recommending this link. We posted it on our Facebook page last week and were surprised when some of our readers said they recognized people in the video. Do you?

As exploitive as Fox News was of Latino youth and our subcultures in the 90s, it’s kinda nice, 20 years later, to have some documentation of the DIY Eastside and Southeast LA backyard party scene. Interestingly, they never infiltrated the punk backyard gig scene of the same era, maybe it’s cause punks are a little smarter. Yeah, I stick by that statement.

This video also confirmed my suspicion that the “rebel” look (only a few guys in the video below have the rebel look – there’s more in the above clip) was just one incarnation of an enduring style on the Eastside, a gradual morphing of 80s rockabilly into rebel into swing/rockabilly into psychobilly and finally, into present day greasers. The look never really died. In the 90s, the pompadour and James Dean chic was a style reference to artists like Dave Gahan from Depeche Mode. A quick aside, everyone talks about the prolific “Mexican Morrissey fans” but in the 90s, it was Depeche Mode who sold out the Rose Bowl. They were more famous here than anywhere else (“These guys are god over here!”) and even inspired a riot at a local album signing. A huge part of their fan base were Latino/Chicano kids. Naturally, young folks would emulate this look and these folks were called “rebels.”

How about you? Do you know someone who has rocked a pompadour and creepers for more than twenty years?


The Rebel Party Scene

“It’s a Saturday night house party in Huntington Park. Strobe lights color an evening of dancing, drinking and dope smoking. Here, boy comes to meet girl in a ritual as old as time…”

Rambling On My Mind: South American Edition: Guatepé, Antioquia, Colombia: Meet Me At The Bottom:

Part 1 here
Part 2 here


up at 8, showered night before. got out by 845, got to parque lleyras and like calle 10, it is empty. take metro to poblado to metro caribe then to north bus station to get bus to Guatepé. 11000 pesos it ran me. bout 5 bills
i’m right on time, sit in the back, wait 5 minutes.

last minute folks getting on, hustling for chairs. windows somewhat tinted and chairs not too comfy. i never thought of myself as tall, but every bus so far on this trip has chairs that dislike my knees. i have the bruised knee caps to prove it. and off we go (“so saddle up MC’s, and off we go. it’s not a rodeo, but i carry a lasso”). some tourists start to talk and i am grateful i have my ipod, i throw it on and vader accompanies me. Continue reading

Useless Earthquake News

The first trickle of devastating news came through facebook, links to some still images. Then another link. Turn on the tv, maybe they’ll be on the case. When they did get on the story they showed some of the same things already available online, some grade school explanations on how earthquakes happen, and some “exclusive YouTube videos” which was kinda sad. Everyone has exclusive YouTube video access.

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In Quotes: The Labyrinth of Solitude


My great-grandmother Matilde V. Tellez at an unknown Los Angeles park, circa 1940s.

Octavio Paz lived in Los Angeles during the late 1940s. Below is an excerpt from his book The Labyrinth of Solitude.

When I arrived in the United States I lived for awhile in Los Angeles, a city inhabited by over a million persons of Mexican origin. At first sight, the visitor is surprised not only by the purity of the sky and the ugliness of the dispersed and ostentatious buildings, but also by the city’s vaguely Mexican atmosphere, which cannot be captured in words or concepts. This Mexicanism – delight in decorations, carelessness and pomp, negligence, passion and reserve – floats in the air. I say “floats” because it never mixes or unites with the other world, the North American world based on precision and efficiency. It floats, without offering any opposition; it hovers, blown here and there by wind, sometimes breaking up like a cloud, sometimes standing erect like a rising skyrocket. It creeps, it wrinkles, it expands and contracts; it sleeps or dreams; it is ragged but beautiful. It floats, never quite existing, never quite vanishing.

Rambling On My Mind: South American Edition: Medellín, Colombia 2: Feints and Jabs aka The Feeling Out Process Continues

part 1 here

brazilian guys in hostel were loud sleepers. snoring bastards woke me up once or twice. i had packed my suitcase real tight, so no one would mess with it. just to be safe and not sorry. i had a long day but the brazilians left to party. it was about midnight. i scribbled some more and then went downstairs and spoke with a different guy from brazil, curitiba to be exact. i asked him about the famous fighters from his city. he was surprised that i knew about his city’s reputation, since i had never been there.
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