Tucked away in the back of the San Gabriel Valley’s most unassuming strip mall, Bridgetown DIY sits in the middle of a triangle made up by a coin laundromat, a pizza parlor, and a Zumba studio. Here, on a weekly basis, a diverse group of students, punks, and dreamers hold shows, meetings, workshops, support groups, and a whole array of do-it-yourself arts and organizing projects. In what they call a “safe and sober space,” Bridgetown DIY functions free from the hierarchical oppression and violence that the outside world of America in 2015 tries to pretend doesn’t exist.
As I sit down with Cameron Hughes, Daniel Torres, and Kevin Lopez, I am reminded of an excerpt from Washington D.C. activist and punk historian Mark Andersen’s book, 2004’s All the Power, in which he writes, “The punk scene can and does function as a free space, a temporary autonomous zone. This is a context in which the control of society is weakened enough, in whatever way, to allow for seeds to be planted, to germinate, and begin to grow, even blossom.”
Bridgetown DIY is located at 1421 N. Valinda Ave. in La Puente, California. On April 19, they are celebrating their two-year anniversary with an all-day event that includes food, a community flea market tabled with DIY crafts and local, punk-friendly organizations, and a show to follow with a lineup that includes friends of the space. Here is a semi-detailed account of how they got here. Please read, take notes, organize your comrades, and then go do it yourself. Do it yourself, forever.
John Mule: I’d like to start with you all just telling me what you do at Bridgetown, anything else related that you’re involved in, and the first album, movie, or person that turned you on to the punk scene.
Cameron Hughes: I am one of the founding collective members at Bridgetown. In high school my friend’s older brother took me to a backyard punk show that I wanna say was in Whittier. It was the first time that I saw local, San Gabriel Valley punk bands playing. The only bands that I remember playing were Badmouth and Brainfreeze. That show and that singular interaction with the people who were making art and music in this community essentially brought me into it. Shortly after that I wanted to contribute in some way so I started doing a zine and that’s how I started meeting people. Currently, I am a collective member here and I am part of a band called La Bella. I also participate in various local and national anarchist organizations and I do some labor, community organizing stuff on the side, outside of Bridgetown, whenever I get the chance.
Kevin: I am a general collective member. I help out. I think the first record that got me into this was a CD in my mentor’s car. It was the Misfits’ Evil Live. And I just liked it a lot because the design was cool, and it set a precedent for everything: listening to punk and being involved in anything DIY related. I’m not involved in any bands. I just do DIY stuff. I’m really getting into sewing.
Daniel: Aren’t you doing a record label?
Kevin: A record label—uhh, up and coming. I have one release and I still haven’t gotten my copies.
Daniel: [Laughs]
John: So it goes.
Kevin: It’s bullshit. Print that.
Daniel: Print that! [Laughs] I am also a volunteer and collective member here. I do a little bit of everything. What got me into this community was an experience similar to Cameron’s. A friend of mine in my freshman year of high school took me to a backyard show up the street from my house. It was also Badmouth. I think A Nation Sleeps and Baby’s Breath played. Cameron was there and I had known him from previous things. That show was the first time I’d ever been to anything like that. There were zines and I called them [rhymes with “signs”] “zines.”
John: [laughs]
Daniel: I picked up a how-to-crochet zine and I learned how to crochet from that. I heard what a vegan was for the first time there. I had my first vegan cupcake. Later that year, I went to a backyard show at Cameron’s house, also with Bad Mouth, and a bunch of other bands. I think Rotting Out played, all kinds of local San Gabriel bands. This band called Sheeep played and I really liked that band. With three E’s.
John: Can you give me a brief history of Bridgetown?
Cameron: Doing backyard shows and participating in the community that was really thriving in San Gabriel Valley was awesome because there was a backyard show—if not every weekend—then at least every couple weeks. The issue that kept coming up at these house shows is that they were extremely precarious, in that they could be shut down by the police really easily. And they were, almost always. Basically, you were against the clock. You wanted to get every band to play before the cops came.
I had heard about the legendary DIY spaces that existed in the United States. As I was getting into DIY, I was becoming more and more radicalized. I knew about the squats that existed in Europe that had shows and were also social centers. I learned about the famous DIY spaces in the United States like 924 Gilman and Plea for Peace and ABC No Rio in New York. It became obvious that there wasn’t anything like that in the San Gabriel Valley or even in Los Angeles. There were venues that we were aware of, like the Smell, but they didn’t necessarily fit what we wanted in a scene, and they were far away. I remember having this idea for a long time and ruminating on it and how was it going to happen. I was looking for people who had more experience booking shows and running logistics because I had only done zines and backyard shows. My friends and I thought we could do it but we also wanted to look for people who had a little more know-how than we did. I met Danny Lyerla at a show that he was running at Aladdin Jr. in Pomona and I mentioned to him that my friends and I all had this idea for a DIY space.
Daniel: [Laughs] He’s a little older.
Cameron: He’s a little older but he knows what he is doing.
He’s booking shows every week at this place. Then I found out we were the same age.
As I got to know him more I found out that he’s from San Diego and he had participated on the periphery of the Che Collective in the past. We put out a general call to see what people’s ambitions were. After a show at Aladdin Jr., we secured a utility room on the Pitzer College campus in Claremont. We asked people if they were interested in a DIY space in San Gabriel Valley. I think there were twenty-five people there in this tiny room.
John: That was the first meeting?
Cameron: That was the first meeting. There was no format or structure. Some of us in the past had been involved with activist organizations, so we were coming into this with that kind of experience. Different people came into it knowing what they wanted to get out of it, and some came into it not knowing what they wanted to get out of it. I went into it very acutely aware that I wanted this to function horizontally. There had to be no hierarchy involved whatsoever. I had been involved with an organization in called Direct Action: Claremont that did various things. We organized against the neo-Nazi marches that were happening in Riverside and did support for labor union organizing on the Pomona College campus.
We all went around and said what we wanted to see or thought we could offer. Some people suggested bike maintenance workshops, and other people wanted dietician workshops for people who don’t know how to eat well, or introduction to veganism. And other people wanted it to be a very specific activist, political space, and saw it as a space with potential for organizing. Some people had no political bend whatsoever and thought there was no sustainable space that was safe from the cops to do music and art in the San Gabriel Valley that is owned by us and for us.
John: How many people are now members at Bridgetown? There’s not really a strict membership—anyone is welcome at the meetings—but people who pay for shows get a membership card.
Kevin: I could give a rough idea. Last year alone, I made most of the membership card copies. A ream is 250 sheets, and I would make copies of that every three months or so, for the entire year. Each sheet has ten cards, so you can imagine. Probably around 8,500.
Cameron: I think the question has two different ramifications.
Daniel: Like, how many people come to meetings.
[People have been trickling in for tonight’s meeting. There are maybe ten people. By the end of the meeting, another eight to ten will have arrived.]
Kevin: I want to say, core collective people who are here every week, who participate and help the space grow, there are ten or fifteen of us.
John: And no hierarchy?
Cameron: No.
Kevin: Well, technically, whoever’s name is on the lease, but that’s just… you know?
Daniel: Jesus, dude.
John: Don’t worry, we’ll strike that.
Cameron: I have no power to do anything. I could pull the lease but why would I?
John: In terms of the meetings, there is a value of full inclusion over the value of efficiency, right?
Cameron: Right.
Daniel: [Laughs]
John: So the meetings can seem like a pain in the ass?
Kevin: Well put.
Daniel: Oh yeah. That’s very well put. [Still laughing.]
John: But that’s the idea, right?
Cameron: Yeah. The thing is that real direct democracy is never going to be a quick, efficient process.
Daniel: Yeah.
Cameron: That’s never going to happen and it shouldn’t be that. No one should come to a meeting where there are divisive things on the agenda and expect them to be worked out real quickly because that’s just not going to happen. A real, lively, direct democracy, in which everyone participates, if it’s healthy, is going to have debate and disagreement. It’s going to have people hashing through and working out the different problems that arise from the different issues that are presented. The only way that we reach viable conclusions to the questions that are posed is through debate and compromise and that is what happens here.
Kevin: At the end of the night, if we start at 8:30, then we’re probably not out of here until 11:00 PM. And then there are times that we are still here. The meeting is officially over and we are still going over how we are planning on doing whatever we need to do.
Cameron: That speaks to the fact that we’re not a non-profit, and that’s not to say that we’re not a not for profit space or an anti-capitalist space, but we are not officially recognized by the federal government as a non-profit. And if we were, that would necessitate a different kind of organization. The federal government requires you to have a board of directors in order to be a non-profit and it requires those board members to have complete control over the organization. That, to us, is not democratic.
Daniel: We tried. We went that route. Our friend Jamie was trying to get us a non-profit status for the majority of the first year that we met at the space. That was an agenda item that always came up.
Kevin: And we were working on our charter.
Daniel: Yeah. I remember it kept getting stalled and then someone, maybe Astrid [Witchtree, core member of Bridgetown, also plays and sings in Moon Bandits], took charge of it and was doing a great job. Then we got to the place where we had to establish a hierarchy…
Cameron: It became an ideological question rather than a practical question. It was always going to be an ideological question and in order to navigate that we would say that the board of directors will never have power over the collective. At the time we were operating under the assumption that we needed a non-profit status in order to be seen as legit by city, county, state or federal governments. We needed to get funding, and the only way to get funding is through grants, and the only way to get grants is by being a non-profit. And so we had to justify that fact to ourselves. We said that if there was going to be a board of directors then they wouldn’t have power, but we didn’t have any way to assure that.
Cameron: I would rather take the safe route and ensure that we have an entirely horizontal, non-hierarchal way that we decide things, then run the risk of imposing—even if it was unintentional—a hierarchy on the space in one way or another.
Daniel: I think those meetings, leading up to the final non-profit decision, were the most frustrating.
Kevin: Yeah. We literally sat down and said, “Why shouldn’t we do this?” And most of us said, “Because we’re punk.”
[Everyone laughs, but in a way that includes a common understanding.]
Kevin: Our political ideology kind of eschewed it. Like, someone could take this away if they don’t like what we do? The idea was that we wanted to offer free stuff, free food, and free clothes. By becoming a non-profit, some of us felt threatened already, like someone could revoke something or slap us on the wrist. We thought, let’s not deal with that. We said, “Fuck it, we won’t be a non-profit and we’ll….”
Cameron: Be in limbo. [Laughs]
Kevin: Yeah.
John:Bridgetown has been really involved in efforts to save the Che Café on UC San Diego’s campus. You mentioned that some of your original members were involved there. Can you explain how you all have been involved recently and what’s going on now?
Cameron: The Che Café collective is a seminal DIY space that has existed on the University of California, San Diego campus since 1980, but the history can be traced back before that.
Daniel: Forty or fifty years.
Cameron: It’s been around on the campus for about forty years—longer than any of the people in this room have been around. The space has operated under the same exact ideals that Bridgetown has. It is a non-hierarchical space that is run by students and community members and they’ve existed in strange tension with the University of California for almost their entire existence. The building that houses the Che was initially, back in the 60s, a faculty lounge. During the latter half of the 1960s, with the introduction of a multitude of different liberation movements on the UCs—like the student antiwar movement—there was a lot of interest in students becoming self-organized and organizing for their own power. They saw this lounge as an incursion on their territory. They didn’t feel like the faculty needed another lounge on the campus so they said, “No, this is the student government, the students’ property, and we are going to take the space from the University.” It became a student space and it operated as a café for a long time. Eventually, in 1980, it became known as the Che Café.
Daniel: Cheap, Healthy Eats.
John: I never knew it was an acronym.
Cameron: It was a vegan café. That’s the primary function it served for a long time. It did some music and art stuff from time to time. So, throughout the early history there was an established intention with the university, and that’s a really important fact in their history.
John: Is that a legal fact? Is that what they are using to say, “We’ve already established this.”
Cameron: It’s not something that has been used by the administration in the current struggle, but when you look at the struggle of the Che in the historical context, you realize that the administration has always had an issue with them. There were multiple attempts by the university to shut them down using different guises; everything from budget shortfall to saying that they were not up to code so they had to be shut down. During that entire time there was always students’ resistance to stand up to the administration.
Daniel and I and my partner Miranda have been actively involved in making a documentary about the Che, Bridgetown, and Blood Orange Infoshop in Riverside. We had the chance to pore over all these different documents that the Che has kept, and its incredible the different situations and generations of Che collective have found themselves in and the way that they have stood up to it. There was one that stuck out to me from the 1970s because it’s the same thing that the university is using now to shut them down. They say that the Che isn’t up to code and that the school could never fund bringing it up to code; it will cost too much. At the time, the Che Collective, student government, and cooperatives on campus said, “Fuck you. We’ll raise the money and do it ourselves.” They did and managed to do it at ten percent of the cost of what the university estimated.
The history of the Che has been a history of struggle. Spaces like Bridgetown or Blood Orange, we don’t have that history, and Che does, and it’s a real manifestation of our ideals as radical, political spaces. They have had to actually fight tooth and nail for….
Daniel: They put their bodies on the line.
Cameron: Literally. Following these attempts by the university, throughout the ‘80s and the ‘90s, there are times when the collective members have had to chain themselves to the building, have had to lock the doors and build barricades to prevent the university police from evicting them. Every time they’ve struggled, they’ve won. They’ve beaten the university, and said, “Fuck you. We’re staying.” In the most recent situation, the university has a claim that the building and fire sprinkler system are not up to code, and that it would cost, I don’t know exactly….
Daniel: It was like $800,000.
Cameron: It’s an astronomical amount of money that they feel would feel bring it up to code. Yesterday, the Che got a letter that said they had to move by March 14th (2015) or they will be evicted.
Daniel: It’s not looking good.
Cameron: Bridgetown sees itself as ideologically aligned with the Che. We know those people and we’ve gone to shows there.
John: Are any of you UC students?
Daniel: No.
Cameron: None of us are UC students. I’m at a community college right now so I see myself as having a dog in this fight because, in the larger political context, the University of California at San Diego has overwhelmingly attempted to sterilize the campus of any arts or music. All the while, more money is being funneled into more research and science programs on the campus. Bridgetown has printed stickers and posters for the Che, and members have gone to the various court hearings that have happened. We’ve shown up in person at their collective meetings. And we’ve done this because…
Kevin: We wouldn’t be here without them.
Cameron: If we faced a similar situation, they would be here with us. And who are we with all these radical books on our shelf and circle-As on our walls, or claiming that we aren’t hierarchical if we aren’t willing to put ourselves and our resources on the line? Solidarity is necessary.
John: Can you explain your argument to someone who says the reason the Che Café is running into these problems is because they are connected to the state and on the state university’s land? This is why Bridgetown hasn’t run into problems, right? You do it on your own. And you could say that these are taxpayer dollars, but the state is going to do what they want with them.
Cameron: In my opinion, the UC system claims to be an open system. When it was brought into being, the idea was that it was a democratic, fully accessible system for anybody who had the grades to go there. Back when Jerry Brown was governor his first time, tuition was barely a thing. The UCs were meant to be public utility spaces that anybody could go and engage in. The Che Café, in my opinion, is an extension of that and it is one of few things, or the only thing, on campus that keeps any ties to the community. You could say that they have problems because they are tied to the state but, rather than throw in the towel, I think a lot of people see that they have to fight to hold on to what little public utility still exists on UC campuses. They see that they are fighting for something bigger than themselves and something that is even bigger than the Che.
John: When I think about people I have met at Bridgetown, I am quickly struck by how wonderfully open and vulnerable the people here are. The most casual acquaintances have shared stories with me about run-ins with cops, overbearing religious parents, and gender transition stories. What is it about Bridgetown that facilitates this openness with one another?
Daniel: Bridgetown from the start has been a safe space where no types of oppression or bigotry, racism, sexism, etcetera are allowed. We haven’t really had a particular run-in where we have had to enforce that policy. The fact that we call ourselves a safe space helps to facilitate that kind of environment. I feel comfortable here with my fellow collective members and pretty much anyone who comes into the space. Being a safe space is so important, especially for punk. People come in with all types of backgrounds and identities seeking solace. Your experience is awesome to hear, to hear that we are doing it. Does that answer the question?
John: Yeah, for sure. I was at a show at another space not too long ago where some fucked up dude felt that he should take his pants off and the other people at the show got on his case about it. Afterward, it was this huge to-do and he kept saying a bunch of bullshit about, “This is punk! I should be allowed to do whatever the fuck I want!” You get so tired of hearing that nonsense. It’s just amazing to me that Bridgetown is here and holding strong to its ideals of inclusivity.
Cameron: This is something that’s been bothering me a lot recently because Bridgetown has been getting flack from individuals and as the desire for safe DIY spaces grows, there is also a reaction to that. There have been bands who sent out tweets saying, “Fuck safe spaces. We’re a hardcore band. We don’t need that.” There are local hardcore bands that have song titles directly targeting Bridgetown and I have seen various event pages with people calling us “PC.” The sentiment is basically that people feel that punk music is not “safe,” has never been “safe,” never will be, and shouldn’t be. What I want to say to those people is that it’s not about being “safe.” That terminology could be articulated better, but we don’t have control over the buzzword that people use to describe spaces that foster inclusivity. People confuse this and assume that we mean to be sterile or don’t provide room for challenging ideas—not that people who criticize safe spaces are interested in those things.
Daniel: Yeah. [Laughs]
Cameron: For all of the drivel that kids spout about punk being a community of outsiders, they are really quick to turn around and not give a fuck about people who are actually marginalized. Places like Bridgetown and the Che Café and the Laughing Horse in Portland try to put structures in place that hope to insure that this is a place for all people to enjoy themselves. The people who tend to oppose safe spaces are often men, usually white men. In reality, its power slipping out of their hands because there are plenty of safe spaces for straight, white dudes.
John: Right.
Cameron: They can do whatever they want. And anytime there is an attempt to level the playing field and people want to challenge white supremacy or heteronormativity or whatever it may be, they feel power slipping away, whether they are conscious of that shift or not. Just because you can’t pretend to be GG Allin here doesn’t mean that we are squashing creativity. That notion is just fucking crazy to me.
John: I have noticed a lot of GG Allin shirts on young kids at shows lately and I wonder if these kids really understand who he was. How did this become the cool shirt to have? The poor guy had all kinds of problems starting from the second he was born, but he also did some incredibly fucked up stuff.
Cameron: I understand that shock value has its place in music but I have also had people say that what a particular group is doing is satire. And, to me, the point of satire is to hammer against despots and against systems that act to marginalize people. If you are going against people who are already marginalized on a daily basis then how is that powerful satire? There will always be people—and you know the type of people—who are opposed to it for whatever reason.
Daniel: The space isn’t for them. Bridgetown is for people who suffer the consequences of a system that was built to work against them. We want to help people to subvert that system.
John: Totally. There is the scene and then there is the movement, right? The Clash faced ridicule and accepted an invitation to join Rock Against Racism (along with Steel Pulse, The Buzzcocks, and The Ruts). Fugazi faced it for their ethos, Bikini Kill faced it.
Cameron: I think the great irony is that the spaces that don’t have safe and sober policies, and the people who flock there; there is no critical discussion whatsoever.
John: Right.
Cameron: And it’s hugely ironic to me that they use this heady idea like free speech and yet they don’t use it critically whatsoever.
John: It’s just fucking boring.
Cameron: Yeah, it’s boring and they don’t have the necessary conversations. It would be great if a non-safe space would be open to critical discussions, but those things don’t happen there. And the spaces that aren’t sober and safe tend to get shut down. They don’t foster inclusivity or communities around them that care and then that’s when shitty stuff goes down because there isn’t a structure in place that tries to stop violence or drinking. This isn’t something we just blindly adhere to. We are actively, constantly evaluating what we are doing.
John: The last time I was here, there was this beautiful scene taking place. Astrid was at the front desk and there was a mom there, speaking in sort of broken English, and she was asking about the space, asking if her son would be safe here, asking if there would be drinking, and it was just another level of involvement for the community. Astrid and Tommy (Danger, also a core member of Bridgetown and Moon Bandits) were really gracious with her and it was cool to see that connection.
Kevin: Yeah, I used to have a drinking problem and, like Cameron alluded to, alcohol is the number one reason that these spaces get shut down. For us to stay true to this is another way for the community around us to feel engaged and comfortable enough to participate. And when parents actually want their kids to come back, it helps to build something bigger.
Cameron: Parents feel comfortable letting their kids go to shows here and, as a result, they participate in critical discussion. If punk isn’t able to facilitate that, then what the fuck is the point? I don’t give a shit if you think that punk is doing what you want and getting away with it. It’s not that to me and it never will be. It is the place where people find themselves and engage and shift the world around them.
Daniel: We still have problems.
Cameron: But our structure allows us to deal with it in a way that doesn’t destroy us like it would another scene or venue.
Kevin: Punk is about moving forward in a positive way to grow something. Right now, we are offering this art class here to young people. They could totally be us two or three years from now. I know I won’t be here forever and I would love to pass the torch to someone else. If people hate us, we must be doing something right.
John: Tommy tells this hilarious story about doing folk punk shows here and then letting bands stay at his house afterward. In the morning, he gets up, puts his tie on, and gets ready for work. The bands are often like, “What the fuck are you doing?” [Everyone laughs.]He has his band and his partner and his daughter, but he still takes the punk ethos into his life. Again, it’s that branding of punk itself—that you have to be GG Allin and take your pants off—and the idea that that’s what punk is.
Kevin: That reminds me, as long as we are talking about Tommy, he is also a huge Dodger fan.
Daniel: What the fuck?
Cameron: I had no idea.
Kevin: Dude, he is a huge Dodger fan.
John: Damn, I have to talk to him about that because I’m a Dodger fan, too.
Kevin: He gets tickets from his job sometimes, and he was hoping that they would make it last year so he could let the world know that he bleeds blue.
Daniel: Oh, geez. [Laughs]
Kevin: Punks put on this persona, but at the end of the day we’re just regular people. Bridgetown just has a bigger purpose, whether it’s being safe and sober, or its creative aspects, or whatever.
Daniel: I came into Bridgetown and it was just a place to see a show, but seeing people foster an environment where everyone could participate instilled these ideals in me forever. If I found this space at sixteen, it would be mind-blowing to me and I would want to get involved. And now that I am, these ideals have spilled over into other aspects of my life and have affected the way I interact with the world. That’s what I love the most about this place.
Kevin: There are people who are regular helpers here, who are totally normal, who I would never have met or seen at a show, and now they have totally influenced me.
Daniel: Those are some of my favorite people here.
Cameron: The experience of molding or shaping a space is something that doesn’t always happen in our lives. So much of our lives aren’t dictated by us, but by outside forces and we don’t always get a say: how our job works, or elected officials, or how we make money, or the political landscape. Some people would say that we have a say in a lot of those things, but I’m not always sure that we do. And any attempt by Bridgetown to introduce those ideals and radically different organizational structure into people’s lives is trying to show people that we can come together, with different backgrounds—in an egalitarian setting where no one controls anyone else—and work together towards a common goal.
Maybe it’s not the most cost efficient thing ever, but the things that come out of it are so much more democratic than what we are taught to believe is democracy. The space is political but we don’t tend to use a lot of adjectives. Bridgetown is made up of anarchists, feminists, communists, and radicals of all stripes. We don’t necessarily place those in front of the Bridgetown name, but the praxis of those helps to determine what Bridgetown is. It helps to craft and alter the way people who come here see the world around them and how they contribute to the world. It’s illogical compared to what we have been taught. There is no boss. No hierarchy. We share things with each other. And Bridgetown is the embodiment of that antithesis. We will continue to show that another world is possible.
John: We have used that word “efficiency” a couple times now and you just used the word “illogical.” You can see how those words are just capitalist terms or imperialist terms. People here are “vulnerable,” as opposed to being “efficient,” whatever the fuck that means. I would much rather have their vulnerability.
Cameron: Yeah, efficiency and logic have been co-opted by capitalism. And, to me, Bridgetown makes so much more logical sense than what we have been accustomed to in the past. To me—having a space where everyone comes and decides how things will work—makes so much more sense to me than going to a job where my boss explains how I should do things and tells me how to do something that I may have been doing for years—and may know much better than he or she does.
John: David Graeber writes that maybe the reason that anarchy doesn’t work on the state level is because anarchy is supposed to be totally opposite of the state. It’s not supposed to look like the state. It’s supposed to look like something completely different. And what that looks like, I think, is Bridgetown. You are carving out your own space.
(The passage I am thinking of here comes from Graeber’s short but powerful book, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology: “There is a way out, which is to accept that anarchist forms of organization would not look anything like a state. That they would involve an endless variety of communities, associations, networks, projects, on every conceivable scale, overlapping and intersecting in any way we could imagine, and possibly many that we can’t. Some would be quite local, others global. Perhaps all they would have in common is that none would involve anyone showing up with weapons and telling everyone else to shut up and do what they were told.”)
John: So, what is planned for the two year anniversary on April 19?
Kevin: I spearheaded the anniversary planning. It’s a happy birthday to us. We are having a lot of friends play who have been important to us. Before the show, we are also hosting a flea market with people from the community tabling crafts and groups and people who we have worked with in the past. A Riot Grrrl chapter started here in the last few months and they’ll be tabling there. The local youth art collective will be here along with some other local artists.
John: What bands are playing the show that night?
Daniel:Tough Stuff from Orange County, Leer from the Bay Area, La Bella which is Cameron’s band, Sophie, Strange Wilds from Washington, and Slow Paradise.
Kevin: All these bands are good friends of ours. They are the bands that we have counted on when we needed them the most.
Daniel: We should also mention that Rafa’s tacos will be there.
Kevin: The best vegan, Mexican food in L.A. County.
Daniel: In the world.
Kevin: You haven’t had my tacos, so you don’t know.
Daniel: Yeah, okay. But Rafa’s is great and supports us, so they’re coming.
Kevin: Burrito LA is coming too. They are like a mobile version of Food Not Bombs. And other venues, like Blood Orange in Orange County, have been invited.
John: Well, I really dig Bridgetown and I look forward to the anniversary show. Any last words?
Kevin: Do it yourself, forever.
Daniel: That was going to be my final thought.
John: I couldn’t hear. Can you say it again?
Kevin: Do it yourself, forever.
