FEBRUARY: Valentine Street Day

For a year now I’ve wanted to cover the question: is LA a romantic city? When I think of romance of the urban variety, I think of walking along the quai of the Seine river in Paris (obviously), I think dining solo in New York, I think wandering the halls of the National Portrait Gallery in London or getting lost in a garden in Kyoto. Unsurprisingly, I don’t think about sitting in traffic on the 405.

Yet I remember being quite romanced when arriving in LA thirteen years ago. All the special pockets of the city I wasn’t aware of – like the wild native plants, secret stairs, winter beaches, old restaurant haunts, blankets of jacaranda trees, and year-round strawberries. And the romance of a creative community that sees sunlight almost 365 days a year is not to be underestimated. 

I lived on Valentine Street in Echo Park for eight years and I used to say that everyday is Valentine’s Day on Valentine Street. It was a dreamy time: I was in my early 30s, living in neighboring bungalows with my best pal (and co-editor of this review), within a long walk of the bustling businesses of Sunset Boulevard, during the early years of Cookbook Market. One year Betsy and I threw a Valentine’s Party which totally unlocked the holiday for me. Instead of booking a basic 2-top with a new (or old!) love, or feeling like a sad, single loser, it was a moment to gather with friends and partners – no matter your romantic status – and to celebrate all the different kinds of love. 

A stone’s throw from Valentine Street is Elysian Heights Elementary. I remember one day going for a walk, and discovering etchings in the sidewalk pavement near the school. I felt like an urban archeologist, uncovering something previously unseen. Memorialized in the 1950s cement, little Angelenos of a bygone era were professing their love for their favorite neighborhood cat, affectionately named “Room 8”. Talk about a love letter! I walked up and down the same block, touched with delight. It was the most charming moment I’ve experienced in this city to date.

So, as in any city, with its crowded subway cars, twinkling lights, a million little lives doing a million things, remember that LA can surprise you with its romance. And as with all love, the more you put into it – and look where you walk -, the more you get back.

Happy Valentine Street Day, kiddos.

-Meredith Rogers

Cultural Events

City Scraps #1: “Stay Down, Man”

I love a theme. When we started out, I was spending a lot of my time puzzling over the vanity plates that I saw on my commute across town, so it was as natural as BRDSNBZ to write about those. Then, when that began to feel a bit stale, I pivoted to strip mall reviews, because strip malls, like vanity plates, require a unique combination of boldness and finesse to really work. But this year I’m feeling a bit stumped. Billboard criticism seemed like a fun idea, but those have already been thoroughly scrutinized across a variety of Reddit threads; I was also interested in writing about seemingly forgotten spaces -- empty lots and overgrown alleys -- but those seem best addressed by actual experts; and I wouldn’t hate writing about LA-centric movies, but that just seems a bit too obvious (and redundant). 

I’ve therefore decided to do something extremely un-obvious (or, to put it another way, to do something that I don’t think AI or Reddit can easily render superfluous): I want to celebrate scraps -- little bits of art that feature Los Angeles only obliquely, or in a supporting role. Which brings me to Dan Reeder and his song “Stay down, man.”.

I really enjoyed Jeff Tweedy’s book How to Write One Song, which makes a great case (as Tweedy’s own music does) for employing dadaist techniques as a means to unleashing your inner poet, but at the same time, I do not mind it when lyricists (or writers, for that matter) can create great poetry while remaining exceedingly literal and direct. The lyrics for “Stay Down, Man” read like a transcript from an actual parking lot confrontation. But like a Denis Johnson story, it transmutes that base stuff into something profoundly beautiful and moving. “Stay where you are / I’ll get the car and we can go. / But I swear to god I’ll leave you / here to die / If you say one more word to that guy.”

The Los Angeles of it all is revealed by passing references to a nightclub and palm trees (“Nightclub parking lot, south of L.A. / …The warm wind blows, and the palm trees sway”). But I appreciate how its indefiniteness echoes with the anonymity of the characters. We have no idea who these people are beyond the sound of their voices. And what better setting for anonymous, apathetic lives rendered with incredible precision than a Los Angeles parking lot. 

I watched F1 recently (which was a pretty great family movie, truth be told), and I know Brad Pitt has done some great work in his time, but I also know that he is best used in a supporting role (which I acknowledge is not a new take). This is surprising, of course, because few people have ever had a more “leading man” bearing than Mr. Pitt. But looks can be deceiving. Charisma can be, too. Los Angeles, I would argue, is also best suited to a supporting role -- and it seems to know it. New York is America’s A-list star. It is the place to be for all our top crimes, romances, and laffs. But that also gives Los Angeles the freedom to be a little bit less grandiose; a little more real. And that’s a great atmosphere for great art as well.

-Daniel Harmon