HV125- City of Angels

Hearing Voices from NPR®
125 City of Angels: An Ode to Old L.A.
Host: Barrett Golding of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2011-11-02

“City of Angels” (52:00 mp3):

We’re occupying the streets of Los Angeles; our demands: bring us stories…

From the album Hotwalker: Charles Bukowski & A Ballad for Gone. An Americana ode to old L.A., the music, the culture, from beat outsiders to religious revivals to long gone radio sounds; with stuntman, circus midget, and actor Little Jack Horton.

“Hotwalker is the best Sam Peckinpah movie since Peckinpah died. It’s a ghostly jubilee, an audacious slab of Blue America. Narrated aby noir cowboy, Tom Russell, it is a singular recording, bound to be controversial — it’s not only going to ruffle feathers, but leave feathers scattered on the ground.”
—novelist-poet Luis Urrea

A couple web extras…

“Tom Russell’s ‘Hotwalker’ Influences,” an inteview by NPR’s Alex Chadwick:

“WLS Radio Interview w/ Tom Russell” (10:21 mp3):

From Joe’s “Streetwise” hour, and the CD collection Joe Frank Team Favorites: an interview with an anonymous homeless man on the streets of Los Angeles. Music: Thomas Newman “Rock Hammer” The Shawshank Redemption: Soundtrack.

Excepted from an hour radio program, this audio portrait explores the lives of elderly Mexican-Americans in California. David Greenberger talked with residents of East Los Angeles senoir centers about their history, and that of their city and state. Louie Perez and David Hidalgo of Los Lobos created the soundtrack.

The hour was created and produced by David Greenberger with co-producers Jay Allison and Barbara Price, This project is made possible in part, by a grant from the California Council for the Humanities in partnership with the Skirball Foundation, through the jointly supported California Documentary Project, a program of the California Stories initiative.

When the last school bell rings, Pastor Mike Cummings stands in front of Jordan High School in Watts, Los Angeles. Jordan High is next door to the gang-ridden Jordan Downs projects, which students have to pass through to go home — sometimes with Pastor Mike at their side.

From Bran Van’s Glee:

We close the hour with the end of Hotwalker: Charles Bukowski & A Ballad for Gone. With the stories of Little Jack Horton, and Gretchen Peters singing “America the Beautiful.”

A spoken/sung SoCal story-song from Soul’s Core:

Top photo: Venice West Cafe, 1950s, scene from the film “Venice: Lost and Found.”