With Love To and From Los Angeles

& A Path to Healing

Matthewdavid & me at Leaving Records HQ

Two days after the fires broke out here in Los Angeles, Matthewdavid - the founder of Leaving Records - invited me to contribute a song for a compilation benefitting the countless affected by the Eaton Fire.

“Our shared music community is all we got. Let’s start making a difference collectively through music now.” - MD

Curated with help from Carlos Niño, this 98 track collection features artists as diverse as Andre 3000 of Outkast, Laraaji, Reggie Watts, Julia Holter, Mndsgn, Daedelus, and truly far too many others to mention. But I will mention some of the artists who donated their sound lost EVERYTHING - including Photay, EMV & others on the Leaving Records roster. Madlib lost his house. Historic neighborhoods are ash.

Entire lives are gone.

OUT NOW as a digital format (over six hours!), select songs - including mine - are available on double LP (around 80 minutes of music), as well as a triple cassette (240 minutes).

All proceeds are split between impacted artists and displaced families in the Altadena community here in Los Angeles.

In an age where attention is a waning commodity, only action - not a “thumbs up” or even a small prayer to no one in particular - is appropriate. Catastrophes like this and the far too many over 2024 alone merit all hands & hearts on deck.

In Emmett Shoemaker’s beautiful notes on this project, he writes:

“Though we may not even know what ‘hope’ constitutes yet, we know we’ve got it somewhere. We know it’s in solidarity, and we know it’s in the music.”