📄 Transcript [show]
People have powerful feelings about the traffic in Los Angeles.
It says something that local officials warned motorists about a temporary roadwork closure on the 405 last year by calling it Carmageddon.
Angelenos took the hint, and this weekend they're expected to steer clear of the latest 405 closure, named, of course, Carmageddon 2.
That's how it is in L.A., a snarl of overstuffed freeways and commuters who keep their cool, except when they don't.
KPCC's Stephen Cuevas has this profile of a punk rocker whose music expresses the insanity of L.A.
traffic while extolling the virtues of public transit.
Couple of things you need to know about Eddie Solis.
He lives in L.A., loves the band Kiss, and does not own a car.
Being someone who's from L.A., born and raised, and, you know, having a few cars in my past, I saw the city much differently through a different perspective through the eyes of a bus rider.
Come on, just all the way to the back.
Line 18, Wilshire, Western Station.
Just steps from the front door of his home, across the street from a tortilla factory in L.A.'s Boyle Heights neighborhood, Solis catches a bus that connects him with the city's subway, and the commuter train he catches to his day job at an indie record label in Hollywood.
It just opened me up to, like, little neighborhoods, galleries, clubs, bars, just everything, just seeing what's out there, little pockets of the city.
He's a great guy.
He's a great guy.
He's a great guy.
Solis' journeys aboard L.A.
buses and subway cars informs a lot of the material on The New Los Angeles Part One, Through the Eyes of a Bus Rider, the latest release by the singer-guitarist band It's Casual.
The New Los Angeles.
No one has their choice.
In Solis' vision of a new Los Angeles, people abandon their cars, climb aboard public transit.
And rediscover their communities.
One song extols the virtues of the L.A.
County Metropolitan Transit Agency's E-ZPass and the urban underbelly it introduces to the rider.
And that's, like, a nod, an homage to, you know, the people who know what you can even go cheaper and really beat the system and really steer away from spending money on gas and oil profits and all that.
Fifty dollars is all it takes for me to get to work.
Fifty dollars is all it takes.
Fifty dollars is all it takes for me to get to work.
It's not just for me to witness racial tension, for me to witness illegal aliens.
It's not to paint a negative picture.
It's just my perspective of what is seen.
Off the bus and back on the street, we make our way past a jazz saxophonist playing for pocket change and down a long escalator to catch a train.
So, where are we now?
We're at the Red Line Station.
We're at the Pershing Square Station in downtown L.A.
And what's our destination?
We're going to go downstairs another tier and in about five minutes we're going to get on the Red Line going northbound.
Okay, let's go.
Let's go.
The Metro Red Line snakes from North Hollywood to downtown Los Angeles.
It's the train that inspired its casuals' signature tune and spawned a viral Internet video.
It was partly filmed late at night on a moving train as it hurtles from station to station.
Solis thrashes away on his guitar and barks the lyrics.
Celebrate the Red Line and call out the congested freeways that coil around Los Angeles.
This is a Metro Red Line train to North Hollywood.
The 210-605, the freeways are not so nice.
The I-5, the 210, the freeways are not so nice.
The thread that comes out of the record that ties everyone together is just like, be alive, don't be a victim of having a car.
All right.
The 210-605, the freeways are not so nice.
The I-5, the 210, the freeways are not so nice.
The Red Line.
The Red Line.
An MTA spokesman said he couldn't comment on Eddie Solis' furious pro-Metro message, but the Red Line video was a hit at the offices of Move LA.
Eddie's done a good job.
Thank you, Eddie.
Thank you, Eddie.
Thank you, Eddie.
Hey, this is cool.
I can mellow out.
Or you can blast the tune like Too Many People as you claw your way across Los Angeles by car, bus, or skateboard.
Los Angeles There's too many people I want them to go away Even LND days are free Too Many People could also be a motto for its casual, Over the years, the band whittled itself down to a power duo of solis and a rotating cast of drummers.
So you may think the burly, bearded punk rocker just can't get along with freeways, with people, or his native L.A.
Not true.
I love it.
I love everything about it.
I've traveled throughout the U.S.
many times, and I could never look forward enough to coming back.
The weather, the different cultures, the landscape.
I was just like, you know what?
Now I know why everyone moves to L.A.
Solis will bring the love and the volume during a Redline mini-tour next month.
Its casual will play a different venue within walking distance of several Redline metro stops from Union Station to West Hollywood.
For the California Report, I'm Stephen Cuevas.
I was my driver back then.
And that's the California Report, a production of KQED Public Radio in San Francisco.
Our director this week is Nina Thorson.
Sil Muller is our technical producer.
We had additional engineering from Danny Bringer and Howard Gellman.
Thanks to Hank Hadley at KCBX.
Our online team includes Lisa Pickoff-White, David Marks, and Don Clyde.
Our interns are Katherine Borgeson and Rachel Johnson.
Tyke Hendricks is our elections editor with production.
and help from Tina Lauerberg.
We had editing support from Paul Rogers.
Victoria Malione is our associate senior producer.
Ingrid Becker is our senior producer.
The news director is Bruce Kuhn.
I'm Rachel Miro.
Thanks for listening and have a great weekend.
This is the California Report.
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Expanding opportunity for the people of California and supporting the California Report since its premiere in 1995.
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More information at chevron.com.
The freeways are not so nice.
The I-5, the I-10, the freeways are not so nice.
The I-10, the freeways are not so nice.
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