The homeless shelter lies in the shadows of downtown Los Angeles. I drive two undergraduates up Figueroa and right at Sixth Street past men and women with ragged, worn clothes and tired faces. Just before San Pedro, we turn and pull into the parking lot. An attendant tells us not to park in the gated lot – only employees. We park outside Project Lamp in the heart of Skid Row Los Angeles and walk inside. Men, women and children walk past us.

Los Angeles is a place of myth, fantasy and brutal reality. The most beautiful, handmade artwork stands on the wall – “In Time, through recovery, Our Dreams Come Through,” “One Day At a Time,” “Recovery, A New Way of Life,” and “The Community of Recovery.” Words cannot capture the beauty. One of these drawings shows a dove taking off, another a group of angles crouching down, four in a row, ready to fly.

We walk outside and the Rabbi takes out his guitar. Soon, all of us gather around with a homeless man – Louis, the electric guitar player – and jam.

Two weeks prior, I attend another event at USC for the band, Ozomatli. Ozo is a true LA band, formed out of a common political identity: a desire to transform the structure and society around Los Angeles, and the world.

I heard my first Ozo show live in the late ‘90s at their weekly Dragonfly gig. DJs heat the crowd up, then once the shouts are loud enough, Ozo begins Samba-style from the back of the da-club. The crowd explodes.

The show at USC brings together my past and my future. Ozomatli has fans whose brothers were killed in gangs for straying from Highland Park to Echo Park ten years ago before the neighborhoods gentrified. Ozomatli plays in front of senior USC administrators who impact national and global policy. Now, they end their shows by merging with the crowd, leaving the stage and weaving their way into the dead center of Bovard Hall. The crowd roars.

I am a student engaged in issues of globalization and culture in the most grounded, real way. I am a recovering Hollywood independent producer who was blind to the damage done by the corporate movie, television and recording studio’s Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) policy. Now, thanks to my professors, I understand how power flows through our network society; how music, politics, images and financial capital are disseminated in specific directions through networks according to corporate power actors' needs. I “see” how specific corporate IPR actors follow the same underlying, impoverished, hyper-consumerist logic that dis-invests from Los Angeles inner-city communities, that prioritizes enclosures around knowledge and uses power to maximize profits over all else.

I also see visions of sublime beauty: When Hillel Jewish students jam with homeless men and women while little children play in the background, when two bands at two separate USC shows - Ozomatli and TV Sheriff – dance with their children on stage in front of everyone. I wonder what is possible.

Los Angeles needs places where the public can see, hear, feel and respond to people different from themselves. There are organizations like Friends of the LA River, LA Conservancy, and Midnight Ridazz that offer counter-examples. There organization use knowledge to bring communities together and create meaning in commons spaces like the Not a Cornfield project. We angelinos need to step outside our doors, follow the street to places where spirits truly can fly, where music is most desperately needed and appreciated.