China Room, a rising indie band on the Los Angeles music scene, is comprised of Joaquin Pastor, Nima Kazerouni, Vince Mazza, Johann Carbajal, and Greg Bramlet. The band first began to work with CounterCulture Productions on a feature film “Omarska” about the Roma (Gypsy) genocide in Bosnia, a tragedy that horrified and affected them deeply. Through CounterCulture, they then learned about something positive and hopeful – the Campaign for a U.S. Department of Peace.
For Nima Kazerouni, the need for a Department of Peace is painfully real. “My life has been deeply touched by war,” he says. “My hope is that others’ lives will be touched by peace. I was born into a world where bombs were falling yards away from my parents’ apartment, while warning sirens blared from street corners urging citizens to run for cover. Living in Iran through the early '80s, amidst a bloody domestic revolution and a fully realized war with Iraq, changed the course of my parents’ lives and left an impression on my family that would never fully heal.”
When he is not playing with China Room, Nima is a substitute teacher in the Los Angeles Unified School District and is thus well aware of the toll violence takes on parents, children, and faculty and the consequent needs for a U.S. Department of Peace: “We tend to think of violence as a foreign issue, but I've been substitute teaching in inner city schools and have experienced vicious racial prejudice and seen first-hand the effects of gang violence in disturbingly young classrooms. A student was stabbed and killed on campus only months ago. The experience still lives vividly with the students and myself, and leaves a community seeking solutions to ensure this doesn't happen again.”
When China Room was set to go out on their first tour, therefore, they wanted it to mean more than just supporting sales of a CD. They wanted to use the power of music and their ability to reach a global community of music lovers both online and face to face to do something good. They were a band venturing out on their first tour, without the power and money of label backing, without a huge tour operation, without big corporate sponsors, without much of anything but a van and their music.
With little time for planning and fundraising, they got together with CounterCulture and realized that any action, no matter how small, can do big things. So, China Room decided to tour in support of the Campaign for a U.S. Department of Peace.
CounterCulture’s Brett Michael Pitts put together an ambitious documentary project, his first as a feature length director. Brett was a musician himself and had toured with his band, We Stick Our Hands in the Fire, as well as filming several music videos for bands such as The Shiny Toy Guns and Runon Fragment. He was so committed to the project that he gave up his apartment, put his possessions in storage, and committed to the entire three-week West Coast tour on deferred pay.
China Room, who were completely open to the project, generously allowed him to travel, eat, and sleep with the band, and promised him 24/7 access to every minute of the tour, July 5-24. With everyone working long hours, Peace Tour 2007 became a reality. It was just an indie band going on tour, but they made it something extraordinary.
At a pre-tour send-off at UCLA, China Room spread the word about the Department of Peace, passed out literature, stickers and magnets, and signed up students for the Student Peace Alliance. At the kickoff at the Knitting Factory Hollywood, Tin Panda (the company promoting the event) was so impressed by what China Room were doing and the buzz that was spreading about them that they donated over a hundred free tickets. In a music scene where promoters usually demand that bands “pre-sell” a set number of tickets, that was a really amazing gift.
The Department of Peace information table was well supported by volunteers, like Tory Haslinger (State co-coordinator for the Los Angeles, San Fernando Valley and Santa Barbara areas), JoAnne Gaines (District 36), and Rosaline Roch (Student Peace Alliance). Senator Feinstein's State Deputy director, Guillermo Gonzalez, attended in support, and we answered many questions and passed out lots of literature to the crowd.
The next morning, the band loaded up their van and headed out to dates in San Francisco, Oakland, Roseville, Portland, Seattle, and Anacortes. Sometimes they played to crowds –their Anacortes show was so popular that the bar next door closed down for the night, having lost their customers to the concert. Sometimes they played to only a few people – but they planted seeds of peace wherever they went.
Without much money, they slept in the van, on the roof of a restaurant, and in a parking lot. They sang for their supper on the street and sold CDs out of their knapsacks to get money for gas and for the peanut butter sandwiches they survived on. They were jammed together in the van for miles on end, and Brett was filming constantly.
And then something extraordinary happened. They heard from people all over the world as this message about the Campaign for a U.S. Department of Peace flew out on the wings of music:
And everywhere that China Room goes, the message of the Campaign for a U.S. Department of Peace goes, too! The reaction, particularly by other indie bands inspired by the grassroots activism of Peace Tour 2007, has been so encouraging that Los Angeles volunteers and South Florida volunteers are cooperating to create a model with a website, information, and support so that other bands can do the same.
The documentary “Summer of Seven” is already in post-production, with offers of distribution, so look to hear more from China Room and Brett Michael Pitts and the Campaign for a U.S. Department of Peace.
They didn’t have much, but they gave it their all. They are the change and are making a difference. It doesn’t take millions; anyone can do it. You can change the world. You can make the U.S. Department of Peace a reality.
