“So many hearts, one love”
“The Space Babies Show: A Song in a Day” is a series of 6 documentary – style videos that walk you through our songwriting process. Each episode begins in the morning as a blank slate… and over the course of one day, a song is born.
For this episode, we recruited our buddy Eric Ernest Johnson (Eric on Instgram) to paint a mural on the back of “The Wigwam” (which is what we call our garage). We decided to do a mural of a Chumash native village, something that might have been in the area before the Spanish arrived and “saved” everyone. Venice Beach, CA has a rich history of murals and this beauty will certainly add to the lexicon.
The Chumash are a very interesting tribe that lived in coastal California from Malibu up to Paso Robles. They had fairly primitive technology but were master canoe builders, traders, and had a very rich artistic and religious life. It is a great gift to stumble upon a cave filled with beautiful psychedelic and ancient paintings of the cosmos and the “other realms “ while on a hike. The medicine men were great soul travelers. Modern day chumash have a reservation and still conduct ceremonies. If interested, check this out:
While Eric got busy painting the wikiup homes, canoes, and native characters, we tried to concoct a song that would be about his artwork. What if we could enter the mural and go back in time? Are we so different from them? Or are we all a family, divided only by time?
We are a “West Coast Family” … with “so many hearts, but one love!”
In the middle of the song, we break into a chant. “Moomat Ahiko” which means “breath of the sea” in Tongvan (which is the name of the tribe in the Los Angeles area).
The music video has us enter the mural and dance around through time. My son Ravi goes up the mountain to visit the Shaman in The Cave and returns with the secrets of adulthood. We paddle out in our canoes and celebrate all West Coast dreamers! Ride that whale! We hope you enjoy this ride and heartfelt homage to the custodians of the western land beyond time!!
Mural art & additional vocals by Eric Ernest johnson