When you live inside a place like the Antelope Valley, realizing how the local culture relates to a larger southern California culture can be difficult for a number of reasons. Palmdale and Lancaster are not as culturally vibrant as Los Angeles — few places on the planet are. The Antelope Valley’s proximity to Los Angeles creates a situation for this comparison though, which is unfortunate because it skews the conversation on local culture toward the negative.
Bombarded with disparaging and/or alienating comments from people unfamiliar with what it’s actually like to live in the high desert or distressed by the many teenagers and 20-somethings who crave the metaphorical traffic of Los Angeles over the relative quiet of the desert environs, finding a way to honestly assess the Antelope Valley can mean stepping outside for a moment and taking a pointed view at one aspect of local culture.
The Shots Fired podcast ran an episode a while back that might help do just that.
This is a music podcast dedicated primarily to rap and here the hosts interview MiBBs (of the Pac Div), a rapper who has called Palmdale home. Check out the podcast and let yourself think a little differently – with some distance – about the cultural life of the Antelope Valley and how it comes out of the actual life of the region.
Antelope Valley Arts 