Danny Brewer: Bikes & Bands

Danny Brewer, 28, of Kirkwood, does more than the average “starving artist.” Not only does Brewer write his own music and play acoustic guitar, but he also fixes up bikes – a project he calls “Brewer’s Bikes.”

A few years ago, Brewer sold his car and had to bike everywhere he went. Thus began his interest in bikes.

“I loved the feeling of biking and getting somewhere by the sweat of my brow.

“Brewer’s Bikes’ happened this year after I couldn't find work all winter," he said. "I decided to create a job for myself by taking old, rusty, neglected bikes and rebuilding them, adding some new components and tires and making a small profit – and it just happened to make a big splash in the city this year.”

Courtesy of brewersbikes.tumblr.com

Brewer said that he buys most of his bikes from Craigslist, but he also finds them in the trash and even receives bikes as donations from his friends.

“I work alone most often,” said Brewer. “I like it that way. It’s peaceful.”

Brewer says that most customers – the typical broke college student – learn about the bikes through his own friends.

“Brewer’s Bikes” operates out of “Kirkwood Re-Cycle,” where Brewer shares the passion for recycling with a few of his friends.

Atop the “Brewer’s Bikes” Tumblr page reads an original Brewer quote: “Spaciousness of heart is better than 1,000 luxuries.”

“I believe bikes are a great way to find simplicity and peace,” explained Brewer. “When I exercise and ride, I find that my mind and body kind of sync up, and I find deep contentment.

“I think that if more folks biked as a form of commuting, we would be healthier and happier people.”

courtesy of brewersbikes.tumblr.com

Brewer has built and sold about 50 bikes this year.

“To think I’ve helped 50 folks find an affordable alternative to the normal gas-powered commute is very satisfying.”

His most recent project was a 7-speed bike with an electric blue Peugeot mixte frame, French-made and light.

Brewer says that he hopes to continue building bikes next year and plans to dedicate more time to songwriting this winter.

Brewer began his musical career after he graduated high school and has played in several bands including church bands, and he has comfortably landed into acoustic songwriting.

“I began playing music when I was about 13 when my father would sit around after work, strumming the guitar someone gave him,” recalls Brewer. “I fell in love with the emotions in the chords and the melodies he could create with a few simple strums. I was drawn to music for its mystical and emotional power.”

Brewer says that he is inspired by his family, faith, and other artists.

Danny Brewer and Molly Parden in 2010

Brewer has performed all over the country, including shows in Seattle, Portland, Dallas, New York, Chicago, Nashville, and Savannah, among many others.

In Atlanta, Brewer has played at Eddie’s Attic, Vinyl, Smith’s Olde Bar, WonderRoot, among other “under the radar” venues.


And he hasn’t only played in venues.

“I’ve played on top of my van,” said Brewer. He said that he has also almost gotten arrested for “busking,” or street performing.

“I’ve been playing with Molly Parden a ton this year,” said Brewer. They plan to put more videos up on Youtube soon.

“I was recently contacted by an investor who is going to be funding some recording time,” said Brewer. “He ran across some of my Youtube videos and emailed me.”

Brewer recently performed at “Songs for Supper,” a dinner party adorned with local songwriters, at the Church of the Apostles on Northside Parkway in Atlanta on Oct. 29. He played alongside Molly Parden, Micah Dalton, Nathan Angelo, Jeremy Ezell, Emily Lynch, Jonathan Ray, Jonathan Rich, and Jason Harwell. 

Atlanta Trend: Juice Fasting

A trend towards organic eating in Atlanta has fostered an upsurge in juice fasting, a process of drinking nothing but fresh fruit and vegetable juice for extended amounts of time.

Juice fasting, also known as juice cleansing, detoxifies and can often lead to weight loss.

Arden’s Garden, an Atlanta-based fresh juice manufacturer established in 1996 by Arden Zinn and now owned by her daughter, Leslie Zinn, offers a “Two-Day Detox” juice blend as well as a “21 Day Turn-Around” cleansing program.

Heather Michelle, manager at Arden’s Garden in Little Five Points, one of six locations in the Atlanta area, said that they offer the “21 Day Turn-Around” program about once every couple of months. She has noticed a considerable increase in interest in the program and in the “Two-Day Detox” since she began working for Arden’s Garden a year and a half ago.

Michelle explained that the “Two-Day Detox” works best when a raw foods diet is adopted two days before and two days after the cleanse. “You really want to prepare your body,” said Michelle.

Michelle said that the benefits of drinking fruit and vegetable juice include phytochemicals and micronutrients that come from plants. The body does not expend as much energy digesting the juices and essentially “gets to play catch-up.”

Other employees at Arden’s Garden agree that word-of-mouth is definitely a major reason why people have become interested in juice cleansing recently. People also have been watching the documentary “Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead,” a true story about a man who juice fasted as a remedy to his illness. “When you see a story like that,” said Michelle, “it makes it more personal.”

Michelle herself has used juice cleansing as a way to better her health. She has lost 70 pounds in the past three years and has yet to catch a cold since she started working at Arden’s Garden.

Heather Michelle juices Wheatgrass for  a "Grand Slam"

Codie Young, 25, attributed her decision to start juice fasting to “Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead.” “The documentary really put a lot of things into perspective,” said Young, “It was really interesting and outlined the entire juicing process, while also showing the health benefits of taking on an all juice diet.”

Young said she has noticed a trend in juice cleansing. “I think people in general are fixated with the idea of ‘organic’ anything and juicing goes along with living a healthier lifestyle.”

Elizabeth Finlon, a 21-year-old vegan student at Georgia State University, has “juiced” for up to five days straight in the past. “You get all of the nutrients and still reap all of the benefits from doing a fast,” said Finlon.

“Losing fat means that you lose the harmful chemicals stored in fat cells,” according to Finlon. “It gives you a surprising amount of energy.” Finlon recommends vegetable juice over fruit juice because it is nutrient-dense and contains less sugar.

Michelle described her cleansing experience as “euphoric.” “I honestly feel like it can change your life,” Michelle said. “It helps you put everything into perspective.” 

Atlanta Street Art: Living Walls, The City Speaks

A fire hydrant, bright red with a Chinese flag imprinted upon it, glares down at Atlanta passersby, captioned with the words “Emergency Only”. It is a political message, to be sure. What it is not, however, is traditional art. This fire hydrant, painted by Spanish street artist Escif, dominates nearly an entire parking deck right in the heart of Underground Atlanta. It is one of many murals undertaken by the street arts conference, Living Walls, The City Speaks.

Living Walls, The City Speaks, a conference on street art and urbanism, was founded in 2009 by Monica Campana and Blacki Li Rudi Migliozzi, with the central aim to bring awareness to street art.

“It’s a very democratic thing,” said Alex Parrish, 21, Director of Communications and Assistant Project Coordinator at Living Walls. “It’s an invaluable resource, especially in Atlanta.”

According to Parrish, the conference’s mission is “to incite a public dialogue to inspire awareness of your surroundings.” Living Walls hopes that people will interact more with their surroundings instead of just consuming the advertisements that, especially in a city like Atlanta, use large amounts of city space.

“Places in Atlanta kind of get overlooked,” explained Parrish. Living Walls tries to attend to places that are not getting developmental improvements.

Living Walls works with street artists from all over the United States and from overseas to paint murals on city buildings. The building owners are not asked to pick a theme. “We just trust in the artistic merit,” says Parrish.

Artists use swing stages and lifts to scale large buildings, and work with aerosol, latex paint, and wheat paste, where they paste paper onto the wall.

They recently had a conference with an academic lecture series including Billy Mitchell of Truly Living Well, who lectured about urban gardening; Timothy Franzen of the American Friends Service Committee and Chris Appleton of WonderRoot, a local non-profit community arts organization, both of whom  spoke about activism through public art.

International speakers who spoke in the lecture series include Sabra Ripley of The Beautiful City Tax Act in Toronto, which taxed all billboards in order to create art projects, and Tristan Manco, from Bristol, a publisher who promotes street artists.

Gaia, a street artist from Baltimore, Maryland, and Doodles, an artist from Oakland, California, also spoke in the lecture series and worked alongside Living Walls to paint murals in Atlanta over the summer.

Living Walls has also recently worked in conjunction with WonderRoot on a youth mural project conducted at seven different recreational centers with seven different artists who painted murals with children and young adults.

Living Walls conducted its first conference in August of 2010 and has only grown since. In 2010, over 25 participating artists painted 12 murals. This year, more than 40 artists painted over 25 murals throughout Atlanta and the surrounding areas of Decatur and East Point.

Street artist Sam 3’s mural is visible from Georgia State University campus, and may be the tallest mural on the East Coast, stretching up 16 stories on the side of a Comfort Suites Hotel near Underground Atlanta.

Future projects include a mural and several workshops with a street artist from Tel Aviv, Know Hope. Living Walls also has something in the works for April. They hope to focus their next summer conference on female street artists, according to Parrish, because street art today largely consists of male artists.

Living Walls gets its funding from fundraising – carnivals, yard sales, even “paint parties” – as well as from grants like the one they are receiving from the non-profit organization Possible Future. Sponsorship is not just monetary, says Parrish, as sponsors participate in their projects.

Parrish says that the organization is currently attempting to gain non-profit status.

“Street art is a movement,” says Parrish. “This is not just a few people. It’s the city of Atlanta.”

Occupy Atlanta Affects GSU Students, Vice Versa

In just one hour, a constant flow of people in suits, rags, sweater vests, book bags and dresses filtered in and out of “Troy Davis Park.” Wherever they came from, curiosity filled their faces as they approached a monument of sorts in the center of the park: the “Believe” wall. Filled with sheets of paper of all different colors, each sheet had different handwriting and each sheet contained its own complaint, cry for help, or inspiring message. Gathering around this wall, the unlikeliest of groups formed in earnest conversation, many of them Georgia State University students, all of them willing to listen.

“I believe... that love is intrinsic to us and we need to spread it” was the message written by Megan Hollomon, a 19-year-old GSU student visiting the park for the first time on Tuesday. Hollomon said that she had been keeping up with Occupy Wall Street in New York and that she was curious about Occupy Atlanta.

“I know it’s not big, but it’s powerful,” said Hollomon. According to Hollomon, the movement in Atlanta “seems very liberal and progressive, but it’s not just Republican or Democrat.”

Hollomon said that here, everyone is coming out because they feel their rights have been violated.

“Everybody’s story is important,” she said.  

Daniela Villamizar and John Fink, both 19-year-old Georgia State students, sat near the “Believe” wall as they at their lunch.

“I think it’s cool how it’s right here downtown on our campus,” said Villamizar, about the Occupy Atlanta protests.  

“All of my friends are doing it,” said Fink. He said that he was not involved because the movement has “no general consensus.

“I think it’s a product of where we are in society right now.”

Villamizar and Fink discussed how technology is, for the first time, enabling us to watch protesters live. Fink said that although there does not seem to be a large group of people protesting, there does not need to be.

 “I don’t think this movement would be nearly as strong without technology,” said Amber Thornton, a 21-year-old GSU student studying English. She found out about the protests in Atlanta from her Sociology and LGBT Studies classes.

“I’m a huge proponent of the Occupy movement,” said Thornton. “I’m proud that our city has stood up and taken part in the protests.

“The Occupy movement has no leader, which is significant. Their list of grievances was written collectively, reflecting their collective statement – that corporate capitalism has infiltrated major aspects of our economy and society at large. Corporations need to be separated from government in order to redistribute wealth and power more fairly.”

Thornton said that the public presence of Occupy Atlanta on GSU campus is a reminder to students that activism and organization are useful tools in the fight against oppression. She said that their greatest achievement has been its ability to raise awareness.

“I think there is a reason why Occupy chose Woodruff Park over other public areas, like Centennial Olympic. The presence and participation of students, in my opinion, is central to the success of the movement.”

Thornton said that she knows several people who have taken part in the movement.

“The longer Occupy remains, the more likely people are to participate. The more police get involved, the more likely more people are to participate. I think that people want to feel like they are a part of something larger and important.”

Cassidy Stallings, a 22-year-old student at GSU, first heard about Occupy Atlanta when she saw flyers on campus and Facebook posts.

“I feel it is fair to say that there is not a single, specific goal of the movement, but many, fluid ideas of what is wrong with the country and those who run it,” said Stallings. “I feel that the Occupy movement is more focused on everyone getting the chance to have a voice and fight back rather than having a verified beginning and end.”

“It’s hard for people to understand that it’s not just one big problem,” Stallings said. She went to Woodruff Park on the first Friday of the Occupy Atlanta protests and took part in the march to the Bank of America.

“I hope the Atlanta movement is recognized by our state government, and the city itself,” said Hollomon. “People are here for a reason.”

“I can only hope that Occupy continues on, strong and active,” said Thornton. Thornton says that she is not sure what will happen next, but she hopes that Atlanta will set a precedent.

Stallings believes that the movement is affecting GSU students in an important way. 

“I think it’s opening the eyes of some GSU students that were not aware of what was really going on. It’s starting conversations and new ideas. It’s a beautiful thing.”