City Hearts Summer of Love Tour Brings House, Techno, and Love to a Club Near You

Article by: Madison Liddle

Thu July 23, 2015 | 00:00 AM


You know that sinking feeling when the festivals over? The lights turn on, the music stops and it’s time to pack up your stuff. Remember how bummed you were? How badly you wished you could stay there forever? Enter City Hearts . An extension of Desert Hearts Festival , City Hearts is a series of parties aimed to spread the “House, Techno, and Love” mantra around the world and bring the energy of a festival indoors.

Co-creator and resident DJ/producer Mikey Lion describes City Hearts as “an urban escape that [is] the perfect complement to our festivals, giving people in our communities something to look forward to year round. City Hearts is the yin to Desert Hearts yang.” With live artists, an amazing sound system, open-minded people and their famously good vibe, the events capture the very essence of Desert Hearts Festival. They serve as both as a place for existing fans to connect with one another as well as a way to introduce newcomers into festival culture.

From the moment you set foot on festival grounds, you are home. The free, profoundly self-expressive vibe is palpable and suddenly it’s hard to remember a time you felt more alive. Similarly, as the crew takes their tour across the U.S and beyond, it brings an unmatched feeling of connectedness wherever the crew goes.

“The main intention behind Desert Hearts is spreading love and positivity and community and when people come to the festival or City Hearts, they make these really strong connections,” says Mikey. Whether you find yourself dancing your ass off, making new friends, creating art, or just watching all of the magic unfold, you feel connected. You feel a part of something. You feel like family.

What's more, City Hearts is a way to expand the Desert Hearts brand without sacrificing the intimate vibe of the festival. After their one-year festival anniversary, the Desert Hearts crew decided to throw a Decompression party in San Diego. What they found was that it gave everyone who was at the festival a way to feel connected to it for the rest of the year. With that, City Hearts was born.

“With a lot of downtime between the festivals it made sense for us to find another creative outlet," says Lee Reynolds, co-creator and DJ/producer). "We also noticed that a lot of people were coming from outside of California to attend Desert Hearts and wanted similar style events." That's when they realized their following was twice as big in L.A. as it was in San Diego. Taking the party up the coast to San Francisco, City Hearts was met with similar success. No matter the location, they found themselves welcomed with open arms – even in New York, where they were told they would fail.

Desert Hearts City Hearts 2015 Wobs Arrazi

Photo by: Wobs Arrazi

City Hearts parties have been repeatedly selling out on the West Coast for some time now, but after successfully debuting the event on the East Coast earlier this summer, the crew has officially decided the show on the road. The “Summer of Love” tour spans from San Diego to Toronto, hitting major markets like L.A., Denver, and Brooklyn in between. Due to a steady, organic growth in the Desert Hearts community, the “Summer of Love Tour” has essentially doubled in size from past City Hearts gigs. The new room in L.A. is three times the size of what it was, San Francisco’s space is twice as big, Denver and Toronto are totally new markets with two insane venues, and in Brooklyn they return to a sold out Good Room. Deep Jesus (co-creator and resident DJ/producer) said it best: “Going to outdoor festivals all the time can get exhausting. This gives people the option of having a one night DH experience in their own city.”

The project has taken on a life of its own with the “Summer of Love Tour,” introducing people to festival culture who either don't have the opportunity to experience it or simply aren’t ready to jump into, say, 72 hours of non-stop house and techno. Its accessibility makes it appealing without losing the excitement that comes along with going to a festival. While diving head first into the festival is, in my opinion, the best way to understand Desert Hearts, the Summer of Love Tour offers a great glimpse into the culture and ethos behind the movement. Lee points out that “festival culture could make the world a better place, showing people that its possible to coexist in harmony.”

It’s no secret that you can’t get the complete experience of a three-day camping festival in the club, but the vibe – the feeling that “we are all Desert Hearts” – is just as present at City Hearts parties as it is out in the wild. And that's what matters. Through these events, they are able to spread love places where a festival wouldn’t be possible, ultimately reaching more people. When I asked the guys what they felt was lost, so to speak, the response was overwhelmingly “nature.” When trees and plants and animals surround you, on sacred Indian land no less, it’s going to be a much deeper experience.

Desert Hearts City Hearts 2015 Wobs Arrazi 2

Photo by: Wobs Arrazi

However, where you lose stars in the night sky and fresh air, you gain energy and community. Whether it be a City Hearts event or the Desert Hearts festival, the intention and goal remains the same: to spread as much love as possible. Marbs (co-creator and resident DJ/producer) likens comparing City Hearts and Desert Hearts to comparing oranges and orange trees. He expresses that “an individual orange is delicious, but to compare it to a full orange tree wouldn't make sense. The tree has endless oranges: it’s older, wiser. What I’m trying to say is that you don't lose something by bringing our festival vibe to indoor venues. The festivals are something special for our community to experience twice a year, but for those who enjoy having that experience more than twice a year, there’s City Hearts.”

Each stop on the Summer of Love tour promises tailored experiences around its respective city. When you first walk into the party, you are given a custom necklace that is made specifically for that city. With Desert Hearts necklaces carrying a source of pride for many fans, individualized city necklaces are an amazing way of making party-goers feel like family. From the moment you walk in, you immediately feel a part of something bigger; you are part of a community.

This Friday, July 24, the City Hearts Summer of Love Tour is set to hit Los Angeles in the beautiful Belasco Theater. If the rest of the tour is anything like its first stop in San Diego, we are all in for one hell of a ride.

Summer of Love Tour Dates

Dh Summer Of Love 2015 Tour Poster

July 4: Spin, San Diego, CA
July 24: Belasco Theater, Los Angeles, CA
Aug 1: Warehouse TBA, Denver, CO
Aug 15: Public Works, San Fransisco, CA