KEXP Presents: Expansions 13th Annual MLK Celebration

We should believe in each other's dreams"Wholy Holy" - Marvin Gaye

Coming so soon after that month long holiday season of light, set during the deepest part of the yearly time when all larger land mammals are usually in deep slumber. In a still contentious and sometimes dangerous social climate, when the fatigue of struggling to resolve long standing and sometimes conflicting ideas of who we are, how we should move to a better place all the while enduring our cold longest nights and short fog-filled gray days. We the Expansions crew ho;d a celebration that dares us to remind ourselves of our better nation and our better selves. We've had this celebration that i'll sheepishly admit began as a way to capitalize on the first 3-day weekend of the year, usually a time where not much else is going on, but for 13 years we've discovere that there is a restorative power and magic when you ask a community to gather, reflect, hold fellowship and, yes, dance. To witness our community transform itself into a family energized by celebration to action, whether it be small - individuals crossing over boundaries personal comfort to embrace a stranger - or larger complex involvement in civic responsibility that leads to larger and more substantial gains in making our world a better place. We've done this for 13 years and never ever found this celebration to be less than inspirational or fun. 4 years ago during what promised to be the cusp of the entrance into an era where we might finally put some of our largest conflicts to rest the celebration seemed natural, reflexive and easy. In the years since, we've observed that surmounting those conflicts will take more lifetime than we imagined. The progression seems slow, but who imagined even 13 years ago what triumphs would bear fruit? How our mountaintop dreams are still becoming realities even among people that didn't dare to dream at all? I confess that that I've been one of those people and from time to time even dreaming seems too difficult to do. But every year the celebration reminds me that I don't dream alone, I don't move I don't live alone, I don't love alone, I don't dance alone. Come dream, move, live, love, come dance with us.

Join me, DJ Riz, with Masa and Kid Hops this Sunday, January 20, at Q nightclub for Expansions 13th Annual MLK Celebration, proudly presented by KEXP. Tickets are only $5 at the door and the party runs from 9PM to 2AM.

A special THANKS to our community partners Ground-Up Organics and Washington Bus for helping us keep the party right! and big THANKS you all who are KEXP and that includes YOU!