Undiscovered L.A.

Director · Producer · Writer / Interviewer

A documentary anthology built from short portraits of working musicians taking less conventional paths through the Los Angeles music scene. Undiscovered L.A. brings together personal stories, performances, and reflections on creativity, persistence, identity, and what it means to build a life in music outside the most obvious routes.

The Project

Undiscovered L.A. grew out of compelling stories we heard from artists during the making of the feature documentary Breaking: Los Angeles. These musicians’ careers rarely fit the familiar success-or-failure narrative.

Rather than follow a single artist, the project became a collection of individual stories, each offering a different view of what it means to make a life in music in and around Los Angeles.

UDLA’s short-form narrative format allowed us to move between very different artists, histories, and approaches while exploring ideas that connected them: persistence, creative independence, adaptation, and the often unconventional choices required to keep doing the work.

Selected Stories

Jim Wilson
Guitarist and singer associated with Black Dub, Rollins Band, and Mother Superior. His segment includes a personal story about Michael Jackson and the unexpected turns a life in music can take.

Greg Mathieson
Keyboardist, arranger, and producer whose career spans decades and includes collaborations with artists such as Helen Reddy, Steve Lukather, Michael Landau, and Larry Carlton. His story focuses on the realities of sustaining a life in music over time.

Gram Rabbit
The Joshua Tree band built its identity by moving across psychedelic rock, contemporary rock, and electropop rather than staying within one conventional lane.

Christen Lien
Composer and violist whose work blends classical and contemporary instrumentation, using viola, guitar, harmonica, synthesizer, drums, and kalimba in original compositions.

Additional segments feature artists including
Chasing Kings, Assemble the Skyline, Angelica Star, and Army of Sun,
drawn from various corners of the Los Angeles music scene.

Making
Undiscovered L.A.

As a director, producer, and interviewer, many of our interviews ventured beyond the themes we covered in UHP’s feature documentary Breaking: Los Angeles. Undiscovered L.A.’s anthology format grew naturally from these stories.

We were less interested in constructing a single argument than in creating space for an eclectic group of musicians to tell their own stories. These interviews often move beyond music itself into uniquely personal stories about identity, resilience, creativity, and business.

Each story stands on its own. Collectively, these short-format narratives offer a broader portrait of a music community defined less by one version of success than by the many ways people find meaning and purpose in their creative expression.