You can’t spell Shangri-La without L.A.

Our new video for Shangri-La, which just premiered on the LA Times, is a document of a perfect day in our newly-adopted hometown of Los Angeles, California. From sunrise to sunset, the video follows our movements throughout the sprawling strangeness of the Southland, from ice-cream parlors to beach bonfires.

Shangri-La features dozens of extended members of the YACHT family—fans, collaborators, friends—sharing a space of our own invention, spotted with magical realism. Every point of light smiles. We believe that Utopia, like reality, is not a physical experience, nor one dictated by the boundaries of a particular space. Rather, it’s a movable feast, defined by its capacity to adapt and change to new surroundings. Utopia can’t be physical, because to remain steadfastly in one unchanging place is to ideologically separate oneself from the strange emergent chaos of the world. And chaos, challenge, change: these are the factors which keep us alive. So we moved, and put ourselves in the heart of a new chaos, a chaos which is challenging our worldview and forcing us to mold a new version of our personal heaven on Earth.

(Basically, any place can be Utopia. But it doesn’t hurt when that place is already Los Angeles.)

Shangri-La was made in collaboration with All Cut Up Films. Brandon Vedder directed and edited it, and Colin Mika was the director of photography and colorist. We, YACHT, produced and styled.

We’re very lucky to have a community of gentle, natural YACHT fans and members who are open-minded enough to spend a day exploring the city and essentially playing with us. Huge gratitude goes to our people in white: Rob Kieswetter, Jenny Lee, Evan George, Katie Bachler, Jillene Johnson, Jordan Johnson, Greg Peterson, Steven Andrew Garcia, Leo Arthur-Space Erickson, Eve Kendall, Alex Hill, Andy Weymouth, Tom Hamilton, Carlos Cuauhtémoc Aguas Pinzón, Benji Bilheimer, Bobby Honolulu, Jasmine Amaya, Morgan Mitchell, Duncan Gregory, Jason Boxer, Patrick Jewett, Stacy Michelson, Marley Maron, and Emma Lorsch. Special thanks to Rob Kieswetter, Evan George, Tai Kim, Becca McCharen, Brandon Vedder and Colin Mika.

Psst: we’ve been working really, really diligently on creating an entire full-spectrum Shangri-La for you. The experience, as we understand it, is important and visceral, tactile and emotional, suspended in a filigreed web of the present and echoing into the future. This video is just the beginning. Expect new sights, feelings, smells.