Queer-run label Get Better Records and PA’s Little Amps Coffee Roasters joined together for a limited edition of Super Tasty Instant Coffee in support of the label’s forthcoming compilation album ‘Sunday, Someday’ (out March 26, 2021). Proceeds of this special pre-order album and coffee bundle – AVAILABLE HERE – benefit the LGBT Center of Central PA’s Common Roads program by funding acoustic treatment for youth with sensory needs. You can listen a new KOJI track lifted from the album, titled To Carry (On and On) via BandCamp below.
The community-driven collaboration album celebrates friendship and connection and features a lineup of queer, trans, non-binary and agender artists including KOJI and Full On Mone’t from Harrisburg, PA, as well as LA-based Potty Mouth, UK-based Nervus, and Philadelphia-based Solstice Rey. The five artists were scheduled to tour the UK together in early 2020 but that tour was ultimately canceled due to the pandemic. The artists continued to stay in touch over weekly Sunday Zoom calls, which led to the collaborative creation of the album to help support top surgery aftercare for Full On Mone’t and the LGBT Center of Central PA.
“Our weekly Zoom call has been a space for collectively imagining the world we want to live in,” says Koji Shiraki. “These are lessons that I’ve learned growing up in Harrisburg and come to better understand through community in pandemic. Projects like our record and this coffee collaboration will hopefully show that you can use your time, talent, and resources to grow more access to spaces for care and creativity.”
The Common Roads program is a space for LGBTQI+ youth and young adults in Central PA to find community, connection, and support. The installation of acoustic treatment would greatly improve the environment for participants with sensory issues. “We wanted to be a part of creating more access to LGBTQI+ spaces,” says Ally Einbinder of Potty Mouth. “These are resources none of us were fortunate enough to have growing up.”
Little Amps is a specialty coffee roaster with three retail locations that source high quality coffees from around the world and roast them with care in Harrisburg, PA. The coffee for this project was sourced by The Coffee Quest, from Pitalito in Huila, Colombia. It’s not uncommon for coffee buyers to cherry-pick producer’s highest scoring lots, leaving many producers struggling and unable to sell their product. The work of Cafe Pitalito represents a dedication to changing that and supporting producers by committing to purchase their entire harvests, year after year.
“We are humbled to direct the coffee for this community-driven project,” says Peter Leonard of Little Amps. “It’s important to support impactful coffee projects like Cafe Pitalito and feels powerful to collaborate with the Sunday, Someday artists, Get Better Records, and the LGBT Center of Central PA who all put community first.”
Album/coffee bundle available for pre-order here: https://littleampscoffee.com.
More about the ‘Sunday, Someday’ LP
‘Sunday, Someday’ is a compilation album created by a group of like-minded musicians who began meeting virtually each Sunday after their planned tour together was cancelled due to the pandemic. Alt/punk band Nervus (UK), pop/rock trio Potty Mouth (LA), indie/folk/punk songwriter KOJI (PA), singer/songwriter Solstice Rey (PA) and multimedia artist Full on Mone’t (PA contributed songs to the album, while crew members who would have been on the tour lent their creative and promotional support. Queer-run independent label Get Better Records will release the album on March 26, 2021. While the album developed initially to support a member’s fundraising efforts for top surgery, when they reached their fundraising goal, the focus shifted to supporting aftercare expenses and LGBTQI+ youth initiatives. In partnership with Harrisburg, PA coffee roaster Little Amps, Get Better Records has launched a pre-order bundle benefitting the LGBT Center of Central PA’s afterschool program by funding acoustic treatment for youth with sensory needs. This commitment to supporting queer community members is deeply personal for the group, as the bands involved are comprised primarily of LGBTQI+ people, including members who identify as queer, trans, non-binary, and agender. Living remotely from one another and in relative isolation during the pandemic actually created more space for collaboration. “When pandemic and uprising hit, our instinct was to turn toward one another, to create together, and to support one another,” says KOJI. “Whether we’re doing mutual aid, community care, or we’re out at a protest, we had each other to make sense of the world and what was going on. This project is just an extension of the care that we give to each other and our communities.”
Every aspect of song production and artwork creation for the album was done within the group: Nervus contributed guitars and drums on both Solstice Rey tracks, Em Foster (Nervus) and KOJI mixed and mastered all of the tracks on the album, Abby Weems (Potty Mouth) designed the album art, and Nervus’ manager Megan Foster Rose designed the website for the project. Collaboration, however, extends far beyond album credits, and the power or sum of the project is based on the invisible work and the creativity that takes place within authentic relationships.
‘It’s exciting to work on something with people I feel so connected to and understood by,” says Abby Weems (Potty Mouth). “This release is an opportunity for all of us to use our collective passions, skills, and resources to support each other as artists and as people with our own personal needs.”“This record is a celebration of living in community,” says KOJI. “It’s a project that asks, ‘what world is possible when everyone’s needs are met?’”
Pre-order ‘Sunday, Someday’ (digital/vinyl) here: https://sundaysomedayrecord.bandcamp.com/album/sunday-someday
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