While the global pandemic may have put a damper on our adventures in clubbing, music still has the power to transport us to places unknown. For now, the greatest club on earth may exist in our imagination – Discoteca Imaginaria. Each episode takes listeners to the scenes, clubs, regions and technology that have shaped our sonic history.

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Starting in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Bristol, UK-based artists Massive Attack, Portishead and Tricky experimented with a new sound that drew inspiration from hip-hop, Jamaican dub, post-punk, and soul. “Trip Hop” would immediately emerge as a divisive musical trope, with even Portishead’s Geoff Barrow calling the label “just a shit word.” On this special episode of Discoteca Imaginara, special guest Ari Simon joins Jonathan to examine Trip Hop’s global glow-up, from Madonna to The Garden State soundtrack. Whatever you do, just don’t call it trip hop!

Ari Simon is a facilitator, climate policy convener, producer, coach & grief care worker, and the founder of Grief at Work – helping organizations, teams, and communities lead with grief and loss competency. Ari obsesses over niche music eras, keeping their record collection in alphabetical order, and babbling about urban forms, Angeleno phenomena, spiritual infrastructure, and art-making as they did at the helm of Get Down Town magazine from 2015-18.