USA: Los Angeles based musician Doug Levitt releases 'Greyhound Diaries,' a window to life in middle America.

A Greyhound bus is an unlikely stage for an artist, but for 34-year-old singer and songwriter Doug Levitt it is the perfect platform for observing life in middle America. The Los Angeles based musician spent six weeks travelling across the swing states of America during the 2004 presidential campaign election, a journey which inspired an album and a book both titled 'Greyhound Diaries'. "One of the reasons I set out on the road was that I felt the narrative, America's own narrative about itself at a very critical point in our history is very thin and shallow," Levitt told Reuters. "You turn on the TV and it's reality which is anything but real as we all know. So I felt it was important to get some rendering of another America." Raised in Washington D.C., Levitt graduated from Cornell University and continued his studies at the London School of Economics where he earned his masters degree in International Relations. Levitt spent several years as a London based foreign correspondent before deciding to leave reporting behind to pursue a career in music. He played regularly at popular clubs in London before deciding to return to the United States. His first stop was Nashville, Tennessee, where he spent time in the studio with producer, David Henry. Levitt then became preoccupied with what he saw as his own country in crisis, which propelled him to take some time to explore middle America. A Greyhound bus seemed to be the logical mode of transport. "In a way, Greyhound is a travelling crossroads in America. You have all walks of life and all ethnicities and backgrounds, the one commonality being that people don't drive or that they can't afford a plane ticket or train ticket. Generally it's the working poor who travel by Greyhound, itinerant folks and labourers and single parents and veterans and the afflicted. And its part of America that's generally not reflected in the tit for tat that generally poses as news," said Levitt. In his book, Levitt paints a human portrait of people struggling to get by. He writes about encountering single mothers, labourers and military reservists on his journey. He says virtually all of these passengers were not able to access a polling booth in the November 2004 presidential election. "There actually is a third America. Red America and blue America both hover between 57 and 60 million people and then there's a third America that's biggest in fact than either two. And this third America has about 75 million people. And these are folks that are eligible to vote but are just not in the political system at all, and while this doesn't pretend to speak on behalf of 75 million people, the project does at least try to offer a window on part of America that may not be in the political debate." As well as stories from the road, Levitt reveals in his book, his inspiration for expressing himself in music, which was the tragic suicide of his father when he was 16. Levitt says Greyhound Diaries is for people who want to rediscover their country themselves and can't take the journey on their own. He is retracing his steps in the lead up to the mid-term elections in November, planning to travel across the country again, by Greyhound, leaving from New York September 21.

ITN Source | September 9, 2006

Tags:. .inspiration. .earned. .career. .reality. .foreign