YOU WANT IT DARKER

A road trip to the Desert Doghouse in Joshua Tree, where rock & roll style meets Dark Nostalgia'

- JARED PAUL STERN

Joshua Tree, one of the most iconic and compelling places in America, in the High Desert of California, is bordered to the south by the Coachella Valley and encompasses Joshua Tree National Park. The Park itself occupies nearly 800,000 acres of otherworldly, starkly beautiful scenery, and the rest of the land can seem scarcely civilized outside of the few towns that cling to the rocky mesas and deep-rutted valleys. Most of the surrounding roads are unpaved, and the houses dotted around the cactus-studded hills tend to blend into the harsh landscape.

Close observers however may notice that one house in particular, though well off the beaten path, seems to increasingly be a hive of activity. If they happen to drive down the right dirt road they might even have seen the mysterious sign reading “Desert Doghouse.” And perhaps they’ve even caught a snatch of pulsing music, quickly whipped away by the wind.