Picking up Trash with Holy Ghost!

I spent all of this summer traveling across the States, finding out about local music scenes, as part of Noisey's Made In America series, directed by Lance Bangs. It was an insane, whirlwind of an experience and to cap it off Budweiser and Living Lands & Waters were like, "Kim, it would be way awesome if you would go join Holy Ghost! and 80-odd volunteers to go clean up a garbage covered island in the middle of the Delaware Estuary."

I'm paraphrasing, obviously, but that was the basic gist. I've got to put my hands up and say, charity trash pick-ups aren't something I do on the regular, but that was all the more reason to take part. So I headed down to Philly to meet up with BK-based duo Holy Ghost! at the ungodly hour of 7am. Above is a document of the experience, all weird stuff we found on the island, the stories of the volunteers, and how Holy Ghost! dealt with it all. Let's just say we were all pretty perspirational by the end of it.

Not to get all cheesy, but it was really incredible to see all these enthusiastic volunteers, knee-deep in trash on an island that is, like many of these garbage-covered islands, out of sight, out of mind. The volunteers were a true testament to the phrase every little helps.

Check out all the snaps from the clean up below. Flip-flops, blow up dolls, light bulbs, kid's pools, and more. All photos by Rocco Avallone.

To say thanks Bud gave all the volunteers ticks to the festival.

Holy Ghost! and the founder of Living Lands & Waters, Chad.