They say the only constant in life is change.

It’s a line usually credited to pre-Socratic philosopher, Heraclitus of Ephesus, an ancient Greek city whose sunbaked ruins I wandered around once in Selçuk, Turkey, sweating for a few selfies beneath the long shadows of an UNESCO World Heritage site that isn’t actually the original site, having been moved west over the centuries for various reasons, including malaria epidemics.

Heraclitus’ philosophy of universal change, or panta rhei (“everything flows”), applies to the concept of home as well: With a world in flux, you can never really go back home, because home never stays the same – physically or even in our own memories. Yet most of us need and long for these safe spaces. Just ask immigrants who thought they found a new home in America, but who have been learning lately that home here is not so certain.

“Home, as we know it, is under threat,” says local filmmaker and musician Rick Alverson, a producer and organizer with his partner, educator and musician Emilie Rex, of the new compilation benefit album, “Passages: Artists in Solidarity with Immigrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers,” released by Western Vinyl out of Austin, Texas in December 2025. “When immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers exercise their human right to safe passage, they defend our ability to do so—and our right to be and feel at home.”

Rex says that when they started the project at the beginning of last year, the focus was more on border issues. “But as things have progressed, there are so many more threats to our neighbors – even here in Richmond,” she says.

Alverson and Rex, whose quiet indie folk duo Lean Year has previously recorded for Western Vinyl, have held listening parties for “Passages” in Austin, New York and Chicago to connect the record with local action networks. Now they’re bringing it home to Studio Two Three on Friday, May 15, with additional performances from local artists including Nabeel (shoegaze by Iraqi-American Yasir Razak), Zhtml (experimental pop from Afghan-American Zahra Sanie), Strawberry Moon (rock) and Robert Donne, a musician and film composer known for his work with influential Richmond band, Labradford, as well as Pan American; the night will also feature Evrim Dogu of Sub Rosa Bakery DJing (his handle is Doguchi) and Chioke l’Anson of ICA/NPR will be their emcee.

Richmond-based Iraqi-American Yasir Razak is one of the performers at the “Passages” event in Richmond at Studio Two Three on Friday, May 15. Photo credit: Dianne Anguiano

The “Passages” benefit album features an interesting lineup of nationally known artists – including Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Marisa Anderson, Lambchop, Y La Bamba, Alan Sparhawk (Low), Dirty Projectors, Daniel Lopatin (Oneohtrix Point Never), Tim Heidecker and William Tyler among others. The producers asked the musicians to write and record songs in gratitude for a place that feels like home to them, which makes the resulting work feel intimate and personal. Check out one of the standout tracks, “A Border is Just a Space Between Two Lines,” by the Birmingham, Ala.-born artist, Lonnie Holley, whose expressive vocals floating above meditative piano can begin to feel like an interrogation of America itself, or the concept of othering.

 

“The album does take on the concept of Americana and pushes past its boundaries,” says Alverson. “Lonnie Holley’s track in particular is just remarkable.”

All proceeds from the album, as well as a tour of listening parties and performances in major cities, go primarily to benefit two Texas-based nonprofit organizations, American Gateways and Casa Marianella, which provide comprehensive “no-to-low-cost legal services, food, shelter, access to health care, and other essential services to immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers.” Also, the local nonprofit Sacred Heart Center will be involved and be a recipient of proceeds in Richmond.

Afro-futurist folk musician and artist Lonnie Holley provides one of the comp’s most memorable tracks.
Sacred Heart to provide info at Studio Two Three

“The idea is to expand the reach of the record and to partner with a local organization to provide information about how to protect our neighbors,” Rex explains, adding that in Richmond, Sacred Heart will provide tutorials. “They see this as an opportunity to really plug more people into the effort to support our immigrant, refugee and asylum-seeking neighbors, and to stand in solidarity with them in a variety of ways.”

Rex recalls that in Chicago, their listening party was held “right after the really intense immigration enforcement actions, so we had Pilsen Arts and Community House, who do these Whistle Warrior programs, where people are coming out to alert their neighbors.”

Sacred Heart Executive Director Lyons Sanchezconcha, who just took on the role in January, says that he has already been “incredibly touched to see the city [of Richmond] come together to support their mission of connecting Latino families with the tools to thrive and flourish.”

To him, moments like these are the beauty of Richmond.

“Here neighbors help neighbors, and collectively, we help build a city that actively embraces each other in our shared humanity,” he says, adding that over the last year, 10,000 individuals served in Sacred Heart’s youth programs, food pantry, adult education classes, community initiatives and partnerships, and their immigration and legal services program. “Thank you to all who put this event together, and all who continue to lend a hand to support, donate, and advocate for the Sacred Heart Center,” he adds.

There are a number of ways to purchase the record: digital albums are $20 and vinyl is $30; there’s also a deluxe edition including writing from 2024 National Book Award winner Jason De León (“Soldiers and Kings”) and poetry from National Book Critics Circle Award winner Ross Gay (“Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude”) available for $50.

Luz Elena Mendoza of Y La Bamba says about their track on “Passages”: “This song [“Wrong Crowd”] was written for and about many reasons. It’s about finding yourself through struggle. So many things come up like being misplaced, misunderstood, being vulnerable, grieving, compassion… I feel a deep despair but I’m always trying to find a way to create visibility for my family and my communities. We don’t talk about how much we need to nurture our mental health as we are trying to keep things together for others and ourselves.” Photo by Emma Platais
Breaking the algorithmic chokehold

Alverson, one of Richmond’s most challenging filmmakers, is known for movies such as “Entertainment,” “The Comedy,” and “The Mountain” starring Jeff Goldblum, but he also creates art as a musician with Rex in their own indie folk musical duo, Lean Year (which is not performing at this show, to be clear). As producers of the compilation, Alverson says that they reached out to like-minded musical artists that lean toward activism, as well as utilizing connections they had at labels like Jagjaguwar and Secretly Canadian.

He notes that between ecological collapse and increasing disasters related to global warming, such as the LA wildfires and the flooding damage in North Carolina and Virginia, there has been plenty of need lately for artists to step up and help out however they can.

“In a national sense, there’s so many crises going on, it feels like last year was 10 years ago,” he says, adding that the pair was subsequently energized by the problems of amplifying this crisis in today’s media-saturated environment. “We’re so inundated on a daily basis. There’s a strategic numbness that occurs, especially the oversaturation and the difficulty of amplifying anything in an algorithm-controlled environment.”

Organizers Emilie Rex and Rick Alverson in a Lean Year publicity photo from a few years ago. Photo credit: James Schueren.

And this is not the only thing the pair has been working on, they have also started an art school, Little Valley, nestled in the Allegheny Highlands of western Virginia, a “community experiment dedicated to redirecting our attention away from products and toward practice, process and problems.” The school convenes artists and thinkers across disciplines and has been facilitated mostly online so far, but they plan in-person events in the future within a farmhouse they are rehabbing, which is one of the original farmsteads in the valley.

“The idea of community engagement is strategically being crushed,” Alverson says. “This record is a deep comfort to listen to, but also a call to arms within the space of that comfort.”

Celebrate “Passages: Artists in Solidarity with Immigrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers” with bands including Nabeel, Zhtml, Strawberry Moon and Robert Donne at Studio Two Three on Friday, May 15 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $10-$20 at the door. All proceeds support Sacred Heart, American Gateways and Casa Marianella. Doors open at 7 p.m.