LA

The Magic Castle
7001 Franklin Avenue, Hollywood
“It’s a members-only club where magicians perform. I was there for a party, and they offered me a membership and I accepted. It’s great because you can go anytime and see magic. What more can you want? My friend Rob, of the band Possum Dixon, performs there every week.”

The Griffith Park Railroads
440 Crystal Springs Drive, Los Angeles
“There is a miniature choo-choo train that drives around the park, toward the edge near the freeway. It’s my son’s favorite place to go, so we come here a lot. It’s cool because I can ride in the train with him. And there’s a conductor with a conductor outfit.”

Tiny Naylor’s
Corner of Sunset and La Brea, Hollywood
“Tiny Naylor’s was a drive-in from the 1950s that was demolished in the ’80s. Waitresses wore roller skates and little skirts, and they’d roll up to your car with a tray that attached. I ate breakfast with my grandfather there all the time. It was a big hangout for punk rockers in the mid-’70s. The architecture was amazing, too, like a giant spaceship.”

The Griffith Observatory
2800 East Observatory Road, Los Angeles
“An obvious landmark, but I always take my friends from out of town. On a clear day, you can see the ocean and the harbor in Long Beach and Pasadena. It’s one of the last places in L.A. that is still in intact from when I was young. Rebel Without a Cause was also filmed here.”

South Willard
8038 West Third Street, Los Angeles
“South Willard is a clothing store that always has something good. I’ve gotten some weird necklaces and sweaters and T-shirts there.”

Amoeba Music
6400 Sunset Boulevard, Hollywood
“It’s a mecca for music — it’s overwhelming, but you can find anything. I went yesterday and picked up the TV on the Radio record. I haven’t done a proper excavation, but you can go and in 15 minutes, you leave with your hands full.”

Ocean Way Recording
6050 Sunset Boulevard, Hollywood
“I’ve spend a lot of time at this recording studio. I’ve made three albums (Sea Change, Mutations and The Information) and a million different projects here. Frank Sinatra and the Mamas & the Papas recorded here. It still has the old mixing board and the rooms are fairly untouched, and it just has a magic sound to it. Everything recorded here comes out with a little sheen of gold.”

Zuma Beach
30000 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu
“I would take my producer Nigel [Godrich] here. It’s his favorite place in the city. It’s the English person’s ideal of what L.A. is — because of the sun and the cliffs. I think it’s the best place to go see the sunset.”

Puerto Escondido
10321 Hawthorne Boulevard, Inglewood
“I tell people to go here on Sundays. It’s a Mexican restaurant in East L.A., and they have a mariachi band and dancing and really good seafood. It’s relaxed, but kind of a party, too. We shot a scene in my video for ‘Girl’ here. It’s a pretty authentic place.”

City of Monterey Park
“I was really obsessed with this neighborhood 10 years ago. I’d go every weekend. It’s mostly Chinese. In the ’90s, there was an influx of 750,000 or more Chinese who left Hong Kong to come here. They built massive shopping malls and movieplexes. The street signs and supermarkets are all in Chinese. When you go to the movies, the concession stands have mung bean Popsicles and dried shrimps instead of M&M’s.”

Clearman’s Steak ’n Stein Inn
9545 east Whittier Boulevard, Pico Rivera
“It’s a steakhouse that looks like a giant mountain lodge with fake snow on it year-round. The waitresses all wear Swiss halter-top dresses. The bar is probably 30 years old and it’s just, like, frozen in time. I took Stephen Malkmus there for a big dinner recently.”