Now breaking . . . The Broken West

Ross Flournoy is nervous. The singer-guitarist of Los Angeles' the Broken West is facing the biggest month of his young band's life -- its debut album "I Can't Go On, I'll Go On" comes out Jan. 23 on Merge Records, and quintet is honing its chops for a hard year of touring by playing the Monday residency this month at Spaceland. It sounds like the first act of every indie rocker's dream, sure, but Flournoy seems to be floating in the same emotional space as the songs on the Byrds- and Teenage Fanclub-informed album: boxing with the uncertainty of future and humming a catchy tune with every punch. We got the rundown from Flournoy, 27, on the band's name change (they were formally the Brokedown), and did our best to make him laugh:

So what's with the name change? I have a feeling lawyers were involved ...

Flournoy: Someone threatened to sue us. There was a band in Illinois called the Brokedowns; we knew they existed, so in the summer of 2004 when we found out about them, we just lost the "s." We thought that was enough of a distinction, although our lawyer said it wasn't.

We went back and forth with our lawyer and Merge on what to do, and finally I called Merge said we were gonna go with the Brokedown. And the label printed 1,000 promo [copies of the album]. Two days later we got hit with a cease-and-desist order, which would have been very costly and time-consuming to fight. It taught me never to question a lawyer again.

What's broken about the West and how on earth can we fix it?

Flournoy: (Laughing) Nothing really. We sort of went into a panic mode after we got the cease and desist. We like the Broken West because it's not that different from our original name -- it's not like we were going to become the Jolly Rogers. I thought later that there could be some sort of stupid political element, but I don't think so. We love living here; it's a great place to make music.

I spent a formative year and half in Austin before moving here. When I was there I was really broke and miserable, but in hindsight I sort of romaticize that period. Yet I found the music scene snottier than it is in L.A., which is surprising. When I came here, I thought L.A. was going to be 10 times worse, because it's L.A. But we've found L.A. to be very welcoming.

Are you tired of "Down in the Valley" (the single from the EP that also appears on "I Can't Go On")?

Flournoy: I will be by the end of this year, after having played it 200 times on the road. But I love that song. [Keyboardist] Scott Claasen wrote that song with me in Austin, and he actually rejoined us to play keyboards over the last year. But just last week we amicably parted ways; he's going to do some traveling and go to Cuba. So Darice Bailey will be playing keyboards for us in the short term.

You and Dan Iead [guitars-backing vocals] sound like you were in a pretty good mood when you wrote these songs. Anything going on that made your outlook so sunny?

Flournoy: I think there's some sort of an intangible Los Angeles thing that informs what we do. I think we all love living here. And it is a pretty sunny album, but I also think there was a lot of trepidation and a lot of anxiety when we were doing it -- that's the reason the album is titled what it is. I could wax philosophical ... well, at the risk of sounding stupid, I think that being in a band can be hard. None of us comes from any money, so this is kind of a go-for-broke thing with us. This is what we want to do with our lives.

But on top of that, on an aesthetic level the music we love tends to be more upbeat, bands like Fanclub, the Byrds and Love. With those bands, the lyrics generally have darker undertones even though the melodies are upbeat. Same thing with Joe Pernice, a songwriter I love. He gets put in a box for being depressive, but his songs are so ebullient and his melodies are so infectious. We just love that kind of stuff.

That faint twang we heard on the EP went the way of old name, yes?

Flournoy: Most of the songs we brought to the table to for this record, it would have been silly to put a pedal steel to them. It would have sounded like we were trying to countrify something that didn't need to be countrified. But the running joke with the band is that by our thrid or fourth album it'll all be pedal steel.

||| Download "Down in the Valley."

Photo of the Broken West by Aaron Farley.

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Tonight's touts: Mezzanine Owls and the Broken West at Spaceland; the Submarines kick off their residency at the Echo; the Pity Party starts its residency at the Silverlake Lounge; Pigeon John entertains at Safari Sam's; Great Class Elevator and Briertone tee it up at the Viper Room.