It’s Tuesday, one of the biggest days in Cary Brothers’ life, the day his album “Who You Are” is released, and the singer-songwriter is talking about good fortune. “I hope my karma is saving itself for the record,” he jokes from his home in L.A., where he is laid up. “I cracked my ankle doing the video shoot, then I lost the hard drive on the laptop that does everything for me.”
By the time he hobbles into the Hotel Cafe tonight for his record-release show, Brothers figures to have some stories to tell, beyond those on his lushly orchestrated debut. There, amid ringing guitars, crashing cymbals and tinkling pianos, the Nashville native with the Britpop sensibilities tells his L.A. tales, touching on “a lot of things that have happened to me since I moved here, all the disastrous relationships, everything I’ve learned ... like not to date actresses,” he says.
In Brothers’ case, it’s been as much “where you are” as “Who You Are.”
[Another in a series covering bands playing around L.A.:] The Appearance aren't exactly reinventing the wheel; in fact, they're kind of pushing one downhill, waving to the past 10 years of alt-rock bands as they pass. On the Orange County quartet's debut album, "Lost in Aurora" (released last week by the Adrenaline Music Group), singer-guitarist Alan Oakes marches bandmates Chad Kulengosky, Justin McCarthy and Jason Nelson through early Jimmy Eat World and straight to the precipice of contemporary emo, power chords at full throttle and lovelorn vocals alternately soaring and intertwined. If you like what you hear on commercial radio, the Appearance may be for you -- producer Chris Fudurich keeps things nice and crisp, guitarist Kulengosky has the chops, and Oakes displays a deft enough touch with his wordplay. The Appearance have racked up impressive MySpace numbers, and it'd be no surprise if those virtual "friends" turned into real fans.
||| See the Appearance perform tonight at Red Dragon Studios, 1444 N. Highland (at Sunset). Details on the band's MySpace page, of course. And Rocket is also playing.
It might have been the most productive 10 minutes Eamon Hamilton ever played. The keyboardist of British Sea Power was doing an acoustic guitar set in a Brighton, England, pub when two tipsy patrons approached and offered to play on the songs.
They were Tom and Alex White, the duo behind Brighton luminaries and onetime Mercury Music Prize nominees the Electric Soft Parade. Hamilton was game. "From the first chords, we knew we had something special. They are just sickeningly talented, those two," Hamilton says.
Now they are doing double duty in BrakesBrakesBrakes, the Hamilton project that last week released its second album, "The Beatific Visions." It's a collection of occasionally twangy pop-punk, quick-moving and catchy and built on Hamilton's agitated yelp. (The first album was released as Brakes, before Hamilton renamed the quartet to avoid a conflict with a U.S. band called the Brakes. "We're so good we named ourselves three times," he jokes.)
Like the album, which mixes what Hamilton calls "the great stories and the heartbroken quality" of country music with fun sendups such as the dance number "Spring Chicken," the tour that brings the band to L.A. is all in good fun. Electric Soft Parade is also on the bill, supporting its own new album, "No Need to Be Downhearted."
Says Hamilton: "Tom and Alex will be drinking a lot of coffee."
||| See BrakesBrakesBrakes, the Electric Soft Parade and Pela tonight at Club NME at Spaceland.
[We'll play catch-up this week on album releases and reviews. We think ...]
Amateurs, "Speak Easy" (self-released): L.A. quartet Amateurs can't quite decide what they want to be, except good. Their first album nods to classic rock, folky '70s radio fare, modern indie titans and maybe even prog rock band or two, if they used strings. Whether you hear a lot of Wilco or a little Fleetwood Mac, Fairport Convention or the Band, it's the emotional range that makes Amateurs' an impressive debut. Its melodic bounce, gorgeous wedding of harmonies with Shannon De Jong's strings and smartly spun vignettes by singer-guitarist Keith Waggoner give "Speak Easy" a warm, organic sheen. It's folk-rock that doesn't need to resort to gimmickry or conscious deconstruction.
||| See Amateurs tonight at their album release show at the Scene in Glendale.
Touts for Tuesday, May 29
It's an album release party for ex-Fur singer Holly Ramos tonight too -- an early show at the Hotel Cafe ... Toca celebrates its album release with a show at the Knitting Factory. ... Icelandic blues-country songstress Lay Low performs at the Silverlake Lounge. ... And that's in case you're missing the bigger shows, the Arcade Fire at the Greek and Voxtrot at the El Rey Theatre.
Voxtrot's Ramesh Srivastava won't even read this, if he's true to his word. "I'm sick of reading about it on the Internet already," the singer-songwriter says of his quintet's debut album, released last week. "People blog and things like that, but ..."
But it's a double-edged sword. Those same writers who heaped praise on Voxtrot's three EPs and its merry Anglophilic sensibilities — accelerating the buzz that made the Austin, Texas, group a national phenomenon — have reacted quizzically, or critically, to the more thoughtful and textured "Voxtrot." Yes, the nods to Britpop and the likes of the Smiths, and Belle and Sebastian are still there, but what happened to the party?
"I don't know what the album would have had to sound like to live up to the buzz," Srivastava says. "I do feel like there's too much emphasis on the concept that a band is not a band until they put out an album."
Voxtrot has been a band since 2002, when the frontman got together with boyhood friends Mitch Calvert (guitar), Jason Chronis (bass), Jared Van Fleet (keyboards) and Matt Simon (drums). The band's infancy was interrupted by Srivastava's studies, first in Boston, then in Glasgow, Scotland. The three EPs were recorded when he was home on holiday — that's where the party was.
"I finally came back to do the band full force ... and I kind of went insane for a while," Srivastava says of that period, during which he dealt with the death of a grandmother. In the end, though, he is proud of the range displayed on the final product. "Nothing really encapsulated us up until now."
And what's in the capsule? "Voxtrot" roots itself in the heart-on-sleeve territory of Britpop bands big and small; the album's swoon-worthiness will depend entirely on your threshold for sincerity. Voxtrot's fans, rest assured, have already checked their cynicism at the door.
The posters say "The Autumns vs. The Sugarplastic" -- and as those L.A. bands' co-residency ends tonight at the Spaceland, I'd have to say it's a tie. The Autumns' dense guitars have taken on almost a post-rock feel in their new material; the Sugarplastic's tightly wound, eclectic pop still wields plenty of bite. It was an odd pairing for a co-residency, but thte night I attended the crowd did not turn over too much.
LoveLikeFire ends its residency tonight too, at El Cid. The San Francisco quartet has a stage presence that might exceed its interest musically right now, but a hook or two could change that, and the band certainly has attracted devotees to its dark, urgent churn. Certainly, the downloadable "A Million Pieces" is worth a buck, if you visit their MySpace page.
The Topanga Days festival starts a three-day run -- plenty of talent on it diverse lineup, from Veruca Salt
and Minibar on Saturday to to John Doe (with special gust Pamela Des Barres) and the Sin City All Stars on Sunday to the Young Dubliners on Sunday. Lineup here. ... Meanwhile, Saturday, Something for Rockets, Bedtime for Toys and Glacier Hiking make for a strong night at the Scene.
Touts for Sunday, May 27
Tussle headlines the Echo in what promises to promises to be a dancy night. Or you could stay in, pour yourself a drink and watch their video for "Second Guessing."
Touts for Monday, May 28
Phantom Planet, supported by Emma Burgess, plays the Roxy. (Phantom Planet returns for a June 4 engagement there too.) ... At Indie 103.1's night at the Viper Room, Nico Vega, the Gray Kid and the Ringers perform. And the eastside May residencies end on this holiday night -- Gliss at Spaceland, Bodies of Water at the Echo and the all-star lineup doing business as the High Society at the Silverlake Lounge. ... Have a lovely weekend.
Photo of Gliss's Marty Klingman performing at Spaceland.
A deep lineup of music is shaping up for the annual Sunset Junction Street Fair, the carnival/food fair/rock festival that takes over Sunset Boulevard in Silver Lake on Aug. 18 and 19.
Some major headliners for Sunday are still to be announced -- watch for a big name to be dropped July 16 -- but the Saturday roster for the rock-oriented Bates Stage is formidable, with the night ending with sets by New York shoegazers Blonde Redhead and the pride of Claremont, Ben Harper.
Blonde Redhead, fresh off an appearance at Coachella and the release of their seventh (and I'll join those who are saying, best) album, "23," has always had a stong L.A. following, owing to the strong presence of bands with similar sensibilities. One of those, Autolux, will precede the New Yorkers on the Bates Stages on Friday night. Is that enough wall-of-sound for you, kids?
By the way, Blonde Redhead is inviting fans to remix "Signs Along the Path" -- you can download the parts here.
||| Download the title track from Blonde Redhead's album, "23."
[One in a series tipping you to bands playing around town:]
Over three EPs for Orange County-based Velvet Blue Music, Kissing Cousins are happily all over the map -- dispensing infectious girl-pop, slightly bent balladry and spiky anthems with schoolgirl enthusiam and postgradute aplomb. It's never too serious, though -- at a recent show at the Echo, they also dispensed cotton candy. Drummer Beth, singer-guitarist Heather, bassist Rhea and keyboardist-flutist Kara all go by their first names only; maybe by the time they make a full-length, we'll get the whole story.
||| See: Kissing Cousins perform tonight (as part of a Tribute to the Doors) at Safari Sam's, Monday at the Detroit Bar and June 1 at Mr. T's Bowl.
Brother Ali doesn't believe his rising prominence in the hip-hop world represents a victory for the underground over the mainstream. "A lot of people don't feel represented by what's in the mainstream because they feel the mainstream is terrible and it's holding them back," the Minneapolis rapper says. "I don't necessarily feel that way. But maybe people do want voices that are a little closer to where they're coming from."
It's called Everyman appeal, and Brother Ali exudes plenty of it. An albino Muslim who overcame a hardscrabble upbringing, Ali mines his personal experiences on "The Undisputed Truth," his second album for Rhymesayers Entertainment. The breakup of his marriage, being homeless, life as a single dad, his working-class frustration with the government -- all are fodder for his deft flow and wordplay, which got a warm reception during an afternoon set last month at the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival.
It's a deeper -- and, thanks to the soulful backdrop by producer Ant (Atmosphere), more tuneful -- excursion into a world Ali first shared with listeners in the song "Forest Whitiker," off 2003's "Shadows on the Sun." "I listed a lot of personal stuff, a lot of details, but that's the song people respect," Ali says. "It shows you don't have to have the exact same experience as somebody to relate to what they're doing."
||| See Brother Ali, with DJ BK One, host Toki Wright and Chicago rapper Psalm One, tonight at the Troubadour.
Videos from the Smashing Pumpkins show tonight at the Grand Rex in Paris -- the band's first show since 2000 -- are already all over YouTube. And even if none is of particularly good quality, it's amusing to hear people sing along to "Today" with a French accent.
The show, in front of 2,200, is already the subject of some spirited debate all over the Internet -- and that figures to escalate throughout their European dates -- but most of it boils down to one issue: Do fans accept that Billy Corgan and Jimmy Chamberlin and their hired musicians are calling themselves the Pumpkins? Or are the Pumpkins without James and D'Arcy not the Pumpkins at all?
Please discuss. I continue to spend time with "Zeitgeist" and try to decide for myself.
One thing for sure: The Grand Rex crowd got its money's worth. Corgan, Chamberlin, bassist Ginger Reyes, guitarist Jeff Schroeder and keyboardist Lisa Harriton played for three hours.
The setlist, forgoing the quotation marks around song names: United States, Today, Stand Inside Your Love, Orchid, Doomsday Clock, Home, Hummer, Starz, Tarantula, Bullet, Gossamer, God and Country, 33, Rocket, Winterlong, To Sheila, Glass and the Ghost Children, Cherub Rock, 1979, Tonight, Neverlost, That's the Way, Disarm, Zero, Untitled, Shame, Silverf---, Annie Dog, Muzzle.
Kevin Bronson Kevin Bronson has covered emerging and indie music since 2002 in his weekly Buzz Bands column in the Calendar Weekend section of the L.A. Times. He adores caffeine, judicious use of falsetto and the 6-4-3 double play. He abhors exclamation points, modern country and any notion that New York City is the center of the cultural universe. He's older than any music blogger he knows but has been known to pogo. He'll try not to pretend.
Bronson's Buzz Bands show can be heard Wednesdays from 6 to 8 p.m. Pacific time on the Internet radio station LittleRadio.com.
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