The Little Ones, and other Monday musings

The Little Ones are still one of this city's strongest musical happy pills, but, as a set Friday night showed, it's hard to maintain that peak level of exuberance when you're doing it night after night, tour after tour.

The L.A. quintet -- "Rhymin' Simon on steroids" is how I described them last year, and it still applies -- played an ASCAP- and Filter-sponsored music night on Friday tied to the Silverlake Film Festival. The stuff from their "Sing Song" EP still sounded crisp, and their new songs were upbeat and catchy too. But after having spent the early part of this year doing some rigorous touring, the Little Ones weren't quite as unhinged as they were when their EP was first released and Astralwerks (in the U.S.) and Heavenly (in the U.K.) swooped in to sign the band.

Are the Little Ones still as happy as their music? "That's a good question," frontman Edward Reyes says. "We're excited. ... Remember, we just looked at that EP as our calling card -- we just wanted to get some shows with it."

Their as-yet-untitled debut album is recorded and due in January, Reyes says. "It's turning out great," he adds. "Right now we have a whole track devoted to laughing."

||| Download Little Ones' songs from their Daytrotter session here.

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Passion of the Weiss has a play-by-play of Britney Spears' Houses of Blues appearance (I will not call it a performance). He even has some empathy.

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Ran into an employee of a recently merged record company who was enthused about having adopted a puppy. Cute thing ... so what did you name him? "Andy Slater."

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"So how was Coachella?" That was the most-asked question last week. I told inquiring minds that it was a three-day weekend of once-in-a-lifetime experiences, and even as they were unfolding I knew I was missing others. Wish the festival could have just hesitated a few times each day and let me catch up.

The inconsiderate hipsters at Anthem, who throw their Coachella party during the day while the music is going on, tell me I missed something else too -- a mask-less Thomas Bangalter from Daft Punk [face obscured] spinning the LCD Soundsystem track "Daft Punk Is Playing at My House." Not that anybody recognized him. But a cool party nonetheless.

Daft Punk turned up on the turntables a couple nights later at the Echo too. Not that anybody recognized them.

Touts for tonight

Gliss (Spaceland), the High Society (Silverlake Lounge), Bodies of Water (Echo) and Richard Bivens & Foreign Press (Detroit Bar) start their Monday night residencies. ... Midnight Movies plays an in-store at Amoeba. ... And London's Apartment joins locals the Grand Marquee and others at Indie 103.1's Viper Room show.