"May we rock you gently?" singer-songwriter Buddy asks on his MySpace page. Well, yes, since you asked so nicely.
On his debut album, "Alterations and Repairs," Buddy -- Humberston is the last name, "but that's kind of a mouthful," he allows -- delivers crisp, date-movie pop in a tenor so gossamer you fear the next finger-picked note might puncture it, though it never does. His on-the-beat vocals allude to life-changing events, reflecting the period after he moved to Los Angeles from Portland, Ore., and wrote much of the material.
"It was a time I was breaking free of a few things," he says.
And, as it turns out, attaching himself to others. When he played his first show at the Hotel Cafe in 2004, he befriended the doorman and sound guy -- both of whom now play in his band. He cites the venue's fraternal feel in helping build his confidence.
"When I did finally work up the courage to get out and do the solo thing, it was amazing to be welcomed like I was," Buddy says. "It means a lot when people you respect come up to you after a show. ... There are so many people, and so many talented ones, it can be kind of overwhelming and intimidating."
Buddy, with band mates Will Golden, Percy Haverson, Al Sgro, Fil Krohnengold and Michael Jerome, celebrates the release of "Alterations and Repairs" with a show tonight at the Hotel Cafe. Also on the bill are Greg Laswell, Emily Wells and Brian Wright and the Waco Tragedies.
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Speaking of the Hotel Cafe, Tom Morello (as the Nightwatchman) returned Thursday night (with Perry Farrell and Jill Sobule among the guests). He'll also do the next two Thursdays at the venue.
[Late with a post today, sorry; here are some news bits:]
The band is no longer on an indie label, but Interpol today released a six-song live EP, "Interpol Live," that's available only at independent music stores. You mean there's some of those left? Yes, indeed. The retail outlets, listed at Think Indie, include North Hollywood's Miles of Music and Long Beach's Fingerprints, along with that cozy hole in the wall at Sunset and Ivar. The EP, by the way, is heavily weighted toward new material -- four songs off this year's "Our Love to Admire."
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The Plug Independent Music Awards nominees include a healthy number of major-label artists too, but who's counting? What's indie? I've watched this video five times and I'm still befuddled. The Plugs do appear to be an emo-free zone, however, even though there's a lot of indie emo. L.A.'s very own No Age and Sea Wolf (that's Alex Church at left) are among nominees for new artist of the year. Even if you don't vote, the Plug list offers the chance to test your cool quotient -- how many discs on the album-of-the-year list have you heard? Or how many do you own? And did you really make it all the way through the Beirut album? And why can't this Beirut get any love? So many questions.
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Highlights for Tuesday, Nov. 27
If I were in the mood for some serious, thoughtful music tonight, I would see Johnette Napolitano at the Roxy. The ex-Concrete Blonde singer-bassist's solo album “Scarred” is powerful stuff -- plus she has a reputation for delivering the goods live. ... If I were in the mood to dance my legs off and hear the Cure recycled, I'd hit Cinespace for its Tuesday party -- War Tapes is playing, along with local rockers Policy. ... With only an EP on their resume, there's a buzz surrounding the indie pop of Los Campesinos!, who are from Wales but sound like they should be from Canada and are touring with another of our northern neighbor's government-supported indie outfits, the Most Serene Republic. That show is at the Echoplex. ... Maybe coolest of all, one of the Quannum Projects heroes, Honeycut, is down from San Francisco for a show at the Knitting Factory.
Their name has been mumbled, mangled and maybe even mocked — not that the four guys in Voxhaul Broadcast can blame anybody. “Every name we’d pick would be taken,” singer-guitarist David Dennis says, “so we thought, ‘Let’s make up some words and hope it’s not taken.’ ”
In a way, the Orange County quartet set about making their music in similar fashion. “If it sounds too reminiscent of anything, we kind of [rough] it up,” Dennis says. “It’s really easy to be cliché; you have to be picky about what you do.”
Voxhaul Broadcast’s twitchy, soul-infused rock isn’t exactly new — but the work of Dennis, guitarist-keyboardist Anthony Aguiar, bassist Phillip Munset II and drummer Kurt Allen is distinctive, if only because it originated on an O.C. landscape populated by harder-edged bands. “It used to be a band like us could not play a show without being booked with a hard-core band,” Dennis says. “Now there is a lot of other music coming out of Orange County.”
Indeed, the band’s “Rotten Apples” EP, out on Retone Records, recalls the Charlatans UK or the Strokes more than any suburban thrashers. The quartet, now based in L.A., has spent much of the fall on tour. “Right now, we’re just trying to get our name out there,” Dennis says.
The final night of the Softlightes residency has been moved from Spaceland to the Echoplex. The dreamy quartet spread some serious feel-good pop over the first three weeks of its stand. ... The Airborne Toxic Event ends its four-week stand at the Detroit Bar, with Orange County's Cavil at Rest. ... Restaurant winds up its residency at the Echo. ... And I See Hawks in LA holds forth at Bordello.
[Correspondent Jeff Miller reports from the Sunday night festivities at the Echoplex:]
Beck -- the Silver Lake icon whose recent tours have found him banging out drum parts on a kitchen table and dancing along with a puppet version of himself -- isn't exactly predictable. One thing for sure, though: Before embarking on a tour with a new band, he'll give them a test run in front of a smallish sea of rabid fans at a local venue, rather than testing their might in a packed arena.
Such was the impetus for his last-minute, back-to-basics show at the Echoplex on Sunday night -- a warmup for a short international stadium stint opening for the Police. Beck ditched his recent shtick for a guitar-based set that spanned his career, backed by a band that may be the best he's found yet: on-again, off-again collaborators Justin Meldal-Johnsen and Joey Waronker on bass and drums, respectively; singer-songwriter Jason Falkner picking up guitar duties; and, on keys, producer/legend Nigel Godrich (Radiohead, Paul McCartney, Beck, Travis, among others).
Beck claimed this show was Godrich's U.S. stage debut, and, per his repuation, Godrich added electronic whooshes and keyboard fills to everything from the "Mellow Gold"-era album cut "[Messin'] With My Head" to recent hits like "Nausea." When the front man eschewed an encore, insisting the band had played all the songs it knew, Meldal-Johnsen showed them the chords to "Odelay's" "Lord Only Knows." Once they tore into it, the results were shambolic and loose -- perhaps not quite stadium-ready, but certainly a ramshackle fit for an audience rabidly hanging on every chord.
Los Angeles' Casxio has proven itself a little bit more than just the latest band to jump into the dance-music pool. The quartet creates its driving, funky electro-soul without using laptops -- an old-school approach that seems downright ambitious in a time when computers trigger everything from backing tracks to visual effects.
"After a show, I'll have people come up to me and say, 'Wow, I didn't realize this was happening in L.A.,'" says Casxio front man Lucas Guerin. "The influence of Daft Punk, and now people like Justice are amazing and taking it a step further. But when I think about that, I think about how I can create that energy with a live performance, with no prerecorded material or samples."
Guerin, the singer-bassist who'd been working on Casxio's songs for about four years in his bedroom, assembled a lineup that includes guitarist Eric Saez, drummer Zach Schrock and keyboardist Andrea Choe about a year and a half ago. Guerin's compositions spring from the sexed-up music of Sly & the Family Stone, Prince and the Talking Heads. "That was the stuff that really moved me," he says. "I'd go to parties and see the effect it had on people."
In the Eastside clubs where Casxio has been playing its early shows, it's been a tougher sell. Crowds dance more than they used to but still are largely hands-in-pockets. "We're not the whole straight-up rock 'n' roll revival," Guerin says, "but our shows have been great. It's leading to other things, but dancing is not necessarily one of them."
||| Casxio finishes up its residency tonight at the Silverlake Lounge. Also appearing (with laptop): electro-soul phenom Sam Sparro.
Buoyant as he feels these days, Myles Hendrik was no overnight sensation. The Bloodcat Love front man moved to L.A. from New Zealand five years ago — “to pursue the dream,” he says, making you feel silly for asking why — only to take that long to find the right chemistry for his quintet.
“Moving to a different country, you start completely over,” he says. Forming a band “is like having four girlfriends. You don’t marry the first four girls you sleep with in L.A. You have divorces, you have horrible breakups. Things happen.”
Most recently, guitarist Dion Lunadan, formerly of the Kiwi rock band the D4, moved away. But Australian Mitch McIvor (cousin of the Cester brothers of Jet) came aboard, as did drummer Marty Cornish, firming up a lineup that includes guitarist Joshua Mancuso and bassist Nicholas Oja. Just in time. The band recently released its “Only Dreamers Left Alive” EP and is back in L.A. after spreading some of its garage rock to the East Coast in October.
Bloodcat Love’s muscular, beer-soaked primitivism stops mercifully short of the clichéd theatrics that sabotage a lot of L.A. bands, and its danceability speaks to Hendrik’s years spent as a DJ, promoter and man about clubs. “Subconsciously you get a feel for what makes people move, and an understanding of what people emote to,” he says. “We do make music you can kick your heels to.”
||| Bloodcat Love performs tonight at the Viper Room and Saturday at Safari Sam's, opening for Gram Rabbit (celebrating the release of its new album "RadioAngel and the RobotBeat."
Elsewhere Wednesday, Nov. 21
It's a pre-Turkey Day feast: Nice U.K. double-bill at the Wiltern -- Travis and Maximo Park. ... Merrick plays the second of its two shows at Bordello (with the Pity Party and Correatown on the bill). ... Spindrift headlines the Echo. ... Power poppers Scarlet Grey play the Troubadour. ... Silver Needle plays the Kiss or Kill night at El Cid. ... And Pop Noir brings its Anglophile stylings to Club NME at Spaceland.
Tickets went on sale this morning (and as of this post, some remain) for the Troubadour's big 50th-anniversary shows Nov. 28, 29 and 30 featuring James Taylor, Carole King and original band members Danny Kortchmar, Russ Kunkel and Lee Sklar.
There are two shows per night, and, yes, it's pricey (VIP tickets are $1,000 each; general admission is $225). But why not? King and Taylor performed at the Troub in November 1969 in a show that marked her debut as a solo artist. Taylor's solo debut came at the venue four months earlier. For next week's performances, a hefty portion of the proceeds go to charity.
Not sure any of these shows will be of historic proportions, but there is some nice music to be heard tonight: Merrick, the seemingly long-ago project of Inara George (the Bird and the Bee) and Bryony Atkinson, reunites for the first of two nights at Bordello -- with John Gold among the openers. ... Locals Hearts of Palm UK,Letting Up Despite Great Faults and Marvelous Toy convene at Boardner's for a free show being mounted by the Radio Free Silver Lake blog. ... At the Silverlake Lounge, it's Tall Hands and the Soft Hands on the bill. Go figure. ... The Front and Tsk Tsk bring the rock at the Scene, and speaking of bringing the rock, Isis plays the Troubadour.
One of the most appealing holiday shows we've heard about so far is the Christmas Sweater Festival, a party being thrown by the Fold on Dec. 14 at the new downtown venue Crash Mansion.
Not only is it a sweater party, a minimum $10 donation (it's for charity) gets you music by five wildly entertaining local bands. And there is no headliner. In a strange quirk of scheduling, the show will unfold like a fantasy football draft -- with the bands performing sets in 1-2-3-4-5-5-4-3-2-1 order.
Sam Sparro has canceled his set tonight at the Viper Room because of illness. Orange County up-and-comers Pop Noir remains on the bill, along with On Blast and Ari Shine.
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Mighty good fun, despite a modest turnout, at the Roxy last week for the Filter show featuring Oliver Future and Sara Lov. The latter artist, playing an acoustic guitar with a pianist and a cellist, was clearly annoyed that the yappy back-of-the-room folks wouldn't stop talking while she performed. "We have some chatty people here -- you wanna come up here and fight me? " she asked good-naturedly. "I'm sure there are plenty of bars on this block where they're not playing soft music."
Those who held their tongues for a half-hour were rewarded with a gorgeous set of folk-pop. Lov is working on an album that'll be out early next year.
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Speaking of albums, if we strain our ears really really hard right now, we might be able to hear the Little Ones debuting their new material. Well, not really. But the L.A. quintet is playing the Social in London today and doing songs off their long-awaited debut full-length, "Morning Tide." In the meantime, there's a great take on their single "Lovers Who Uncover" on their MySpace page -- it's called "Dubbers Who Uncover" and it's downloadable.
Elsewhere Monday, Nov. 19
The Softlightes (Spaceland), Casxio (Silverlake Lounge) and Restaurant (Echo) continue their residencies, and Castledoor joins the Airborne Toxic Event at its residency at the Detroit Bar in Costa Mesa. ... Until June leads a bill of pop bands in a free show at the Troubadour.
Bodies of Water, who first caught my ear during their Echo residency back in May, have joined the roster of indie label Secretly Canadian, which will distribute the band's self-released album "Ears Will Pop & Eyes Will Blink" on Dec. 4. The band plans to have another album ready for release on the label by spring.
Secretly Canadian is home to the likes of Richard Swift, David Vandevelde, Antony & the Johnsons, Magnolia Electric Co. and Jens Lekman.
Used to be you only heard local music on radio giant KROQ when a Los Angeles band broke big -- or on the occasional one-off "Catch of the Day" or in the wee hours when DJ Rodney Bingenheimer would spin one of his pop/Anglophile favorites.
But this decade's watershed of excellent local and indie music has gotten the station's notice, if the grassroots efforts of smaller upstart Indie 103.1 (KDLD-FM, which turns 4 years old on Christmas) haven't. DJ Kat Corbett has an hourlong slot from 9 to 10 p.m. Sundays for her Locals Only show, and now the station has pressed Volume 1 of its Locals Only compilation.
The KROQ comp weighs in a bit heavier sonically than the three issued so far by Indie 103.1's Mark Sovel. But it's a great snapshot of the L.A. scene, from the muscular stylings of After Midnight Project, A.I. and Big Stone City to the pop-rock of Metro Station, New Year's Day and Heartstop. You could do a lot worse than spend an hour with the 20 tracks on this disc. [Can't find the track listing online anywhere except the Big Stone City page, so here you go.]
KROQ is mounting a Locals Only show at the Roxy on Saturday night, featuring Black Light Burns (fronted by ex-Limp Bizkit guitarist Wes Borland) and Cage9, among others.
Photo of After Midnight Project by Redd Room Studios
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Speaking of Indie 103, the station has scheduled its holiday show, Bands in Toyland, for Dec. 5 at the Avalon, with Spoon, Pinback, Datarock and Sea Wolf on board. It's a $30 ticket if you bring a non-wrapped toy ... And more on the holidays: The final "Gimme Shelter" benefit is Dec. 11Dec. 12 at the Roxy, with Pete Yorn, Matthew Sweet & Suzana Hoffs, Phantom Planet, Peter Himmelman, Jesca Hoop and a bunch more.
Thanks to Olivia for pointing out my mistake.
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Fresno's Rademacher, who are playing a bazillion shows this month in preparation for the Dec. 4 release of their Aaron Espinoza-produced debut "Stunts," are doing something called a "blog residency," with four local blogs previewing the album two tracks at a time. Here's the Aquarium Drunkard's entry, and he has links to two others. The band brings its Pavement-influenced rock to Spaceland on Sunday night, with Espinoza's Earlimart (as a duo) and the Karabal Nightlife also performing.
Momentum can be a grand thing. When singer-songwriter Peter Walker co-founded Dangerbird Records with his manager, Jeff Castelaz, the indie label was seen as an outlet for his Rhett Miller-ish folk-pop. But as Dangerbird gained traction behind the likes of Silversun Pickups and now Sea Wolf, Walker’s music took on a new edge — and he a took a new name.
“In the back of my mind, I wanted it to sound like a band,” Walker says of the metamorphosis that birthed the trio Eulogies, his project with bassist Tim Hutton and drummer Chris Reynolds. “It was apparent when we were touring behind the last Peter Walker record [2006’s ‘“Young Gravity”’] that we were leaning toward a more collective, collaborative effort.”
Their debut, “Eulogies” (released in September and produced by Dangerbird labelmate Hrishikesh Hirway of the One AM Radio), introduces a cast of characters touched by death and less inevitable trials of the human spirit, framing their stories in tones both wistful and resolute. It reflects the growing confidence of a songwriter who doubles as label chief.
“It’s very comforting for me to put on my artist’s hat these days,” Walker says, “because there are no questions about the people we work with.”
Atlanta's Manchester Orchestra and North Carolina's Annuals make a nice 1-2 punch tonight at the Troubadour. ... The Bombshell Alliance Benefit, a charity gig for the Sojourn Battered Women's Shelter, goes off tonight at the Hotel Cafe, with a deep lineup featuring Abby Travis, Quincy Coleman, Correatown and Charlotte Martin, among others. ... Elsewhere, local punkers the Binges are among the openers at the Viper Room for NYC glamsters Semi Precious Weapons. Perez Hilton likes SPW, so they must be good. ... And San Francisco's Citay is in town for a gig at the 1269 Gallery (1269 6th St.) that includes locals the Moon Upstairs. ... As always, a man named Duke has more selections here.
The Sunset Strip still holds plenty of cachet for a lot of folks, but it's hard to spend much time there without getting the suspicion that Every Single Person Alive can't wait until the day returns when the likes of Guns 'N Roses and Janes Addiction rule the roost. With the preponderance of good indie acts -- and bookers at Eastside clubs and the Troubadour doing an excellent job of curating them -- the Strip is often left with bands still playing to the imaginary A&R men of 1988, or nights run by pay-to-play promoters, or indie bands who have already serviced their fanbase on the other side of town.
The past couple of months, Filter, the music marketing machine/magazine that does some pretty good curating of its own, has attempted to bring the Eastside crowds west with its weekly Revenge of the Sunset Strip nights at the Roxy. After all, if you hang out in the Eastside venues, you occasionally wonder whether the hands-in-pockets masses are there because they love the music or because the back room at Spaceland is good for your hipster quotient.
"Are you just there for the scene, or do you really care about the music?" Filter's Samantha Feld says.
Revenge nights have featured many indie bands, both local and touring, that have filled rooms elsewhere. Results have been mixed. J Davey filled the place (as he would almost any room on the Strip on any given night); it was mysteriously empty one night I was there for Foreign Born, one of the best bands in the city. Random people I have asked about the night have given me the usual reasons for budgeting their trips to the Strip carefully -- parking and drink prices being at the top of the list. But the $5 lot across the street from the Roxy is reasonable. And drink prices are what they are; you just need to moderate.
Tonight, with Norwegian pop singer Magnet having canceled his tour because of an illness in his family, smart-rockin' locals Oliver Future (who just had last month's residency at Spaceland) headline, supported by the serene-sounding Sara Lov and Australian psych-poppers the Panda Band. It's the final Revenge night of the year.
No word yet on whether Filter will pick up the promotion in 2008.
Update: "We're still trying to figure that out," Filter's Alan Sartirana says of whether Revenge will start up again after the new year. "We're looking for other partners, and we're looking for a way to make it a free night."
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Funeral services for Lance "Romance" Faulk of the Orange County band the Attraction are Thursday. Faulk, 36, died Saturday of a heart-related illness. The Register has his obituary here.
And Astra Heights' delayed debut album finally came out this week -- digitally, at least. The power-pop quintet has had "Good Problems" done for quite some time. Now it is out (at a very low price) on iTunes.
Two very nice English bands hit town. Athlete's new album "Beyond the Neighbourhood" is full of glistening pop, rich in imagery; the band plays the Troubadour. ... And Manchester newcomers Polytechnic plays Club NME at Spaceland.
Rock radio giant KROQ-FM on Monday announced the roster for the first night (Dec. 8) of its Almost Acoustic Christmas, and the lineup contained a bunch of the usual suspects -- Linkin Park, Angels & Airwaves, Avenged Sevenfold and Bad Religion, along with Paramore, Rise Against and System of a Down Serj Tankian.
This morning KROQ will announce a decidedly more indie lineup for the second night (Dec. 9), including four of the acts that played in 2004 -- Modest Mouse, the Shins, Muse and Jimmy Eat World. They will be joined by Spoon, local quartet Silversun Pickups and Canadian songstress Feist (guesting on the station's morning show today).
Bad Religion will be playing the event for the fourth time in 17 years (Beck has played five times, by the way). Do the Christmas show lineups tell you anything about the state of music? I don't know, but it sure is fun looking at the old KROQ lineups (thanks Wikipedia) and thinking how bummed I am that I missed the Trash Can Sinatras at that very first holiday show.
Both of this year's shows are at the Gibson Amphitheatre.
Photo of Britt Daniel of Spoon performing earlier this year at Internet outlet Little Radio's warehouse by Timothy Norris. Photo of Brian Aubert of Silversun Pickups performing at Coachella by Kevin Bronson / LAT.
[I'll call this "This Just In ..." -- not a full-on review, but quick impressions of something that just landed on my desk or in my e-mail ...]
The tsunami of 2007 releases has slowed to a trickle, but the first wave of 2008 albums awaits. Bobbing its head in and out of the water -- and making its way straight into my CD player -- is "Mission Control," the forthcoming release (Jan. 22 on ATO) from Athens, Ga., three-piece the Whigs. The trio busted your chops with the gritty 2006 album "Give 'Em All a Big Fat Lip," a rockin' if uneven effort they made on their own. "Mission Control," recorded in L.A. with Rob Schnapf, hones the band's propulsive rock without gutting it. Very quick, very urgent, and very much the sonic kin to the likes of the Replacements, Dinosaur Jr. and Buffalo Tom.
||| The Whigs perform at Spaceland tonight in a show presented by local blogging luminary the Aquarium Drunkard.
So many nifty shows tonight: Emma Pollock plays the Echo, and if you loved, liked, respected or even acknowledged the Delgados, you may very well swoon over her solo album "Watch the Fireworks." ... Over at the Silverlake Lounge, young folk phenom Robert Francis performs. ... The Kids of Widney High rock the Key Club. ... And at the Hotel Cafe, where Marina V is on the bill, Jeff Austin Black celebrates the release of his debut, "Human" -- with an introduction by USC football coach Pete Carroll, no less. ... Need more choices? The estimable You Set the Scene has a rundown.
-- Kevin Shields of shoegazer pioneers My Bloody Valentine confirms the band's reunion, not exactly a bulletin after months of rumors and reports to that effect. A new album is in the works and conjecture continues about a Coachella appearance, seemingly a foregone conclusion. (While the Goldenvoicers are at it, can they get these people too?) The video is taking forever to load, but Shields gives an interview here.
-- Ladytron has signed to Nettwerk, and the label will release the band's fourth album; it's being produced by Ed Banger Records dude Vicarious Bliss.
-- Local indie label Hopeless/Sub City lines up Every Time I Die and Escape the Fate for its seventh annual charitable combustion of hardcore and emo-ness, the Take Action Tour.
Evan Voytas is a student of jazz who likes to listen to a lot of '60s and '70s pop, spends his spare time writing and recording music at a farmhouse outside of Kutztown, Pa., and, he says, "has a pretty good amount of un-hipster things going for me."
The 24-year-old singer-guitarist also has a batch of catchy pop songs, as well as the respect of his peers, which will come in handy tonight when he plays his first-ever solo show (the 8 p.m. early set) at the Silverlake Lounge. In a nifty return-of-a-favor, Voytas' backing band will include teen phenom Teddy Geiger (on drums), for whom Voytas plays as a touring guitarist.
Voytas has no trepidation about trying his own material, most of which was conceived "out in the middle of nowhere," he says. "When I write, I'm marooned out there on a dirt road -- I like to avoid people, sleep all day and work at night." Not that he has an aversion to crowds. "I'm always pretty comfortable being onstage, so I'm not nervous about that at all," he says. "And I know the guys who are playing with me are excited."
In addition to Geiger, Voytas will be joined by Mike Fadem of Brooklyn quartet the Jealous Girlfriends (who play the set after him -- see Friday's post about their show last week) and L.A.'s John Girgus (Spider Problem). A For Attack and this month's Silverlake Lounge residents, Caxsio, also are on the bill.
Gliss is back in town, and the L.A. trio is celebrating the physical release of its digital-only album "Love the Virgins" by playing Indie 103.1's night at the Viper Room. ... Feist and Spoon make for a formidable 1-2 punch at the Gibson Amphitheatre. ... The Parson Redheads are on the bill supporting Restaurant's residency at the Echo. ... Sondre Lerche plays the Troubadour. ... The Airborne Toxic Event continues its residency at the Detroit Bar in Costa Mesa. ... And We Barbarians (debut EP available at shows, the trio says) are among the support for the Softlightes' residency at Spaceland.
Maybe it's just residual bliss, but Minipop's set Sunday night at Spaceland echoes off the cobwebbed recesses of my brain this morning like the delay on singer Tricia Kanne's vocals.
The San Francisco quartet, which released its debut album "A New Hope" (Take Root Records) last week, was opening for local shoegazers Eskimohunter and indie heroes Cursive. But it was as good a 9 o'clock set as you'll see at the Silver Lake club, the two-woman, two-man ensemble layering thick bass, driving guitars and keening synths as a foundation for Kanne's celestial vocals. It was gorgeous stuff; U.K. dream-pop bands from the '90s and before, such as Lush, Heavenly and the Darling Buds, particularly this song, come to mind.
Yes, it's a sound many have tried, but Minipop makes it work with savvy pop songwriting and onstage confidence (many a purveyor of this kind of music comes off precious), and on "A New Hope" Minipop's dream-pop sounds as fresh as ever thanks to the production work of Chris Manning (once a member of Jellyfish).
The band has no further L.A. dates planned until the new year.
Only 52 days until New Year's Eve, and downtown Los Angeles is already getting crowded.
Uber-promoter Giant is bringing back Giant Maximus, with heavy hitters such as Tiesto, Roger Sanchez, MSTRKRFT, Z-Trip and Kaskade to its circus-tents-in-a-parking-lot spectacular. About 10,000 are expected for the dance music event to be near the intersection of Figueroa and 8th streets, and the general admission tickets are going for $80.
But hipster hero Steve Aoki is getting into the act too. The guy formerly known as Kid Millionaire brings a lineup heavy on electroclash-or-whatever-you-call-it-in-2007 to downtown's warehouse district (on Imperial Street, just west of the 6th Street bridge) for an inaugural event known as Hard NYE. Justice will do a DJ set, supplemented by the likes of 2 Live Crew, DJ A-Trak, Peaches, Whitey and Aoki himself. GA tickets are going for $60.
Elsewhere, there's no official word yet from the promoters who brought the Killers in to headline an event at Paramount Studios last New Year's Eve. But I'm told something is in the works.
And for folks Of a Different Sensibility -- and we don't say that disparagingly -- there is OCNYE, which this year moves south from its former fairgrounds location to the Oaks Blenheim Events Center in San Juan Capistrano. The third annual affair, which features a pyrotechnics-filled "Orange Drop," features Third Eye Blind, the Psychedelic Furs, Berlin, the English Beat, a handful of tribute acts and some local acts too. GA tickets are $55 until next Thursday; $65 if purchased before Dec. 15.
The Jealous Girlfriends played their first Los Angeles show on Thursday night, and it made me, well, a bit jealous I hadn't seen the Brooklyn quartet before. They're a little bit Sonic Youth, a little bit Blonde Redhead and a little bit synth-crazy, wrapping up their minor-chord melancholy in restless and arresting arrangements that make front woman Holly Miranda's torch-singer vocals sound even more startling.
Miranda could do nicely with just a piano and a microphone, but guitar in hand she proved herself more than capable of both art-rock riffage and laying down bristling sheens of distortion. Seeing the band a first time, you never quite knew what was coming next. But you never wanted to avert your eyes or ears for very long.
Just signed to wee Canadian imprint Good Fences, the Jealous Girlfriends will release their debut early next year -- but you can get a self-released copy at their next show, Monday night at the Silverlake Lounge.
The Blood Brothers have called it quits after 10 scream-alicious years. "We have made a collective decision that our time together has come to an end," the Seattle quintet said in a statement released this morning. "Your friendship, support and love hold ... a profoundly special place in each of our hearts."
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Great Northern this week released an iTunes-only (until February, at least) EP called "Sleepy Eepee," a collection of five songs that the band says "laid the early groundwork" for its current sound. The L.A. quartet plays the Echoplex tonight along with Robbers on High Street.
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Magnet (aka Even Johansen) has canceled next week's date at the Roxy because of an illness in his family. His album "The Simple Life" came out in September on Filter. The show, scheduled for Wednesday, goes on -- with a solid local lineup of Oliver Future and Sara Lov (one-half of L.A.'s Devics) joining fun Australian quintet the Panda Band.
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Dates: Coachella, April 25-27; Stagecoach, the following weekend.
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And for your viewing pleasure, here's the new video by Sam Sparro for the song "Cottonmouth":
Photo of the Blood Brothers by Nathan Martin
Highlights for Thursday, Nov. 8
Lots going on in the bigger venues: Of Montreal starts a two-night stand at the Avalon; big Stones Throw Records night at the El Rey, with Madlib, Peanut Butter Wolf and a host of others; hits aplenty at Staples Center, with Maroon 5, the Hives and Phantom Planet; Ben Harper holds forth at the Orpheum; Circa Survive rocks the Mayan; and Ween plays the Wiltern. ... Meanwhile, Year Long Disaster joins Valient Thorr at Spaceland. ... Hello Stranger tops a big bill at the Viper Room. ... And at the Detroit Bar, it's Voxhaul Broadcast and Saint Motel.
Also:The Dirty Kings, whose music reminds me of 1967 Camaros I never drove and mutton chops I could never grow, celebrate the release of their album, "Who's Along for the Ride," tonight at the Key Club.
It’s 11 p.m.; do you know where your English teacher is?
If he’s Jamie Tepper, he might be onstage, wearing a fiendishly grinning mask, working his laptop and performing under the whimsical name of Raspberry Cocaine. The music -- damaged, driving electro doused with samples -- is home-recorded and self-released (and has even earned some airplay on Indie 103.1). “But it’s not really conducive to a live show,” Tepper says. “Who wants to watch a guy and his laptop?”
So the 32-year-old Hollywood High teacher -- a film school graduate and would-be screenwriter -- concocted what he calls “a multimedia spectacle.” Working from beside a large screen, Tepper triggers his music plus a slide show of carefully curated images, including album covers, historical photos and pop culture ephemera. In front of the screen, actress/performance artist Princess Pop (a.k.a. Audrey Malone, pictured) mimes, lip-syncs and dances accordingly.
“I leave a lot of it up to interpretation, but I do want to say something,” Tepper says of the sometimes-stark sequencing of images and Malone’s interaction with them. “We’re kind of aghast at this whole celebrity culture, and we don’t feel like there’s very much being said. People sometimes are taken aback, but, hey, in some ways Hitler and Britney have a lot in common.”
Tepper acknowledges that his bedroom recordings — which have been called “a soundtrack to a commentary” — have gained more traction than he expected. “So far,” he says, “it’s kind of exactly what I hoped it would be.”
||| Raspberry Cocaine performs the late set tonight the Silverlake Lounge.
[The following observations come without any live photographs -- a certain Sunset Strip booze dispensary, ostensibly feeling that expensive parking, overpriced drinks and positively cheerless bartenders are not inhospitable enough, having dispatched a beefy man into the crowd to ask that patrons put away their digital cameras. I mean, c'mon ...]
The Orange Lights swooped into the Viper Room on Tuesday, six weeks late because of a strange injury sustained by bassist Chris Gittins in London in September, wearing black and administering ballads as if they were Band-Aids for our emotional abrasions. Recommended if you like Travis, the Verve, Snow Patrol and Nic Harcourt, the Newcastle quintet follows the Britpop instruction manual to the letter, fashioning hopeful songs from mournful melodies and, regrettably, holding to one passionate note so long as to Blunt its messages.
Frontman (and former Spiritualized touring guitarist) Jason Hart sells gorgeous tunes such as "Life Is Still Beautiful" and "Let the Love In" for all they're worth, but the Orange Lights' body of work gives them little in the way of context. Once the novelty of a singer enunciating "loss-ahnn-jell-eeze" wears off, there's not enough for the breadbasket, at least not until the Orange Lights ignite a couple of rock songs.
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More on opening act Ride on Rides at a later date, but my first impression is that the local quartet seems more wrapped up in rock-star aspirations than in channeling emotions through their tuneful, likable pop. Reminiscent of indie-poppers Voxtrot, a very good thing, and worth revisiting.
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Down the street at the Key Club, Teaneck hammered out its catchy power pop to a meager crowd at the all-ages Ruby night. Fun stuff -- imagine Weezer if they were dressed to play touch football.
Highlights for Wednesday, Nov. 7
The Thrills are back for the first time in, well, a long time. "Teenager" (produced by Tony Hoffer) is their first album in three years, and it's more rooted in California than it is the quintet's native Ireland. Good for the mood; the band plays Club NME at Spaceland tonight. ... The Hold Steady / Art Brut two-pronged attack visits the Music Box @ Fonda, with locals the Blood Arm opening. ... Sabrosa Purr and the Blakes play Filter's Revenge of the Sunset Strip night at the Roxy. ... And some nice locals: Exitmusic at Tangier; Policy at Boardner's; and the Action Design at Safari Sam's.
Mark Sovel, the Indie 103.1 music director and champion of the local music scene, turns journalist and documentarian for a project he's done for KCET. "Rummage" takes a look at four L.A. bands -- the Pity Party, the Spores, Boom Bip and Bedtime for Toys -- from the perspective, as Sovel writes, of "the way in which musicians of each generation can rummage through the trash piles of music's past to find the magic gems of musical ideas ..."
Narratives, videos, links to music, all courtesy of the man Steve Jones calls Mr. Shovel. Worth checking.
Random notes: Checked in on young Mississippi expats King Elementary on Monday night at the Silverlake Lounge. The quintet's gnarly blues-rock is a work in progress, but "Go Out to Play" could have rocked '70s radio, and their cover of "Helter Skelter" was sweet too. ... Later, up Sunset at the Echo, the Blakes delivered a set of garage rock that, while not as powerful as on their debut album (recommended), still blasted a small crowd toward Monday night oblivion. ... And my Monday ended at Spaceland with a dose of the Softlightes' buoyant, cinematic pop -- how that quartet isn't packing clubs by now is a mystery. Seems to be perfect stuff for an indie date night. ... Meanwhile, the Raveonettes (surely they must qualify as L.A. residents now) have signed to Vice. Their fourth album, "Lust Lust Lust," is due in early '08. ... Voxtrot, who postponed a tour including an earlier L.A. date so they could join the Arctic Monkeys on tour, have rescheduled: Dec. 2 at Music Box @ Fonda. ... The Cribs have postponed a U.S. tour that was to end with an L.A. date in early December; the British punk trio will be opening four shows for the Sex Pistols at the Brixton Academy starting Thursday.
Highights for Tuesday, Nov. 6
British quintet the Orange Lights play their rescheduled Viper Room date, followed by local quartet Ride on Rides. ... Up the street, Stars of Track and Field play the Roxy, while young North Carolina trio the Mile After joins up-and-coming O.C. trio Pop Noir and hum-tastic three-piece Teaneck at the all-ages Ruby night at the Key Club. ... Best of the Eastside shows: Tunng, with Karin Tatoyan, at the Echo.
Earlier this year, I tracked down singer-songwriter Shannon Hurley after she was tabbed by Rolling Stone as one of the Top 25 bands on MySpace. Now she has finished her debut album, "Ready to Wake Up," which she celebrates with an early set tonight at the Hotel Cafe. Sweet record -- and how many singer-songwriters would cover the Charlatans UK ("Try Again Today")?
Other highlights for Monday, Nov. 5
It's certainly no stay-at-home Monday: At the Music Box @ Fonda, Shout Out Louds, Johnossi and Nico Vega make for a formidable triad. ... But in terms of value, the bill at the cover charge-free Silverlake Lounge is just as good -- Casxio kicks off its residency, with support from O.C. up-and-comers Voxhaul Broadcast and hard-rockin' King Elementary. ... The Airborne Toxic Event kicks off a residency at the Detroit Bar in Costa Mesa. ... The Softlightes, whose way-back-in-February release "Say No to Being Cool, Say Yes to Being Happy" remains one of the finest pop albums of the year, kick off their residency at Spaceland. ... The Pity Party and Io Echo rock Indie 103.1's night at the Viper Room. ... And scroll down to read previews of a couple other Monday shows.
The Blakes' self-titled album, out last month on Light in the Attic, is as good a slice of down-and-dirty garage rock as you're likely to hear this year, a Stonesy, Stoogeist, Kinky mix of muscle that at times reminds you of the urgent, less shoegazey side of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's first album.
As immediate as it sounds, none of it came easily for the Seattle-based trio. "It took a lot of writing and recording and rewriting -- it was like a labor pain," says singer-bassist Snow Keim, who brother Garnet migrated from Maine to the West Coast, where they busked and wrote music until they happened upon drummer Bob Husak. "We have a lot of old recordings and EPs stashed away that nobody will ever see."
The brothers adopted their band name after visiting an exhibition devoted to the work of William Blake at the Huntington, then set about honing their '60s garage rock influences. "A lot of artists today seem to concentrate on making an emotional impact," Snow says, "but the thing we wanted to do was just make a fun record."
||| The Blakes help Restaurant kick off its November residency tonight at the Echo. The Blakes also play on Wednesday night at the Roxy with Sabrosa Purr as part of Filter's Revenge of the Sunset Strip.
[Your faithful blogger is back from a week's vacation, staring down an excellent week of shows. First, a couple expanded posts on bands I highlighted in last Thursday's edition of The Guide:]
You're an aspiring local rocker on lunch break at Bob's Big Boy. A couple tables away, you notice Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age. What do you do? "I didn't want to interrupt his lunch," says Karim Chatila, one-half (with brother Kasey) of the Gasoline Angels. "But I grabbed a CD from my car and when he was in line to pay his tab, I gave it to him and told him I was a fan of his music."
Two months later, the Chatilas found out Homme was a fan of theirs -- at least, enough to invite them on QOTSA's "Duluth Tour" as the opening act. "I was just ecstatic," Karim says. "We couldn't have thought up a better summer. We were playing to crowds we never imagined."
The brothers, who have been writing songs together since they were kids, took their melodic, roiling post-grunge on the road, building a big sound by playing over sequencers. "I see our music as heavy, but it's not metal," Karim says. "We've basically always written songs together and then figured out how to play them live."
In addition to this year's tour, Karim self-published a book of poetry, "Scorpion Love Lounge." "It's just something I pick up when I get burned out on the music or the day job gets to be too much," he says of his verse, which he was first inspired to dash out after he happened upon his mother's old typewriter. His girlfriend ended up tossing that typewriter out the window in a fit of anger. Says Karim, "That was inspiration too."
||| The Gasoline Angels play a free show tonight at the Troubadour with Strong Arm Down and Junkload.
||| Download "Let the Fun Begin" from the Gasoline Angels' self-titled album.
Photo by Chris Anthony
About the Blogger
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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