Radio Free Silver Lake

The L.A. Show Low Down (Or: "Become The Weeds We Will Become, Become The Sea We Will Become...")

by Brad Roberts

Interesting week with few big shows as most larger venues are shuttered this week, but a vibrant local scene takes over with a bunch of stellar lineups at some terrific shows. The Western States Motel (at right) is our band of the month over at LaBrie's every Tuesday beginning this week. After a quiet period in which they've been finishing up a new album, it will be great to welcome them back to the local stage, and to hear the new material. See Joe's fact-filled interview with Carl Jordan here.

It was wonderful to return to concert-going after my long flu hiatus with the super show put on with The Monolators, who burned up the LaBrie's stage with a fiery performance at our last RFSL Free Tuesday of January. Walking Sleep performed one of the rockingest sets I've ever seen them give (with Hunter's laryngitis lending a raw raspiness to the songs, many of which were new), and Sara really shined as her smooth vocals took the edge off of the contrasting sounds coming from Hunter. In fact the whole band really rocked out. The World Record opened the night with their new band members, including Ross Flournoy of The Broken West, and with each song they won over the audience more and more. Also great to hear new material from them which made for a rich night of local talent.

I'd had a ticket for months to see Iron and Wine at The Wiltern on Wednesday, so out I trooped again despite my sapped energy and landed in the pit where a wonderful low-key audience was sitting on the floor waiting for the show to begin. The quality of The Low Anthem and Iron and Wine made my exhaustion evaporate and I was swimming in a sea of like-minded fans transfixed by the music. I'll be reviewing the show in full here on Thursday. Then on Saturday was the hugely entertaining "best show ever" billed Lord Growing "704" show at Pehrspace where the amazing line up of Vanaprasta, George Glass, Cody the Band and Manhattan Murder Mystery made for a night that was as unforgettable as it was very well attended.

Actually, I was wrong about the major venues, as Grace Potter and the Nocturnals have a sold out show at El Rey with our local soon-to-be-superstars, The Belle Brigade on Friday, and Cat Power is at The Fonda on Saturday. Sorry, again, to keep updating this column is such a haphazard way...but I just found out about a show at Lot 1 Cafe on Friday night hosted by AD and JAXART, starring Pageants (made up of former members of Avi Buffalo, Rebecca Coleman and Arin Fazio) Honey Loving Cells and Dirty Gold. I'm going to have to try to hit two shows that evening.

This week, in addition to The Western States Motel, WALK and Burial At Sea on Tuesday at LaBrie's, I'm not looking forward to the choice I'm going to have to make on Thursday between Shadow Shadow Shade with Great Northern at The Satellite or We Barbarians, LESANDS and The Union Line at The Echo. More below...

Interview: The Western States Motel

by Joe Fielder

Like we mentioned earlier this week, breezy indie pop act The Western States Motel -- who Buzzbands call "like a more taciturn but no less bittersweet Grandaddy" -- will be headlining our free Tuesday night new music showcase at LaBrie's in February.

They've got some stellar line-ups planned and will be playing music from their new album.

We spoke with lead Carl Jordan earlier this week about the album and much more.

Hey, Carl. How you been? What have you guys been up to?

Hey, Joe. Things have been going really well... What have we been up to? Well, we had a nice little living room practice last night, trying to get our act together for next Tuesday!

We usually rent an hourly room at a rehearsal studio, and that tends to mean its business time when you are in there, cause the clock is ticking. If you take a long time getting your gear set up or are running late, that just means less time you get to rehearse. It was a nice change to be at our guitar player John's place, because suddenly you're not watching the clock. We'd get through a few songs, then shoot the breeze for a bit, or watch some of his Best of The Detroit Red Wings Fights compilation DVD. Pretty good cover art for a bootleg.

So, this new album. How did it come together? When does it come out?

It's called Freeway Freeway Riverbed, and I'll be wrapping it up for good over the weekend. It's been in the works for a couple of years, but mostly its taken that long because the first 8 or 9 songs I wrote for it were scrapped pretty far into the process of getting them recorded. I just kept writing and writing and seemed to be happier with the later material. I think its becuase the early songs were a bit dark, and the more I thought about it, I realized that I wanted to do a record that felt more optimistic, more positive. I guess the end result is somewhere in the middle.

Album Review – Exray’s s/t LP

By Jackie Lam

Cinematic music functions a lot like films themselves. We enjoy soundtracks and movie scores because of their ability to string together emotional moments that hook you in with a strong narrative pull. Growing up, I enjoyed my fair share of Danny Elfman and John Williams, and a large part of why those songs had such great appeal was because they conjured such vivid pictures and brilliant emotions.

And upon listening to Exray’s self-titled debut LP, their brand of lo-fi electronic pop could be the soundtrack to a sweetly sordid life. And it’s as if Exray’s can maintain a level of musical auteurship while still giving rise to singular tracks that could fit a scene in a movie.

Made up of the collaborative efforts of Jon Bernson and Michael Falsetto-Mapp, a duo from San Francisco, Exray’s s/t LP is an album where the emotional and narrative context takes precedent. The album starts off with “You Forgot,” a man’s monologue that could be perhaps a morose letter to a former love revealed, the kind of thoughts that seep out when one is feeling comfortably safe and alone. The emotiveness wavers back and forth and words like “open up like a paper door” creep up on you unexpectedly.

“Mary Hollow” struck a nerve with me, and it really carries a tone that reminds me like The Decemberists. This album, pound for pound, is nothing but tracks that seek to derive a range of emotions and tales from far and wide. Pulsating with a labryinth of industrial pips and squeaks, the instrumental “La Palma” is an urban dirge, and takes you to the underbelly of the city. “Remember Nothing” is a haunting track, and wraps you inside an alluring world of rhythmic spurts and engaging, loosely weaved together lyrics (Cardboard/mountains of glass/bystanders moving around/blue suit/caution tape/dancing with people I did not know).

Bernson and Falsetto-Mapp seem like a pair of discreet mavericks who have day jobs silkscreening band shirts or maybe delivering pizza at the Domino’s down the street. The kind whose true work is during the afterhours, capturing stolen moments around the city with sundry recording devices.

It’s an album that seems like the appropriate score for most of Fincher’s films (“Hesitation” was featured on the soundtrack for The Social Network), music that’s orchestrated to opens the portal to the dark psyche of the mind. While not in any way sprawling, Exray’s debut is a compilation of disparate sources: industrial beats for a metropolitan miasma, or a synth-pop euphoria that could be a score for a French romance.

And like their counterparts who build music around a narrative, moments (The Clientele, The Decemberists, The Western States Motel), Exray’s builds a aural cityscape composed of low-fi sensibilities while employing touches of eclectic sources to make it their own. The tracks bleed into one another, and feels like a watercolor painting where the colors are blurred and the lines undefined.

Exray’s s/t album was released on Tuesday, January 25^th on Howell’s Transmitter. They'll be celebrating the release of their album with a show at Cafe Du Nord in San Francisco on February 4th.

Video Free Silver Lake: Western States Motel, Eagle and Talon, Les Savy Fav, Best Coast and More...

By Jed

1) Weren't the Monolators lovely last month as featured band for RFSL's Tuesdaily residency at Labrie's? (yes) This month's resident band is the Western States Motel, supported on their first residency night (February 1) by WALK and Burial at Sea (formerly the Temporary Thing). As usual (or at least as often as I am disciplined enough to remember to post) I'm going to post videos from the bands featured at the upcoming residency show. The purpose of this is to 1) give you all a sense of what they sound like,  2) persuade you that these are people that are worth watching and 3) provide entertainment. Please enjoy the following, and see you next Tuesday!

Here's "Powerlines", the smash single from the Western States Motel:

"Lightening Round" by WALK
Lightning Round

WALK | Myspace Music Videos

Burial At Sea (when they were still the Temporary Thing" playing "Awakened By a Dream" live at the Hotel Cafe:

Ticket Giveaway: Amos Lee over at The Music Box this Thursday, January 27

By Joel Robinson

Yes, you read that right, free entry for a reader and guest to a great evening of music just a couple days from now. Amos Lee plays at The Music Box in support of his latest work, Mission Bell, as released today on Blue Note records.

If you are interested in learning a bit more about Amos Lee and Mission Bell take a swing by NPR for a look at their piece on him (as featured on All Songs Considered). Looks to be another solid offering from this already proven, yet still developing, young artist.

Joining in on the night will be South Africa's Vusi Mahlasela providing for a terrific evening most definitely worth seeing, hearing, and fully enjoying.

Thanks to friends over at Goldenvoice, RFSL is able to offer free entry to a lucky reader and guest. So get in on the mix for a chance at freebie entry to this one. Drop an e-mail to "RFSLjoel(at)gmail(dot)com” that includes "Amos Lee at The Music Box" in the subject line and your full name (and any other comments you may have) in the e-mail text. Please be certain to get that e-mail to us by 5:00 Wednesday afternoon.

Good luck to all! -jdr

RFSL Free Tuesdays at LaBrie's: MP3 Preview – The Walking Sleep, The Monolators, and The World Record

Compiled by: Jackie Lam

Are you ready for some mind-blowing music from a few local heavy hitters? Tonight ends our January residency with The Monolators, who will be joined by Walking Sleep and The World Record. So swing by LaBrie’s in Glendale to catch three amazing bands wrap up a great month of free music. It’s your last chance to try some free assorted homemade pretzels while downing some super affordable booze. Doors open at 8:30 am, 21+. Here are some free downloadable Mp3s plus back story:

 

The Walking Sleep Hunter from Walking Sleep on “Let It Go On”:

Our track "Let It Go On" started as a rip-off, but then molded itself into something totally different in execution. I remember driving home from work on Fletcher when KRTH101 spun Aretha Franklin's version of "Say a Little Prayer for You." I was enchanted by the call-and-response verses and immediately wanted to do something like that with Sara. The lounge-y bass line came as some sort of Zombies "Time of the Season" rip and it really set the space. Somewhere along the way I decided the vocal line was too dynamic for me to sing lead on, and it should really be handled by Sara who was pretty new in the band at that point. I wrote a verse and chorus, and Sara put together the lyrics for the rest of the song and wrote a bridge.

We worked out the arrangement a few different ways and ended up editing it down further in mix. Daniel decided to turn the snares off kind of do this soft mallet intro, which was cool, and our friend Fil sat in when we were mixing to lay down the Doors-esque organ solo. Of course, the obscenely-long-for-a-Walking-Sleep-song guitar solo was something I thought would really make a cool multi-tiered ending for this one. It was written out and I basically play it the same way every time. Additionally, there even was a sort of slow jam outro recorded and we were going to fade it out, but the track was just getting too indulgent at that point. Haha. Anyway so that's the story. I really like this track; it's probably my favorite on Measures.

Free Download: Walking Sleep – “Let it Go On”

 

Eli of The Monolators on “Silver Cities”:

 Here's another song from our new Silver Cities EP--the title song. Actually there's two versions of this song, the full-band Monolators version and an earlier 4-track version I recorded in my garage with a
Casiotone keyboard, a bass guitar, and liberal amounts of phaser pedal. The earlier version isn't a demo per se, it was a track off of a solo EP I decided to throw together back in May 2010--but then Mary and I decided to remake the song as a Monolators track, an' I'm glad we did. For the curious, you can download the original version, along with the rest of the EP (I'm kinda proud of it) here:

The song more or less summarizes an incident from a few years back when Mary and I attempted to ride the Los Angeles subway to and from a Bjork concert at the Nokia Center downtown. We missed the last train back and had a to take a cab. Why do the trains stop running so early? We were INCONVENIENCED. The rest of the song veers off into one of my paranoid sci-fi Fritz Lang-esque fantasies that I'm so fond of. Anyone want to make a paranoid sci-fi video for this song? I'd pay you in pie! Really I would.

Free Download – The Monolators – “Silver Cities”

 

Andy of The World Record on “Serious”:

This song was started with no real idea in mind, just playing and seeing what magical sprites might spring forth. The first two lines came out randomly and I thought they were good against the chords, so I tried quickly to write as much as I could in the same mode. The rhymes were pretty corny (avocado / mr roboto) and I intended to fix them later, but when I finally got around to working on the song again I had gotten too used to them and couldn't let go. Now I think without them the song might be too melodramatic. Close one!

It's loosely based on a friend I had in high school in Phoenix whom I admired and whose family moved away, taking him with them. That's jumbled in with some other similar stuff from long ago.

This was the opening track on the S.M.D.E.P., and appears as track 3 on the Guitars Forever CD with trumpet, played by Ted Schumacher, replacing the vocals in the "solo." Will Courtney sings the high harmony and plays some guitar as well. It was recorded and mixed in our practice space.

Free Download – The World Record – “Serious”

RFSL Presents The Western States Motel FREE Tuesday Nights in February at LaBrie's

by Joe Fielder

You already know that there's still one more night in The Monolators' FREE Tuesday night residency at LaBrie's this month -- this time with The World Record and Walking Sleep, right? Right.

But we wanted to give you a heads-up that indie pop act The Western States Motel will be headlining Tuesdays next month in February at LaBrie's. They'll be playing songs from their upcoming album and have assembled some pretty fantastic line-ups. (We seriously vouch for every band on this list...)

Here's a full look at the month:

Tuesday, February 1st

w/ WALK & Burial at Sea (formerly The Temporary Thing)

Tuesday, February 8th

w/ Pacific Hurt (formerly Aushua) & The Mid Cities (Jonathan Price from The Henry Clay People)

Tuesday, February 15th

w/ Judson and Mary & Disaster Speaks (members of Tenlons Fort & Seasons)

Tuesday, February 22nd

w/ Andrew Lynch & The World Record

LaBrie’s is located at 806 E Colorado St in Glendale, doors are at 8:30 PM, and the nights are all 21+ and FREE.

 

 

The L.A. Show Low Down (Or: "The Weather Can Close The World Within It's Hand...")

by Brad Roberts

I've always thought that, chief among life's satisfactions, one should love where they have chosen to live (otherwise, what's the point?). Among three reasons I can think of for loving living in L.A., the first is illustrated by the photo at right. It is a perfect representation for why I don't live in Boston anymore... sorry, Joe. My family is still there and from all I hear, they get between 6 inches and two feet of snow every few days. I spent the first 27 winters of my life with the full four seasons and, as much fun as the first snow can be, winter just goes on way too long in those other parts of the world. Of course, we also miss pastoral scenes like in the shot of Boston Common below, but just remember...it's probably 12 degrees.

 

Meanwhile, back in the land of the swaying palms... Iron and Wine, back in town with the release of a new album, Kiss Each Other Clean, being released Tuesday (1/25), his first on Warner Bros. Records, offers another opportunity to watch Sam Beam's growth as an artist. From his very humble and hushed beginnings, he has blossomed into a consummate live performer, who can both, warmly engage each member of the audience, and overwhelm at the same time with the perfection of his songcraft. Surrounded by a talented and versatile band that brings strength and power to his evocative melodies and highly literary lyrics, he can be seen at Amoeba for free on Monday, and follows with two nights at The Wiltern, Tuesday and Wednesday. I'm going Wednesday. Social Distortion do three nights at Hollywood Palladium beginning Thursday. Deerhoof play the relatively mid-sized venue Echoplex on Saturday, where they sold out, of course. Cold War Kids offer two chances to see them in fairly smallish confines as well, at The Bootleg and at Amoeba on Monday and Tuesday, respectively. A Great range of talented bands performing in a nice array of fine Los Angeles theatres and clubs makes the second reason I'm happy to live here.

Reason three is the local talent flourishing all over the place, everywhere you look. The Belle Brigade are a new band to watch, and along with The Californian, represent some of the top newish talent in town. Both play Monday night. The Monolators are as playful and sarcastic as they are innovative and musically accomplished. They have played constantly for the five years I've known them and I've seen the band grow and change and keep getting better. They have a dedicated following who will always think of them as legendary, no matter where their career takes them. And they're always a blast live. They're on week four at our free Tuesdays at LaBrie's and feature two ever-popular bands with them this week, Walking Sleep and The World Record.

Band Spotlight: Moses Campbell: Mmm Mmm Good!

By Nick Martinez

Sean Solomon, of the LA band Moses Campbell  is incredibly youthful.  This is the first thing that I notice about him.  He is not only youthful in appearance, but also in the way that you can sense a drive, determination, and joie de vivre behind his eyes that usually begins to fade in most people in the first years of independence.  This is good news for all of us, because Sean’s exuberance (along with that of his bandmates Daniela Jiminez, Pascal Stevenson, Miles Wintner, Pauline Lay & Andrew Macelvie) seeps into the music of Moses Campbell.  The infectiousness of this spirit was captured on film in the video for their bouncy, whimsical, multi-instrumental sing-a-long “Ugly” from their debut album Who are you? Who is Anyone?

 

Like a Pied Piper/Peter Pan hybrid, Sean takes Moses Campbell to the streets in the Michael Reyder directed clip, urging us to follow them wherever their music takes us.  Try to resist the catchiness and joy of this song/video and you will probably fail.

Interview: The World Record

by Joe Fielder

We recently checked in with Andy Creighton from indie rock charmers The World Record to see what his band has been up to lately, hear how they first started, find out who is playing in the band now that Sam and Evan from The Parson Redheads have moved back to Portland, and much more.

PLUG: The group is rounding out a fantastic bill with Walking Sleep at the final night of The Monolators' free residency at LaBrie's next Tuesday night. You should go.

What does 2011 have in store for you guys? What shows do you have lined up? Any recording plans?

If all goes as planned, our new record will at last see the light of day very soon.  It's been a treacherous road, with aborted recording sessions, computer failures, and (amicably) departing band members.  There are still some details to iron out, but the recordings are done, and the mixes are about half done.  So that's the big item.  Otherwise, we have appearances at The Monolators (1/25) and Western States Motel (2/22) residencies with RFSL.  There's something in the works at the Music Box for April, which has my heart all a pitter-pat.

How did you guys first start up as a band?

I had released a solo record in 2001 right when I moved to Los Angeles.  I had some pals here whom I convinced to be my backing band.  We played this way for a couple years, but it began to feel like a big ego trip with these guys putting a lot of effort in and getting no credit.  So in 2003 we started to call it The World Record.  Not much else changed, really, except for the perception that it was a band, and maybe the guys felt a little more invested in it.

What made you want to make music originally? What drives you the most now?

I was always drawn to it, and it was encouraged at home.  I was lucky in that my parents listened to lots of good music, and played a bit as well.  My dad had a couple acoustic guitars, my mom had an autoharp, and there were harmonicas and tambourines around.  I have by now appropriated most of the musical instruments they used to own.