Kevin Bronson on February 5th, 2015

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Some of Los Angeles’ most compelling music evolves from accidental collaborations, wandering spirits, lifetime underdogs, the chronically curious and people without fancy managers/publicists/”teams” who are the diametric opposites of bands who look like they’re right out of central casting. Rough Church has some of those qualities. The band is helmed by Silver Lake long-timer Greg Franco, the singer/songwriter/guitarist who played in Ferdinand back in the day and spent time in New Zealand collaborating with the Clean’s David Kilgour and Robert Scott in Greg Franco & the Wandering Bear. On the new Rough Church album “Friction/Reflection,” Franco is joined by violinist/singer Kaitlin Wolfberg (currently a member of Seasons and Lady Low); bassist Dante Pascuzzo, whose background is in jazz; guitarist Carey Fosse, whose work has encompassed avant-garde jazz, rock and comedy theater; and drummers Fredo Ortiz (who played with Beastie Boys) and Tracy Hill. All that talent is corralled on an album — recorded by Andrew Bush at Grandma’s Warehouse in Filipinotown, mixed by Manny Nieto and mastered by Dave Cooley — that could be characterized as art-rock, or maybe art-punk, or maybe a hyphenate they haven’t come up with yet. It’s a record with strong thematic fabric, though, and its first track, “Grandeur,” is a Wolfberg composition that was flushed out by Franco and Pascuzzo. As Gus Black’s video suggests, grandeur has scarcely been more melancholic.

||| Live: Rough Church plays April 10 at Taix with Double Naught Spy Car.