Kevin Bronson on January 20th, 2011

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On his first two releases as the Western States Motel, L.A. songwriter Carl Jordan impresses as a songwriter whose four-minute snapshots feel like landscape paintings of yearning and disconnectedness. Like many a bedroom popster, Jordan can’t quite live in his own pictures, but the simple melodies and plaintive narratives on “The Western States Motel” (2007) and the follow-up “Painted Birds Flying in the Orange Mirror Sun” EP allow his listeners to. The first taste of Western States’ new album “Freeway Freeway Riverbed” (due in February) isn’t really a country-and-western song but a paean to that music’s healing power. Like a more taciturn but no less bittersweet Grandaddy, Jordan captures a fleeting moment – wheezing synths, strummed guitar, programmed drums and all.

||| Download: “Country and Western Song” [audio:http://www.mediafire.com/file/72r6m95pd6ydj2w/The%20Western%20States%20Motel%20-%20Country%20And%20Western%20Song.mp3]

||| Live: The Western States Motel do a residency every Tuesday in February at LaBrie’s in Glendale.