Tennessee’s Those Darlins bring a lot of ’tude with the punk-rock twang on their sophomore album “Screws Get Loose,” but it turns out Jessi, Kelley and Nikki Darlin (who conspire with their long-ago rock ’n’ roll camp counselor Linwood Regensburg) have a fascination with all things mystical too, in a Spector sort of way. “Mystic […]
Kiev’s first outing, the EP “Ain’t No Scary Folks In On Around Here,” impressed with its jammy concoction of funky rhythms, electronics and atmospherics. Since then the Orange County quintet of singer-guitarist Robert Brinkerhoff, keyboardists Alex Wright and Andy Stavas (who also wields a sax), drummer Brandon Corn and bassist Derek Poulsen have cranked up […]
The Californian’s self-titled debut album is a bit like surfing on a moonless night – the riffs and melodies concocted by singer-guitarist John Graney tug like currents, pulling you … where? Under? Ashore? Into a game of beach blanket bingo with Ian Curtis? Maybe all three at times. Here, the slow-mo album closer “Girl in […]
Orange County-based Starving for Gravity has been cultivating its gritty, angsty alt-rock ever since Lucas Holter, Mark Allee, Ben Jindra, Aaryn Minich and Brad Kovar packed up the van in their native Minnesota and headed west. Since, they’ve made an EP with veteran record producer Michael Lloyd and, most recently, become one of five finalists […]
Think of this as a match made at a gloriously noisy station in heaven: Electric Flower pairs one of the most formidable shredders around, guitarist Imaad Wasif, with one of the most ferocious drummers, Josh Garza of Secret Machines. The story goes that they met while trapped in an elevator in London some years ago, […]
As guitarist and songwriter for the U.K. quartet the Mighty Lemon Drops (1985-92), David Newton fashioned buoyant melodies out of spry chord progressions and jangling riffs for a band largely remembered for being part of the C86 movement. He married an American girl and settled in southern California in 1995, setting aside songwriting and performing […]
Gorgeous and gentle atmospheric pop music is always a guarantee from L.A. artist Michael Orendy, aka Frankel. He’s intoxicated us with sweetly swelling orchestrations on his two previous albums “Lullabys for the Passersby” and “Anonymity Is the New Fame,” and he’s preparing to offer his latest collection of gems in form of “Sugar Twists Like […]
It’s been too long since we’ve heard from Nico Stai, who has teased with talk of a full-length album since his last EP a couple of years ago. Stai will preview material from that forthcoming record on Nov. 8 when he heads up the lineup for Buzz Bands LA’s SecondTuesday songwriter night at Lot 1 […]
Leonard Jackson last crossed our radar in 2008 as singer-guitarist for the Ethan Allen-produced, Mark Needham-mixed, Killers-influenced rock quartet the Forward. Directions changed, and Jackson eventually found himself plying his songwriting skills composing for film and TV. Now Imperial Mammoth – his new project with singer-harpist-keyboardist (and his bride-to-be) Laura Jane Scott – has arrived […]
Mahsa Zargaran can be all sticks and fury when she’s banging the skins for L.A. rockers Sabrosa Purr and Big Black Delta, but the Iranian-born multi-instrumentalist is not just a little drummer girl. Zargaran is classically trained pianist – and, in her solo project Omniflux, a sculptor of brooding art-rock that fans of PJ Harvey […]
