[Another installment in my new local music series …] Probably the most exciting thing about Aushua’s new “Limbo” EP is knowing that it’s just the tip of the iceberg. The Santa Ana-based foursome has been working on a full-length album with producer Greg Doyle – a project that will be put on hold the next […]
Leave it to a guy from Interpol to operate under an alias. Julian Plenti is the solo project of singer Paul Banks, and his album “Julian Plenti Is … Skyscraper” is due Aug. 4 on Matador. Full of jagged guitars, rhythmic tension and otherwordly effects – and touches of strings and horns – the rather […]
[Ears Wide Open highlights new and forthcoming music from SoCal artists:] Last American Buffalo made ripples on the L.A. scene with its 2007 debut “Marquis for the Debutante,” and now principal songwriter Kevin Tyler Compton, surrounded by a new lineup, is back with a new EP, “Bohemian Blues.” The vibe is Americana-tinged classic rock, a […]
Their 2007 effort, “Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs, Whatever,” won my heart, and now the Cribs have added Johnny Marr to their guitar assault. Talk about giving me an anxiety attack. The Jarman brothers’ new album, “Ignore the Ignorant,” recording (in part in Laurel Canyon) with Nick Launay (Nick Cave, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Arcade Fire), will […]
That rock cliché about smoky vocals took on a whole new meaning when Leslie Stevens and her band were recording their new album. It was 2008, and “the wildfires were raging,” Stevens says. “You could see on the hills, there were chunks of ash in the air, and you could smell it in the room.” […]
[A couple of noteworthy L.A. releases … with more on the way:] Foreign Born, “Person to Person” (Secretly Canadian) – About the 10th time through the L.A. quartet’s sophomore album – a grower if there ever was one – I had a vision that Foreign Born’s were the fingers plugging the dike that holds back […]
[Buzz Bands today welcomes new contributor Ashton Lunceford, who will be sending along track reviews and perhaps some other musical missives:] Belle and Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch keeps it sweet with his female-fronted solo outing “God Help the Little Girl” – a soundtrack, he says, to a film that has not yet been made. (Murdoch tells […]
Deleted Scenes’ debut album “Birdseed Shirt” is a sonic and emotional roller-coaster, possessing the stubborn eclecticism of a Modest Mouse and the melodic moodswings of your favorite roots rockers. If you want an album with a “vibe,” move on – but “Birdseed Shirt’s” shifting dynamics feel very organic, if not downright stirring. The Washington, D.C., […]
Oh, you say, another actor’s musical tangent. Indeed, on the surface that’s what actor-director-producer Adam Goldberg’s debut as LANDy is – even if, as he points out, he is merely an “occasionally famous actor.” I interviewed Goldberg for a piece in the Los Angeles Times, and, not to steal from that piece, suffice to say […]
[Another edition of Ears Wide Open – had to shorten the headline, sorry – to catch up with a couple SoCal bands with new releases …] With siren-like distortion, a familiar chord progression and a big sound, L.A. quintet Atlantic Line announces its arrival on the single “Big Brother.” The fivesome of Ray Silva, William […]
