mp3: Best Coast "Up All Night"

"Here I Am"
You don't have a job. You wake up at noon daily and watch re-runs of Chappelle's Show your girlfriend DVR'd before leaving her apartment. The next logical move is to get coffee. But you hate coffee...unless your stoned. So you head to the bathroom, pack a bowl, puff and exhale into the exhaust fan, in fear that your girlfriend's ninety-year old neighbor, and her beloved dog Foxy, may catch a whiff of your ganj. You ash the bowl in the toilet, think about brushing your teeth and leave....

...Then, just as the door closes, you realize you left your keys and your phone in her bedroom. Stoned and without 21st century communications tools, you wander until Best Coast's "Up All Night" creeps into your psyche and your girlfriend gets home from work.

Buy Best Coast's Where The Boys Are cassette here.

Best Coast- Up All Night (Mediafire link) (via No Conclussion)

mp3: Pocahaunted "Dusk"

Travel Down Peyote Road

I hate throwing the term drone around because it tends to turn a lot of people off, but I've noticed there is something about Pocahaunted which enthralls even people completely opposed to avant-noise, etc. I've been following the cavernous Angelino's for a while now, snagging their Gold Miner's Daughter tape, as well as the phenomenal Chains LP, but Passage is really where its at. Maybe that's because it is the first time on record (I think) that the Pocahaunted sisters have recorded with Sun Araw axe-mastermind Cameron Stallone and LA weirdo scene maker Bobb Bruno, whose appeared on other Pocahaunted recordings, as well as records by Abe Vigoda, Mika Miko, Silver Dagger and countless other "Smell" acts. While Chains is truly a force to be reckon with, the strength of the Passage lies in its subtlety. It creeps up from behind you, shrouding the room (or the park or wherever the hell you are) in an incredibly dense haze of melodic smog. Breathing in too much of this smog will surely choke one to death, however, if prepared (with swine-flu doctor's mask and a good pair of goggles) one can see the light beeming through the smokey fog, making the Passage the perfect modern representation of Plato's Allegory of the Cave.

Pocahaunted- Dusk

interview: (((Eagle Winged Palace)))

"To Replace The Powers That Be"
A few weeks back I chatted with Los Angeles psych folk purveyors (((Eagle Winged Palace))) about their infancy, Dio, omnipotent doom and the Manson Family sing-a-longs. It's not everyday that psych folkies mention "Rainbow in the Dark" as an influence, but hey, that's why we love (((Eagle Winged Palace))). Oh, and so you don't get confused, Cashew and Michelle are the principle songwriters for (((Eagle Winged Palace))), and CB is the interviewer.

Chocolate Bobka: From the songs I've heard, (((Eagle Winged Palace))) has a very mystical, dark and folky sound.

Cash: Ghost, spirits, legends, and the like. We're trying to keep ourselves artistically narrowed into two things. Instrumentally we try to keep everything acoustic, pre-electronic.

Michelle: Keeping it Organic.

Cash: All the songs have to do with California theme, folklore, legend, so its kind of conceptual but at the same time were trying to make it universal.

CB: Keeping with the organic vibe, how do you guys record? Do you try to stay away from digital recording equipment?

Cash: We'd love to be able to keep it all analog, and go down into Capital's reverb chamber downstairs and use all their reverb plates and analog tape machines and pipe organs. But...Well, it costs alot. Ha.

Michelle: I personally would like to record at the bottom of the ocean like the guys from METALOCALYPSE did.

CB: Cash, when you were getting the band together was it a conscious decision to enlist all women?

Cash: Ha, no.

Michelle: I disagree. I think that secretly Cash has this plan that he will eventually have thousands of women in the band, following him and chanting his name... "Cashew! Cashew!"
(laughs) Whats funny about you being the only guy is that it reminds me of the whole Manson Family sing-along.

CB: Yeah I was thinking the same thing. So how did it start?

Cash: Well, Michelle was really the first one I asked that was totally into it. She was the first one I met that was into Pentangle and classical folk and...

Michelle: Fairport Convention! Manson Family Sing-A-Long.

Cash: I tried finding dudes, but the first people I ran into that were interested were my girl friends.

CB: How long has EWP been together?

Cash: Hmmm, we officially started around November of last year (2007). Very much a baby thing. We've already taken all our baby missteps, now were picking up the diapers, we've made our mistakes on stage and now were making good... Things are coming together.

Mich: Now we're beginning to grow, we've got our songs down and our live show is coming together to the point where were ready to add more aspects to the live show.

Cash: Visual elements.

Mich: Projection, lights, that kind of stuff.

Cash: This weird prop pinwheel spinny-type thing I keep seeing at Paramount. Ha. Megan and I were talking the other day, and its probably way to early to be talking about this, especially with the venues we play here in LA, but she does some trapeze work and we'd be really interested in adding to our show.

Michelle: Oh yeah, that'd be awesome. Shes an aerialist and she does this incredible stuff, her teachers are Cirque de Soleil alums and she's just amazing and we'd really like to figure out a way to incorporate aerialism into our live show in some way, shape or form. Like aerialists and trapeze artists above the stage.

Cash: Visualizations and projections and mini-movies are more focused, just because the venues we play couldn't really handle the aerial stuff.

Mich: Haha, yeah and it'd be pretty hard for her to play and be above the stage doing aerials at the same time.

CB: Your press release highlights "spirits, ghost, Spanish ship wrecks", which all seems to come together in "Hands of Doom."

Cash: Oh, the Ying and Yang. The irony. Its a really pessimistic view of life love and death and all that and, you know, the waves swell and its beautiful and then they crash.

Michelle: Especially being in Southern California where everything is just picture perfect and sometimes there are just those days, like in California, its perfect 82 degree day and the waves and crashing and every ones happy but inside there is all this turmoil going on.

Cash: Elements of danger at all times.

Mich: within this peaceful, perfect California setting.

Cash: At the same time, it's also a little bit of love, ya know, not wanting to die alone, not wanting to go out alone, you know..Just being in Love...I think.... It's one of those things that...You just....I was actually more inspired by Dio more than anything. I don't know why. (MICHELLE LAUGHING) But Dio was calling my name. His lyrics are kind of like that.

Mich: Wait, are you serious?

Cash: Yeah.
(laughing)
CB: Like Dio DIO?

Cash: Like "It's A Rainbow in the Dark."

Mich: Yeah, well we talked about that song and I know our musics more mellow and folky, but we all have really diverse musical backgrounds and we just talked alot about music and we were talking about Dio's "Rainbow in the DarK" and if you read the lyrics there sort of fantastical. So your saying that song inspired you?

Cash: Yeah, by taking a look at the beauty of what we see around here...I've been to the east coast and New York, the east coast cities like Philly and Boston..and over seas in Europe... London, Paris... Things are so ornate and have been set in their ways for centuries. But where we are (Los Angeles), the cities are built on all this nature and at anytime..wildfires, earthquakes, flood, its just so precipitous, so insane. So there is just an element of doom, whether its drowning in the waves or looking over a cliff and falling off.

Mich: Landslides.

Cash: anything could take you down here if you in the wrong spot. i just hope im not the guy whose in the wrong spot and just gets "poop" (bomb drops on head sound).

Mich: Can i ask something?

CB: Go for it.

Mich: I've actually never talked to {Cashew} about "Hands of Doom" and I think we all have our own interpretations but now it just makes so much more sense when you think about where we live and all those different elements.

Cash: Yeah, yeah...I think..Ya know, you don't really know when your writing it but when you look back its like, "Duh, that's what "Hands of Doom" is about.

CB: In going with the whole sense of omnipotent doom, the California sliding into the ocean philosophy, how do you think that affects everyday life for most people? Do most people just put it on the back burner and forget it?

Cash: Yeah, totally. It really is "La la land." Same as Pompei or New Orleans, these cities built around places where they just shouldn't build. I mean, people build places in the middle of tornado alley and stuff.

Mich: Its not to say that everyone disrespects nature, but there is a large majority that are like.."Why did half of my house in Malibu burn down? Well, gee, its because you built it on a Chaparall in Southern California, so geographically landslides occur and landslides really happen there. There's so much natural variance in the California landscape, so when people first moved in and set up cities like Los Angeles, people tend to forget what the environment was initially, so when you have a huge earthquake or when homes burn on the chaparral, they wonder why. At the same time there are alot of people who are ultra aware of their environment.

hot: (((Eagle Winged Palace)))

"Fall Helplessly"
Treat yourself to a J and a meandering walk through a radiant forest...or a nap under a tree in your neighborhood park. Wherever you're going, (((Eagle Winged Palace)))'s "Hands of Doom" should accompany you. It will follow you like an ancient shadow, a haunting dream and a lover from the great beyond. "Embrace the powers that be."

(((Eagle Winged Palace)))- Hands of Doom **(highly rec'd)

new: Dirt Dress

"So Many Girls Look The Same"

I don't know much about Dirt Dress except the following: they rock. They probably know it too, as their slo-mo blend of blues and garage rock is a self-conscious reinvention of what all the psych-garage revivalists have been trying to sound like for years, except instead of getting all snide and hipster'd out, Dirt Dress just sound like a band playing shitty blues in a garage. Their singer could be the millenial love child of Eric Burden and Eddie Argos. Loose, jangly and untouched by work nor duty, Dirt Dress seems to exist solely to kick out the jams (and yes, they sort of remind me of the MC5). They aren't afraid of tackling a meandering fuzz jam ("Peter and The Wolf" clocks in at 11: 40) or talking about bleach blonde girls in cut off jeans ("Iguana"), both of which conjure visions of ramshackle teenage rock and roll, like if Buddy Holly were hanging with Lou Reed while he was waiting for his man. Highly recommend heading over to CokeMachineGlow and downloading the band's EP for FREE! Just do it.

Dirt Dress- Iguana
Dirt Dress- Peter and the Wolf

nu musick: I Make This Sound/The Breakups

"I'm Not Getting Any Younger"

As an east-coaster it's often hard to keep up with all the great music coming from the left coast. However, I Make This Sound is too good not to keep up with. Full of clever, often counter-intuitive, melodies, I Make This Sound has a vibe that owes as much to the Laurel Canyon scene as much as it does pre-school choirs. An affable mix of pop hooks and odd time signatures, mixed with some rainbow sprinkles, makes for a devilish cookie batter that one can't help but devour before cooking. Check out "One, Two, Three!" below, which should be the archetype of a modern pop song.

It just so happens that The Breakups are also releasing an EP next week and playing a show with I Make This Sound. Crazy, right? I've really been digging "Let's See What Happens", an electro-pop song with all the slicing funk guitar needed to get my shoulders shaking, which you can hear at their MySpace page (here). The tune is one of the standouts on their soon to be released Eat Your Heart Out EP. We expect alot out of both of these bands in the coming year. Now come to New York already!

If you're in SoCal be sure to catch their CD release show this Wednesday (2/13) at The Echo with friends The Breakups, Aquarium Drunkard favorites Le Switch and the Amateurs.

I Make This Sound- One, Two, Three!

Bangers and Mash: the Arbiters

"Fame, Fame, Fame Fame, Fame"

So you loved Girl Talk's Night Ripper. Then you got sick of it. Truth is, Greg Gillis' schizo wild style while an informative pop encyclopedia, isn't exactly what you want when you want to dance all night long (it's more of a 40 minute freakout). Luckily The Arbiters respect the groove. The Los Angeles based producers, a project of Music Supervision mastermind Thomas Golubic, is a groove based psychedelic mash for the ages from a producer who truly understands the word 'mix.' This isn't your standard Hood Internet slice of indie, dash of hip hop, but rather a comprehensive blend of pop music from the last 40 years. The Arbiters make the best of familiar beats like Buffalo Springfield "For What It's Worth", the Verve's "Bittersweet Symphony" and The Game's "Hate It or Love It", as well as ear catching riffs from Lou Reed and the Rolling Stones to create seamless grooves with poppin' verses from Biggie, Tupac and Lauryn Hill and punchy spikes from David Bowie and M.I.A. If you think mash ups blow, then I'd stake my musical reputation on you thoroughly enjoying the Arbiters mix-ups, as they don't really mash together high irony but truly, and I mean truly, mix together seemingly contradictory moments from the pop music cannon. The final product is meta- in the best way possible.

The Arbiters- Gimme That Love Thing
The Arbiters-Missing Sweet Love
The Arbiters-Papa Was A Crashing
The Arbiters-Sure Side of Fame