A White Lotus traditionally represents a rebirth. Just like the beautiful flower, Eyes Set To Kill has gone through a metamorphosis. After years of being forced to conceal their aspirations, the Phoenix, Arizona-based collective finally reveal their true identity on their upcoming fourth studio album appropriately entitled White Lotus.
“It’s a symbolic name,” Alexia Rodriguez states. “We have a clear mind set, we have purity and we know exactly what we want to do with our music. We know who we are and where we want to go, and so we wanted to use a white lotus to symbolize how confident and focused we are. It’s a leap for us because we have a clearer vision of what we want.”
Down to a more concentrated four-piece, Eyes Set To Kill slowly drowned out their screamo vibe and have transformed into a metal band led by Rodriguez’s piercing vocal prowess. Tie that in with stellar musicianship, mature songwriting and an adrenaline-charged resonance, and it’s clear this explosive quartet is on the verge of redefining the genre.
Those sentiments are further backed up by smash singles like “The Secrets Between,” a heavy single about withholding the truth from a significant other; “Forget,” an intense ditty about the desire to erase your memory from terrible experience with an ex-lover; and “Where I Wanna Be,” a love song with a dark edge.
Rarely does a young band emerge with a combination of skills, talents and vision fully developed. Outfits in which each member shares a singular artistic vision and the ability to see it through is a trait mostly found in heritage artists who’ve spent decades performing together. Not the case for the LA-based quintet The Lonely Wild, whose writing and arranging talents are only surpassed by their ability to work seamlessly as one, dynamic voice.
Formed in 2010, The Lonely Wild is the brainchild of Andrew Carroll, a native of Sonoma, CA who moved to Los Angeles to study writing, music and film. Years later he unknowingly began to incorporate his love for film into the music he was creating for The Lonely Wild. “I knew I wanted a big sound. I was looking to expand my music to a much larger scope than anything I had done before,” Carroll states. “But the cinematic feel really comes from a subconscious influence, rather than a conscious effort to specifically incorporate these themes.”
Rarely does a young band emerge with a combination of skills, talents and vision fully developed. Outfits in which each member shares a singular artistic vision and the ability to see it through is a trait mostly found in heritage artists who’ve spent decades performing together. Not the case for the LA-based quintet The Lonely Wild, whose writing and arranging talents are only surpassed by their ability to work seamlessly as one, dynamic voice.
Formed in 2010, The Lonely Wild is the brainchild of Andrew Carroll, a native of Sonoma, CA who moved to Los Angeles to study writing, music and film. Years later he unknowingly began to incorporate his love for film into the music he was creating for The Lonely Wild. “I knew I wanted a big sound. I was looking to expand my music to a much larger scope than anything I had done before,” Carroll states. “But the cinematic feel really comes from a subconscious influence, rather than a conscious effort to specifically incorporate these themes.”
Some bands work their fingers to the bone, writing, touring, gigging, and waiting with bated breath for opportunity to knock at last. For Benjamin Davis, frontman of the indie rock duo Bad Veins, opportunity kicked down the door and dragged him across the threshold by his shaggy, dirty blonde hair.
“I never really had the plan to have a band. I just like to record, and experiment with recording, and I had been sitting around with a bunch of gear making sounds, working on a solo recording project that I called Bad Veins.” In early 2006, Davis gathered a megaphone, a telephone, several other quirky gadgets, and an inherited reel-to-reel nicknamed Irene, and played his debut gig at a small bar. “Sebastien [Schultz] was actually at that show, and I don’t think he personally cared for it. He walked right past me while I was playing and walked right out the door! For which I will make fun of him forever.”
Despite Schultz’s unintentional spurn, Davis invited him to jam. “I’ve been burned time and time again by people that didn’t want to work, didn’t want to practice. I was really not interested in having another band member, [but] all my friends told me I should ask him to play with me. I’d seen him play and I always thought he was super interesting, so I called him one day.”
The chemistry was nothing less than amazing. “Suddenly, it became something different. It became a band, a very interesting, unique band.” Schultz’s deep, driving beats and stage theatrics perfectly complimented Davis’ atmospheric, instrumental creations and subdued crooning. The two styles meshed immediately.
Despite only having played one live show six months prior, Davis asked Schultz to play with him, opening for Snowden only 3 weeks out. Schultz made it a point to meet up for practice every single day leading up to the show, and the result of the duo’s dedication was an avalanche of prospects.
“We played that first show together, and literally everything started happening for us instantly. We started getting invited to showcases in New York, record labels started calling, managers started calling, and lawyers… It was just a total snowball effect.”
Euphoric, Davis and Schultz threw themselves into the industry. Bad Veins went from an interesting and dynamic partnership to a full-time project. In between touring, playing festivals like CMJ and Tribeca Film Festival, and responding to an endless stream of correspondence, the band put out their self-titled debut album on Dangerbird Records in 2009, to much acclaim. ABC Amplified named it #7 on their Best Albums of 2009 list, USA Today included the album’s final track “Go Home” in their Top 20 Songs of 2009, and the single “Gold and Warm” is to be featured on the upcoming blockbuster, Chronicle.
However, years of hard work took the shine off of the experience. “It’s just like in any relationship, it starts off magical and everything is hormonal and emotional, and eventually it just becomes what you do.” Davis’ days are now filled with the business of being the frontman in a successful band, but he hasn’t forgotten the heart and subconscious goal of his music. “It’s sculpting what it means to feel things for other people. It’s hard to explain, but just doing what you love and affecting people is the greatest.”
Now, with the release of the second full-length album, The Mess We’ve Made on Modern Outsider Records, Bad Veins showcases the maturity that comes from dedication. “It’s much shinier, pop-pier, tighter, and I think it’s more honest. The first album feels a little bit like I’m dwelling on my own instability, whereas in the second record I’m confronting the instability and the issues. There’s been a total evolution of Bad Veins since it started. If you listen to the first EP, and then the first album, and then the second album, they seem somewhat linear, [like] chapters in a story.”
Thickly layered, expansively mastered, and deeply expressive, The Mess We’ve Made is a collection of carefully selected pieces from Davis’ mountain of compositions. The tempered optimism that comes from working through life’s difficulties seems to be the thread that weaves through the entire album. “If the first album was the cool, vintage car, this album is the newer sports car.” And, as with any new high-octane toy, The Mess We’ve Made gives one a rush of joy. Operatic strings and lush choral accents fill the record, giving depth but also openness to the blatantly synthetic keyboards and upbeat percussion grooves. The album’s cover, a vivid depiction of a person facing rolling clouds hovering above thick green hills, seems to reflect the unfettered and slightly pensive feel of the music.
The Mess We’ve Made is, top to bottom, a declaration of self-acceptance and perspective. The album begins with “Don’t Run,” an epic, fully orchestrated, thickly vocal piece reminiscent of the British indie-rock phenomenon, The Hours. Davis’ new, brave habit of dealing with difficulties rather than turning tail is highlighted in the mature, evolved lyrics. “Nursery Rhyme” continues in the upbeat vein, and reflects Davis’ concept of life as chapters in a story.
The brooding, dramatic track, “If Then,” chronicles the journey from despair to acceptance, an embrace of one’s inner darkness. “Chasing” announces that the singer is drawing a line in the sand; he refuses to waste effort on a person who will not return his energies. Swinging beats and rolling synth patches capture the exhilaration of trouble-free youth in “Child.” Examination of one’s limited perspective permeates “Doubt.” “I Turn Around” begins with jovial ukulele and blossoms into a full-blown indie-tastic tune, delivering warm fuzzies until the last, delicate strum. “Dancing on TV” makes no bones about the fact that it is a catchy, completely digital pop tune concerned with the media’s constant superficial influence.
“Kindness,” a very unique selection, promises that the singer will repay the idiocy of another person with his own caring and generosity, a classy theme that has been woefully absent from today’s music. The track begins with washes of retro-wah synth, gradually adding instrumentation until it culminates in a driving, exuberant refrain. The collection draws to a close with the jazzy, tongue-in-cheek “Not Like You.”
The defining characteristic of The Mess We’ve Made is perspective. This is a record to listen to when you are sinking in the thrall of self-doubt, raging in the crushing grip of injustice, or staggering under stress. It takes the listener back to the gyroscopic center of his or her being and restores a sense of peace and inevitability.
Three years ago, Baths dropped his startlingly beautiful debut, Cerulean. Released on Anticon, the record blurred the line between post-modern pop and the LA beat scene with devastating emotional clarity. Its tone was as celestial as its album title, taken from a shade of blue typically used to describe the sky.
Cerulean earned year-end “Best Of” recognition from Pitchfork and The Onion’s A.V. Club and established Chatsworth-raised Will Wiesenfeld as one of the finest young composers (and falsettos) in Los Angeles. His sophomore album, Obsidian finds him emerging as one of the most complete artists of his generation. As you might expect, the name hints at darker overtones. The mood is shimmering and pitch-black, the lovely blood flow has turned into lava.
“I’ve always been inspired by really dark material and from the beginning I knew I wanted the songs to be much darker, both musically and lyrically,” Baths says.
Following the success of his first album, Baths spent much of the next year touring to progressively larger audiences. He also released an ethereal ambient project under the Goetic name. When he returned home in July of 2011 to record his sophomore effort, he was bedridden for months because of the E. Coli bacterial virus, barely able to digest solid food and bereft of creative energy.
Originally from Chicago, Houses is Dexter Tortoriello and Megan Messina. They formed in 2010 after a 3 month stint in Papaikou Hawaii living off the land . With no modern conveniences the couple worked for meals during the day cultivating indigenous microorganisms and learning the basics of sustainable living. They drank, showered and cooked with rain water applying the basics of grassroots, cultivated reality known to few. This was the inspiration behind their first album All Night put out on Lesfe Records. In the time since the couple have moved to Los Angeles, signed to Downtown Records (Major Lazer, White Denim, Cold War Kids, Miike Snow, Santigold) and written their sophomore album A Quiet Darkness with an equally if not more beautiful process. Recorded over the course of 2012 splitting time between their new home and Sonic Ranch, A Quiet Darkness’s narrative tells the story of a husband and wife separated in the midst of a nuclear disaster and their attempt to reunite with one another along the Highway 10 in California before their inevitable deaths, each song taking place in different abandoned houses along the way. Tortoriello and Messina made the same trek a couple of times themselves to record sound and video at these abandoned houses that are featured in the album. The album’s celestial ambiance and wanderlust concepts are conveyed throughout the recording with techniques employed by Tortoriello’s production and the stark contrast between the minimal electronic pulses, found sounds and meandering and melancholy harmonies. The ethereal sound on which Houses was built is woven through A Quiet Darkness, the 2013 release shows a deep and pensive side to a band who clearly encompass a darker side of bliss; a bold new bravado that will resonate with anyone who has ever experienced love and loss.
Since The Life and Times formed, oh, roughly 1,825 days ago and began disarming audiences and critics with unbelievably loud yet relentlessly beautiful music, the main constant for the band has been how uncategorizable they’ve remained. Sure, they’re a “rock band”, but one that skirts the boundaries of this word in each song, tipping their collective cap to the giants that loom in each melody.
Yes, they’re still moody, spacey, sonically overwhelming, symphonic and always grandiose. But threading these traits together is the same obsessive attention to detail from singer Allen Epley, drummer Chris Metcalf and bassist Eric Abert that was the calling card of Suburban Hymns (DeSoto) and each subsequent release. The music made for their 2nd full length release Tragic Boogie (Arena Rock) reflects a process that’s even more detail-obsessed than earlier efforts.
Quoth Allen Epley (gtr/vocs/etc), “We wanted to make the kind of record that a big-name band with a lot of money might make, except we don’t have any money. But we said what the hell and decided to do it anyway by going in debt and built our own studio and recorded it in my basement”. The result is a record with layered intricacies that rewards repeated listenings. It’s also one that heavily scratches that rock itch, ahem, but doesn’t drown you in Gee Whiz Factor bullshit.
The time granted by recording without being under the pro-studio-money clock was liberating. Some songs were recorded multiple times, trying different tempos and nuances. Songs like the title track ‘Tragic Boogie’ reflect an ethos of what they call “pre-post-production”, where the idea is to try to “anticipate how we might manipulate the song in post on pro-tools, and then actually perform it that way as we were recording it, and not rely on post to create the effect”. After recording , the bulk of tunes were mixed by Jason Livermore (Rise Against, Shiner) at The Blasting Room with the band and their fine-tooth combs in hand.
And though they have made a record for the ages, the live show is the proof. Blisteringly loud, unbelievably lush and brilliantly lit with white light, the sound created by these 3 gentlemen belies their numbers. The muscular 26″ kickdrum thump of songs like ‘Fall of the Angry Clowns’ is not just heard live but felt in the belly. ‘Let It Eat’ recalls Blonde Redhead in 5th gear at 125mph, anchored by Eric Aberts’ headbob-inducing bassline by the time we reach the chorus.
Where ’07s The Magician EP (StiffSlack) echoed slivers of Floyd, My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive, Tragic Boogie finds them wearing multiple masks within one song, or even one verse. The majesty of ‘Que Sera Sera’ reflects an ethos of grandiosity of The Flaming Lips, while songs like ‘Old Souls’ and ‘Catching Crumbs’ owe a debt of gratitude to Doves and Interpol. And an instrumental with a name like ‘Pain Don’t Hurt’ is proof that, while they are moody and melancholy, they refuse to take themselves too seriously.
Tragic Boogie, like the best albums made with unending attention to detail and looking to scale grand heights, never gets bogged down by the frippery. What really hits the listener are 12 foundation-changing rock songs that have been woven together with love and that slippery agent, time.
