Best Coast Live at the El Rey
I've been accused of not supporting "local" bands (i.e. U.S. in general and Californian in particular), which is obviously patently unfair. I've lost count of the number of indigenous bands I've seen live; Hockey, Ingrid Michaelson, Life Down Here, The Airborne Toxic Event and Brilliant Colors to name but, er six… It's purely coincidence that all the aforementioned above were supporting bands from ye olde-worlde...
Tonight though was going to be a first, a triumvirate of Californian bands, including one - who'd been on my radar for a couple of years - making a triumphant home-town return at my rapidly becoming favourite venue, the El Rey Theatre.
But you know it's going to be one of those evenings… Firstly I'm well outside of the standard deviation of the crowd's age range. Secondly, I'm asked - in all honesty - whether I'm here with my daughter...
Actually I'm here on a mission to destroy the street-cred of tonight's bill...
First-up are the O.C.'s Lovely Bad Things, which being ** cough ** somewhat older than the target audience demographic allows me say something along the lines of "I used to see a lot of bands like this 30 or so years ago..." Amidst a lot of noise and energy, there's more than a hint of a half-decent tune trying to escape from this talented and multi-instrumental energetic four piece… To these ears there's a sprinkling of the Pixies and a smidgen of Sonic Youth thrown into the mix… The target demographic liked what it heard and this boring old fart could be found twitching his feet...
And so onto the night's second act; L.A. lo-fi indie rockers Bleached. Let's see. Female vocals? Check. Jangly guitars? Check. Three-minute chord thrashes? Check...
And boy, were ALL boxes most definitely ticked here. The band, fronted by sisters Jessica and Jennifer Clavin (apparently both legends of the L.A. lo-fi scene), charged through a set full of classic guitar fueled West Coast post-punk with more than a few nods to the sensibilities of the C86-era, the modern-day East Coast angst of the Vivian Girls all mellowed by a Dum Dum Girls-esque wall of sound and some fantastic vocal harmonisation. Bleached - Ladies and Gentlemen - are a seriously rocking band, who have a well-worth-shelling-out-for debut album ("Ride Your Heart) and who burn up so much energy on stage that you'll lose a few pounds just by being in their presence...
Unfortunately, I'm going to fail miserably in trying to convey how good the night's hometown headliners, "Best Coast" were... But when it comes to purveyors of contemporary classic reverbed west coast indie-pop, Bethany Cosentino and (silent) Bobb Bruno have few peers. From the opening chords of "Crazy for you" to the closing bars of the evening's finale "Boyfriend", this was a classic tour de force of the art of bittersweet melancholic indie-pop. If Bleached were all nervous energy, then Best Coast were the epitome of calm, collected cool, teasing with the crowd... knowing that another great song was only a few chords away.
Tonight though was going to be a first, a triumvirate of Californian bands, including one - who'd been on my radar for a couple of years - making a triumphant home-town return at my rapidly becoming favourite venue, the El Rey Theatre.
But you know it's going to be one of those evenings… Firstly I'm well outside of the standard deviation of the crowd's age range. Secondly, I'm asked - in all honesty - whether I'm here with my daughter...
Actually I'm here on a mission to destroy the street-cred of tonight's bill...
First-up are the O.C.'s Lovely Bad Things, which being ** cough ** somewhat older than the target audience demographic allows me say something along the lines of "I used to see a lot of bands like this 30 or so years ago..." Amidst a lot of noise and energy, there's more than a hint of a half-decent tune trying to escape from this talented and multi-instrumental energetic four piece… To these ears there's a sprinkling of the Pixies and a smidgen of Sonic Youth thrown into the mix… The target demographic liked what it heard and this boring old fart could be found twitching his feet...
And so onto the night's second act; L.A. lo-fi indie rockers Bleached. Let's see. Female vocals? Check. Jangly guitars? Check. Three-minute chord thrashes? Check...
And boy, were ALL boxes most definitely ticked here. The band, fronted by sisters Jessica and Jennifer Clavin (apparently both legends of the L.A. lo-fi scene), charged through a set full of classic guitar fueled West Coast post-punk with more than a few nods to the sensibilities of the C86-era, the modern-day East Coast angst of the Vivian Girls all mellowed by a Dum Dum Girls-esque wall of sound and some fantastic vocal harmonisation. Bleached - Ladies and Gentlemen - are a seriously rocking band, who have a well-worth-shelling-out-for debut album ("Ride Your Heart) and who burn up so much energy on stage that you'll lose a few pounds just by being in their presence...
Unfortunately, I'm going to fail miserably in trying to convey how good the night's hometown headliners, "Best Coast" were... But when it comes to purveyors of contemporary classic reverbed west coast indie-pop, Bethany Cosentino and (silent) Bobb Bruno have few peers. From the opening chords of "Crazy for you" to the closing bars of the evening's finale "Boyfriend", this was a classic tour de force of the art of bittersweet melancholic indie-pop. If Bleached were all nervous energy, then Best Coast were the epitome of calm, collected cool, teasing with the crowd... knowing that another great song was only a few chords away.
Of course it helps when you have the crowd riding the wave with you, but as the duo liberally mixed the west coast tinged pop of their debut album with the more wistful sound of their sophomore follow-up, it's hard to argue - and as Bethany belts out the chorus to "The only place" (the band's homage to L.A.) - why would we want to be anywhere else?
However this wasn't a case of the band resting on their laurels as their still maturing and evolving sound, evident in new songs such as "Fade away" and "Fear of my identity" (with Pa Cosentino lending a hand on drums) demonstrated. By now though, this was becoming less of a gig and more of a party, so much so that by the band's well deserved encore (or should that be the crowd's deserved encore?), both support acts had joined the stage to lend a hand... and yes, surf the mosh pit.
Tonight Best Coast ably demonstrated that the El Ray on a Monday evening in Los Angeles was The Only Place to be...
Comments
Post a Comment