Studio Tan

Hellz yeah, no kiddin’, that’s right, as promised, we hit the studio and cut some track last week. 3 songs in 3 days. Just like they used to do in the old days! Also just like they used to do when they were on a real tight budget. Apparently they still do it that way. Anyway.



We got some real exciting seven-inch plans for these, all of the split variety. Which means, go ‘head and notch out some space in your collection for three more pieces of vinyl.

One of these is a cover of a 13th Floor Elevators song called “She Lives (In a Time of Her Own),” from the Easter Everywhere record. We’re hoping it’ll come out on a split with another pretty first-rate band (ahem) doing a different Roky cover. Turned out pretty smokin’.

Then there’s a song of ours called “A Lovely Game” (once a tentative title, and perhaps still so, but probably the eventual title by default), which we’ve been kicking around for about a year now. Played it live a lot last year, so if you saw us round then, you’ve probably heard it, albeit way too fast. Planning on putting that out as a split with our buds All the Saints. I wonder if they’ve recorded anything yet. Shit.

Song number 3 is for the I Hate Rock N Roll corporate empire, the braintrust behind the release of 2007’s “Hair Decisions” 12” split with Moccasin. We’re doing this split with Audacity, who might be the best band going in L.A. now, even though they’re from Fullterton or something. So we’re covering one of their songs, and we’re covering one of theirs. Neat, huh? Buy it, because we still haven’t recouped on that other split, and the man’s really breathing down our neck. Kind of an indentured servitude situation. Proceeds go to a fucking great cause.

And oh yeah, we got Bob Mustachio from The Warlocks to play drums on these too. We were all kinda starstruck most the time. Pretty amazing.

So who knows when this stuff’s gonna come out. Later this summer, I guess, if we can all keep it together until then. We being makind. Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you. In the meantime, look, it’s us:


We'd just gotten the bad news. Rob was particularly distraught.

 
Our old (I mean, young!) photographress/band mother Malia came back from this band she went and joined and took these! She's good to have around.

June Bloom

Maybe you are or were or were thinking about wondering what we’ve been up to. Well...

We got back from Europe and were summarily (and mercifully) booted from our dungeonesque practice space on Walk-of-Fame Hollywood Blvd. Practicing there always inevitably meant that any band practice involved either 30-minutes-to-an-hour of circling the streets surrounding the rapidly-overgrowing Hollywood & Vine, or giving up after a few laps and paying 10 bucks to park in a garage 3 blocks away. Never a good way to start the creative process. And it always meant encountering bona fide freakshit out front on the boulevard, over the stars of Jayne Mansfield and Elizabeth Taylor. Like the time a roving panhandler approached us, and after being spurned, none other than an off-duty Superman - that’s right, Superman - walking the other way half a block down, turned around, walked back to said panhandler and made a strikingly firm coin deposit in his hand. And in that exchange, Superman seemed to telepathically impart something powerful, via a solid two seconds of searing eye contact. Then he walked down to Combo’s Pizzeria, sat down outside, and smoked a cigarette. I guess Superman’s never really off duty.

So we left that place and are now shacked up downtown in trucker town, in the same building we conceived the last record. It’s a place with good energy, and this time we have a big window and a sweet view of the downtown skyline, over the LA River and its railroad tracks. We’re in there right now writing, and the juices are really, for lack of a better word, flowing. So far we’ve got a solid handful-plus of songs down, with plenty more half-songs, and if there’s one thing to report, it’s that distortion has yet to make an appearance. With, of course, the exception of Tim’s blistering buzzsaw chainsaw sawmill buzzcut solos.

And that’s that. We’re going into the studio tomorrow to record a few other songs for various split 7”s, and then hopefully we’ll be recording the next record by the end of the summer. Keep in touch.