After seeing the Los Angeles band Afternoons a few times this year, I couldn’t miss their release party for their long-awaited album ‘Say Yes’, at El Cid on Friday night. Plus, I was just coming straight from the studio of Shepard Fairey, who has praised the band’s music and even designed their logo, (which has become the cover art for their debut album), so I really had to go. But more than everything else, I have truly enjoyed their live shows, and that was a good-enough reason. They had invited a lot of their friends to open and close the show, but I unfortunately left after Afternoons and didn’t stay for the last act (‘Crazy Rust featuring Joel Jerome) but it was already close to 1 am…
When I entered the room, Aaron Espinoza was already playing his quiet and thoughtful songs with his guitar and I was right away familiar with his sound (and the crickets’ sound between the songs) for having attended many Earlimart shows in the past… every time I hear Aaron I can’t get Elliott Smith out of my mind (they were good friends), as his singing and quiet whisper ultimately reminds me of Elliott’s… The fact that he sang ‘Heaven Adores You’, a song he wrote for Elliott just after his death, didn’t help to chase the ghost… This song took a total new meaning as El Cid is located just a few yards from the Solutions wall, Smith’s memorial wall…oh and to continue with the idea, he also did a song with ghosts in the title – and it may have been a song of this other band, Admiral Radley, that he formed with Grandaddy’s Jason Lytle. It was a very intimate and moving performance, quite stripped down, while he was using two mics for voice effect, giving texture to his beautiful melodies… he did a very different version of ‘We Drink on the Job’, which used to be a fuzzy punky thing during Earlimart’s old days. I wonder what is the band’s status these days…But Aaron now owns and operates the Ship, a studio which has been host to many artists such as Ben Gibbard, She and Him, The Submarines, Flosstradamus, Imperial Teen, Jay Farrar, Admiral Radley, Silversun Pickups, FIDLAR,… and he has been busy in the studio with Afternoons. By the way, I love the fact that Aaron was wearing a FIDLAR shirt.
Then, The Little Ones gave us a very dynamic and bright set, filled with sunny and sweet melodies and more happiness you can handle at once. They have a very upbeat, explosive pop style, evoking a bit the 60s and they were totally irresistible,… soon, everyone in the room was jumping like happy rabbits, bouncing on their two feet or foot tapping. With layered guitars and keyboard, the sextet sounded like some California band of the 60s, may be the Beach Boys without the subjacent melancholia and multi-voiced harmonies, but one thing is certain, the Little Ones were the ultimate moral booster, some real over-the-top happiness conveyed in a few riffs and notes, which I recommend them in case of serious blues. Their song simply called ‘Ordinary song’ delivered more sweetness and joyfulness than a Taylor Swift commercial with kittens.
Then it was Afternoons and their uplifting songs filled with multi harmonies and wide-screen melodies, which can very easily turn into joyous sing-alongs. Their computer crashed after just one song, they also lost some part of their drum set at one point but this didn’t stop them for very long. May be I hadn’t noticed before, but their song ‘Gloria’ sounded a bit early Bowie, or may be sounded as if the Polyphonic Spree were covering Bowie (and they did), with the help of Grandaddy. Frontmen Steve Scott and Brian Canning always shared the harmonies while vocalist Claire McKeown brought the operatic howl and almost all the songs had this exuberant and euphoric effect, although ‘Oh Heather was a total rocker with an abrupt ending, whereas ‘Perfect Wilderness’ was slower and more melancholic, ‘Love is a Western Word’ was a bombastic and operatic number and ‘Graffiti Artist’ (may be for Sheppard?) had this outgoing and enthusiastic tone that inhabits all their songs… After an upbeat cover of Belle and Sebastian’s ‘Judy and the Dream of Horses’, the exuberance reached the roof during the closer, ‘Say Yes’, their most anthemic tune turned chaos, which has already attracted the attention of NPR among other radios .
‘Say Yes’ is out on October 21st on Eenie Meenie Records but you can stream their full album for some time on Allmusic.
More pictures of the show here.
