Music pops up in the least expected places in Los Angeles, like inside an RVCA store (a clothing company owned by Billabong) in the middle of the afternoon, where young people had gathered to drink beer and listen to Tomorrows Tulips, whose frontman, Alex Knost, is a pro-surfer,… and you can definitively see it by his tan and hear it in his music.
The music is lazy-sunny, a druggy shoegaze in a good way, haze-pop with fuzzy guitars and distant vocals, like coming from the bottom of a tunnel thanks to some kind of mic effect. The type of songs they had to play with their sun-bleached hair covering their faces, slowly head banging over the surfing rhythm of the music.
The songs were sometimes reminiscent of the Brian Jonestown Massacre, but since the BMJ was already channeling the Velvet Underground… anyway, I digress, but not completely, the songs definitively sounded familiar and catchy like something of a close past, to the point I thought they were playing a cover during a song? But this could be interpreted the wrong way, and it is not what I mean since having a knack for melodies that resonate that immediately in your brain, always shows great talent.
‘Do you want a slow one or a fast one?’ asked Alex mid-show; they were effectively alternating songs with different paces but the tunes were all building this laid-back and sweet beach mid-afternoon ambiance.
They were 5 of them playing on Sunday, but the band is originally a duo, Alex Knost (the ex-frontman of another rock group The Japanese Motors) and his girlfriend, Christina Kee, who recently learned drumming. But you have to really wonder why Knost formed this new band and put Japanese Motors on hiatus, when they were just about to tour with the Black Lips and play SXSW! In an interview with the OC Weekly, he gave this bold and great answer:
‘I think when you're passionate about something, obviously we worked hard to get where we were at, you don't want to sacrifice emotions. Having to keep playing due to pressure [to fulfill commitments] feels like a gimmick. We don't wanna do something we don't feel passionate about. We feel bad to the venues we left dry and fans but don't want to be somewhere if our head is somewhere else. The future is unwritten, but as of right now, all feel strongly [about going on hiatus].’
What can I add? You have to love this kind of rebellious attitude.
The band is about to release their debut album ‘Eternally Teenage’ on July 19th via Galaxia Records