May be that’s the future, may be kids are gonna take over everything, after all, they are already better at computers, electronics than most of us, so why not at music? There were a lot of little kids at Amoeba last sunday, obviously toddlers had invaded the place, and a cute 5-year-old was moving in rhythm in front of me the whole time, even grabbing the setlist as if he was able to read! One sure is certain, The Pretty Little Demons took the place by storm, the crowd was totally impressive and what else could I add when you will know that the two young girls got the help of The Donnas’ Brett Anderson and X’s Exene Cervenka during the same show, and have been invited at SXSW?
Lydia Night, the singer/guitarist/bassist of the band is 12, and she started playing at an even younger age after seeing the Donnas live, as she explained in an interview: ‘I saw that girl musicians could rock and I wanted to do the same thing. My first performance with my old band was at McCabe’s Guitar Shop in Santa Monica when I was 7. We played three songs I had written and it lasted three minutes and 39 seconds.’
My old band? She has to be kidding! She met her bandmate Marlhy Murphy at band camp, and Marlhy is only 10 but she sings, plays drums, bass, and keys, and the two girls already have a debut EP out, called ‘Flowers’! They celebrated this release at Amoeba on Sunday afternoon, and even did a signing after their performance like baby rock stars… what kind I say, this was way too much for me. Oh but there’s more, they raised money on Kickstarter, the Amanda Palmer way (whom they admire) and recorded seven songs in three days, playing all the instruments, and of course, writing their own songs: ‘Young bands aren’t introduced to the writing side of things’, noticed Lydia Night in an interview, ‘I was lucky because my first guitar teacher had me writing songs at 6, so it became natural to me. It never crossed my mind to play only covers.’ Jesus! At their age I was just playing with my dolls and color pencils, and I had probably no idea of what a ‘cover’ was. And when they cover songs, they pick Tom Waits (‘I Don’t Wanna Grow Up’), Hole (‘Violet’) that they actually performed at Amoeba, just following a cover of X’s ‘Your Phone's Off The Hook, But You're Not’ with Exene Cervenka! Not exactly your average ten-year-old’s Disney-princess-dream!
The two little demons were actually very good, showing a real confidence and a true stage presence, talking to the crowd – especially the tiny charismatic Marlhy, who was almost invisible behind her big drum set – as if they had done it for years and years. They advertised their website, their upcoming shows at SXSW, their EP, they were in rock 'n' roll fire … and I have checked, these girls have everything covered, iTunes, CD Baby, Amazon, Bandcamp, Facebook, Twitter, the EP is on Spotify…
Their vocals were very expressive, sung with humor and a natural that only kids can have, the songs had hooks, choruses and harmonies, and some of them even rocked, period. If these girls are really doing all this on their own, it’s quite impressive to say the least! One last thing, Marlhy Murphy’s biggest idol is John Bonham, and he also has a Led Zeppelin cover band, The Zeppos,… a side project as it is called!
Setlist
Jackie and Jill
Mean Girls Stink
Bag of Rocks
Dreaming (with Brett Anderson of The Donnas)
Before
Daisy
The Country Song
Clueless
Your Phone's Off The Hook, But You're Not (X cover with exene Cervenka)
Encore
Violet