Download: Infinite Body “Dive”

(from Carve Out The Face Of My God out now on PPM)

Artist and musician Kyle Parker used to make harsh noise with Gator Surprise but Infinite Body is an exploration of the ecstatic—tone and distortion that bubble and spark like the surface of a star. His album Carve Out the Face of My God is out now on PPM and he warns listeners not to fall into a tropical volcano. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

If your brain took physical form and became your roommate, what do you think it would look like? And what would be its most endearing and most annoying habits?
Kyle Parker: Oh no. I’m not sure if it would have a penis or a vagina so I’m just gonna call it ‘It.’ I imagine it would be like some big blow-up doll or crystal man walking around all floppy like those car dealership things waving their arms around, but a brain on top of that. When it talks, the brain would glow like a cheap sci-fi movie. It would have a really short attention span—it would come up with a lot of really good ideas but it would talk so much and so fast because that’s how fast it thinks. I would be saying, ‘Hey man, that’s great—but we can just pick ONE of those things and we could do that—these are all good ideas but we should just write one down and we’ll do it. Otherwise we’ll just keep—’ I don’t know, I can’t even check the internet anymore because the house I live at doesn’t have the internet, so I don’t know what I do to kill time. Then all of a sudden I have to go to work and I’m like, ‘Good thing I have to go to work cuz I don’t know what I’m doing.’
You should take voice notes.
Kyle Parker: I’m trying to use Google calendar now but I don’t have the internet and I don’t have an iPhone or nothing. I have the phone that if you’re on AT&T it costs a penny. And it probably costs less to make it—they’re still making like 300 percent profit off my one penny.
Did you pay cash for it?
Kyle Parker: I didn’t even get to pay a penny because my last phone broke but I wasn’t allowed to buy a new one until April or something so I had to pay $40 for it. So I don’t know if I paid a billion jillion times whatever it costs to make. So the best quality for my brain would be—it would have a lot of great ideas in terms of fun stuff to do and productive stuff to do but it wouldn’t do any of them. It would take like three months to do four of them with a lot of eating in between.
What century or decade and social position would most perfectly fit your talents and shortcomings?
Kyle Parker: I would either just cheat and go as far into the future as the time machine dial would let me go, and I would assume that I would just end up in the void or something and that’s always an easy way out—and it’s not like it wasn’t going to happen anyway so it’s not really cheating. But other than that, I think maybe I would go to any time before TV. I would go back and I would love to be an apprentice for anything. Any time before TV most places in the world looked substantially more beautiful than they do now, or so I imagine. And anything I could get where somebody could make me their apprentice. I like working with my hands—I have really big hands and I like doing stuff with them.
Maybe you should be the guy who makes wagon wheels.
Kyle Parker: I’m not good with straight lines or symmetry. I’m good with like manual labor or something really abstract—well, I could probably learn how to paint or play an actual instrument too, if somebody just told me do it when I was a kid and just made me and I was like, ‘Cool! This is fun because there aren’t all these amazing flashing strobes of color from the time I’m born!’ I’m pretty sure I’d be able to focus as long as somebody made me do it. I would love to work outside—a lumberjack or a landscape artist or like a guy who cleans the fountains at the crazy palaces or some shit.
Like Versailles?
Kyle Parker: I really like fountains. Like PCC—they have a great fountain in the front and it’s like knee-deep. There’s a guy who works there who cleans it and I want his job and I don’t know how to get it.
Maybe he needs an apprentice.
Kyle Parker: And there’s another place in Pasadena called the Church of God World Headquarters.
That’s a great name—every word in that is important.
Kyle Parker: It’s a really weird place and they let you just walk around. It used to be a bunch of rich people in the ’60s who all lived on this giant property and made it the headquarters of their weird rich people church. But they have this crazy Blade Runner fountain with platforms that go over the water and this twisted metallic structure that shoots water twenty feet into the air. I went there one day—it was actually on my birthday—and there was just one guy in this amazing gigantic fountain who was waist-deep in the water. He had like a pool skimmer and was just cleaning the fountain. And I wanted to do that.
That’s probably a relaxing job.
Kyle Parker: Especially if you weren’t cleaning chlorine out of it and you were just cleaning beautiful Victorian men and ladies out of it. I mean—I saw that movie Atonement and that had a cool fountain in it. But that was after TV. I would go to wherever they filmed that and clean that fountain.
Will fountains be the last vestige of natural beauty in a totally urbanized world?
Kyle Parker: I think the only thing natural about a fountain is the water, so if it’s that bad where fountains are the last place that you can see water … then I don’t know, man.
Someone said Gator Surprise was like ‘an introvert’s attempt to exorcise their shame.’ What do you think of that and what do you think that makes Infinite Body?
Kyle Parker: Infinite Body was—well, I just stopped feeling bad. That was it. I had a good spring and summer and it was in 2007 and I did a tour with Gator Surprise, which was the most I ever did with that project—once in every city. It drained the life out of me. In 2007 I played like four times or something and by the last one I was like, ‘OK—well, I gotta practice feeling bad, I guess.’
Did you try to artificially trigger that mind state?
Kyle Parker: I knew I couldn’t do it at the shows for sure. I had tried on that tour—not from a point of trying to put one over on people, but trying to force an important mind state. To make a moment really intense when it’s not—that’s the fucked up thing. On that tour especially, most of the times I was most ready to play, I was in a mind-set where something snapped and I was really scared or everything was really clear or I was upset in some sort of way. I used to be just upset with death and dying and I thought death was really important and I still think it is, but it used to really bum me out and it doesn’t so much anymore.
What changed you?
Kyle Parker: It wasn’t one thing. In terms of the project it was very immediate. I couldn’t always reproduce it on the tour and when it came to the summer I was like, ‘OK, I gotta think about death again.’ I was just starting to feel better about things that summer. I did one show and it was alright—I was happy about it—but I had to do another show that same weekend. I was like, ‘I can’t do that again. I just did that two days ago and I don’t really feel bad anyway so I don’t have anything to shout about.’ So I just played like a really pretty and loud set but it wasn’t like a keyboard or anything—just some loops and stuff. I played really loud and it felt really good and I didn’t know that music could make me feel good. It switched like that. It’s not like that stuff doesn’t still scare me because it does—if I think about it at the right time, yeah, it scares the shit out of me. But the difference is it doesn’t bum me out anymore. Before it scared me and it bummed me out and I felt alone—like I was the smallest thing in the universe. The problem I was having with the harsh noise thing—and a lot of my friends had this problem, too, which is why a lot of them stopped making the music also—is that it’s kind of a really self-absorbed monologue but it doesn’t have anything to do with the audience for the most part. In theory, anyway, you’re not playing it to please the audience. So it’s like a monologue but it’s still kind of co-dependent because if the audience wasn’t there, you probably wouldn’t feel better after you played.
It wouldn’t be cathartic?
Kyle Parker: Yeah, and I guess it’s important to have it in front of a large amount of people even though you just don’t care what they think. It’s really confusing—it’s like the Bible or something or the SATs. So I was like, ‘Here’s all the things I was doing that didn’t make sense and now I’m going to try to do them the opposite way.’ Then everything I was going to do was for the listener and not for me. And then that sucked because you need a balance, obviously—just like anything. Now I’m trying to figure out how much I can focus on me and them at the same time.
You once said your drawings are similar to your songs because the only way they concretely communicate to the audience is through the title. What are you trying to communicate concretely and what are you trying to communicate ambiguously?
Kyle Parker: I think I started trying to give up having concrete intentions. I think that was the problem I was having the second year with it. It still really confuses me as to why people go to shows at all. Before I started playing music I never went to shows, so I’ve never been to a show when—
When you weren’t on duty?
Kyle Parker: No, not when I was on duty. It changes the mentality. I had the same problem with the drawing. I think the clearest way it comes through is that it’s hard to enjoy other people’s stuff when you love it so much because instead of just going, ‘Man, this makes me feel amazing’—when you create stuff in the same medium, or when I do anyways, what it makes me feel is like, ‘They’re already filling the hole that I’m trying to fill with what I do,’ so it makes me want to make it stop.
That’s a brutal way to put it.
Kyle Parker: I’m not thinking about this heavy shit all the time, but the general feeling. It’s a thing that hopefully can turn off someday if I just pay attention or something but it’s always been there. I’ve been better about it this year because I’m taking things less seriously in a sense—I’m trying to add more fun.
What do you do if you need to have emergency fun?
Kyle Parker: Right now I’m calling my friend. He is like positive—proactive—he could do a seminar if he wants to. He’s got this sharp mind like a walking Wikipedia, and I say Wikipedia instead of encyclopedia because there’s some things he says that are like, ‘Man, I don’t even know if that’s true,’ but if it’s on Wikipedia you believe it and you don’t double-check it and that’s the way it is with him. I pick my face sometimes because I still get pimples sometimes and sometimes I’ll be tipsy and I end up with this stupid scar on my face, and he was over the other day and I was like too embarrassed to talk about it. All of a sudden I leave the room and I’m gone for like ten minutes and he comes in and says, ‘Where did you go?’ and I said, ‘Oh, I’m picking my face.’ He’s like, ‘Stop doing that!’ and he got the dead skin off and he put honey on it and he said honey is an anti-inflammatory which will take care of the redness and I was like, ‘Oh, now everything is better.’ But right now he is my emergency fun. And the other one, my brain lumps them together, is my friend who works at the same place I do and she’s kind of a female version of him—I mean, they’re different but she’s very positive, too.
They sound like good problem solvers.
Kyle Parker: I tell them, you should just team up and go on Craigslist like, ‘Pay us like $20 to $100 and we’ll just do whatever you want.’ And they would probably be able to do it because most people on Craigslist just want things to happen easily. ‘What do you need to happen in your life today?’ It could be a package at your house and taking it to the post office down the street that you’re too lazy to walk to—an example from my own daily life! Or do you need to buy something? Like the best place to buy something for the cheapest and the highest quality and they know that somehow. They’re amazing.
I know you’re part of the Songs for the Arctic Ocean album that’s available for download only from a server in Iceland—what’s the equivalent for Infinite Body? The physical location that matches the music that you made on this record?
Kyle Parker: A lot of people think about winter but I don’t tend to. I don’t want to make music that sounds like winter to me because the winter feeling of music makes me feel cold and alone.
What about the rim of a tropical volcano?
Kyle Parker: I don’t know—you might fall in. That’s just careless. Though I imagine it’s a great rush. This feels like cheating a little but one of those planes that they take you up in where—it’s a plane, it’s not a rocket, but—
The zero-G plane that astronauts train in? The vomit comet?
Kyle Parker: Yeah. Like after you puke or maybe while you’re puking, start listening to it while you’re on the ground and then all the way through puking and ecstasy and whatever else happens. It’s kind of an equalizer—the puking thing. I didn’t pick it because of the puking but I’m glad you brought it up.

INFINITE BODY WITH EARN, MIRROR TO MIRROR AND JEANS WILDER ON TUE., MAR. 16, AT SYNCHRONICITY SPACE, 4306 MELROSE AVE., LOS ANGELES. 8 PM / CONTACT VENUE FOR COVER / ALL AGES. SYNCSPACELA.COM. INFINITE BODY’S CARVE OUT THE FACE OF MY GOD IS OUT NOW ON PPM. VISIT INFINITE BODY AT MYSPACE.COM/PLEASENOTTODAY.

We are pleased to announce that our new online shop has soft launched this week! We are also proud to bring you the first installment of our weekly Shop Update email that will be going out every Friday. To directly access our our new store please visit shop.larecord.com.

Also make sure to follow our shop twitter which updates every time we have a new arrival. To follow please visit: twitter.com/shoplarecord. Make sure to check back often as we start to upload new music, apparel and more plus an amazing selection of used vinyl on a daily basis!!

Madvillain – Madvillainy (2xLP)
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Nobunny – Love Visions (CS)
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White Shit – Sculpted Beef (LP)
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Primal Scream – I Want You / RTX – Nature’s Way split (12″)
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Guilty Simpson – Get Bitches (12”)
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Mayer Hawthorne – A Strange Arrangement (CD)
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Dam Funk – Let’s Take Off (12″)
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Guilty Simpson – Coroners Music (12″)
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Wavves – To The Dregs / To The Dregs ‘Version 2′ (7″)
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Vibes – Psychic (7″)
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(off Sculpted Beef out now on PPM)

Download: Silk Flowers “Flash Of Light”

(from Silk Flowers out now on PPM)

New York City’s Silk Flowers’ debut self-titled album is coming out on PPM, though they have much in common with the artists on L.A.’s Human Ear Music—from their stripped-down synth sound to their obvious debt to post-punk. Silk Flowers is certainly a hip, smart album perfect for night drives through Echo Park. However, it doesn’t go too far beyond being an aesthetically pleasing collection of songs with consistent production. Taking pages from similar bands, Silk Flowers uses pieces of the contemporary underground-hipster-pop puzzle—like vintage-sounding, oscillator-equipped synthesizers, reverb-heavy drum machine beats, and the now-all-too-ubiquitous Ian Curtis vocals, which Silk Flowers singer Aviram Cohen nails though Interpol and its clones did them to death five years ago. To its credit, Silk Flowers is a smooth, coherent album, and every once in a while a song does pop out from the others. “In This Place” is a haunting piano-and-tambourine ballad with Oriental overtones, “Cheap Shot” breaks the mold with Furious Pig-style vocals, and “Costume” hearkens back to playful, gleefully oddball new wave bands like Our Daughters Wedding. Silk Flowers show definite skill, finesse, and potential—perhaps with some more time and experimentation, the band will come into its own and develop a more distinctive sound. Meanwhile, its eponymous LP can be classified as an enjoyable, mood-setting piece of work.

—Regina Cherene

Download: Mika Miko “I Got a Lot (New New New)”

(off We Be Xuxa out now on PPM)

It’s hard to think of We Be Xuxa as a “sophomore album,” since Mika Miko have been sharing their music on 7” and cassette since the days when George W. Bush could still get reelected—everybody and their dad has seen Mika Miko play the Smell a billion times and probably stumbled into one of their sets at a college campus, warehouse, or SXSW showcase. Though at first they kinda filled the ecological niche abandoned by the Sharp Ease, Mika Miko’s fame and goodwill has shot far past that—and past anything we expected. They’ve proven to be unstoppable juggernauts of three-chord joy equally at home on a stage with metal hardcore punkers, noise bands, electro hip-hop brats, pop bands, smoke machines and smoky barbecues bursting with Tofurky beer brats.

And what I’d like to do with We Be Xuxa is sculpt a little narrative about musical arcs, and where this album fits into Mika Miko’s happy lifespan, and how it shows a progression or should be showing a progression or has too many extras or not enough. But Mika Miko stands gleefully outside of the spotlight of conventional criticism, as they continue to bang out the most fun-rockin’ sounds of these Smell-y times. They think of themselves as a live band, with recordings being more documentary than sound-crafting, so who am I to even judge? I wouldn’t want to immortalize myself poo-pooing a band whose t-shirts will still be worn thirty years from now by kids in Austin and Greece, but if I write a praise-piece, I may be stroking this generation’s Leaving Trains. (Never head of ‘em? Just ask an Angeleno aged 40-46 and prepare for some teary-eyed adulation).

So fuck history and fuck the scene. This album is really really fun to listen to, and never gives me dry mouth the way, say, bands like No Age sometimes do. (There, I said it!) Whereas so many acts who have “broken out” of the Smell excel at noisy dissonance and minimalist sound, Mika Miko remains minimal in the tried-and-true ways of their forefathers/mothers—three chords, screams and shouts, and short songs that sound nothing like Sonic Youth funneling Steve Reich and so much the better for it. On the surface, We Be Xuxa almost seems like a retread of old school American punk, but actually it evokes without constant copying—it’s fresh-faced punk, yet my heart hears Born Innocent-era Redd Kross in their sisterly choruses, and early early Black Flag or even Ramones in their strumming (minus Greg Ginn’s noodling) and Wipers downturns on the chords, and a Darby Crash-like insistence on writing lyrics too self-referential and profound to sing straight into the microphone. And there’s even a Urinals cover!?! And there’s a Beach Blvd-esque melodicism to Jessie Clavin’s bass lines, one that perfectly matches their Descendants-like love of making up pragmatic gerunds such as “Totion.”

A lot of reviewers have said these gals (et dude) sound like X-Ray Spex, but that is a lazy lie! Jenna Thornhill only seriously plays sax on one song, “Sex Jazz,” and that’s more of a death disco stomp—like Public Image Limited’s “Annalisa” as covered by Suburban Lawns. If I were to compare her to a punker dead, I would say that when Thornhill really sings, and has room to stretch out a bit past the Kipper Kid mongoloid voice she affects, she strongly evokes Mia Zapata’s womanly growl from the old Gits albums. She’s got some seriously untapped talent playing hide and seek with Jennifer Clavin on dueling phone-vocals. But when you hear the chemistry on call-and-response cryptic craziness like “Turkey Sandwich,” you can’t blame them for not exploring new skills when the old ones still work so well.

And the best part of the album is something that I have to admit I have NOT heard yet! Though L.A. RECORD always promises me free vinyl, the most I’ve gotten so far is a Halloween Swim Team single I could have scammed anyway. Ergo, I’ve only heard We Be Xuxa in its digital format, so haven’t been able to replicate the sweet secret I’ve been told exists on the end of the album—namely, that the final groove of the final song never terminates, and that your record player will just keep spinning it over and over again in a sonic loop-de-loop of delight. If that’s true, that puts We Be Xuxa on the par with vintage vinyl such as Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music and another PiL song, “The Cowboy Song.” Perhaps this attention to detail, plus the piano plinks on punk-perfect “Beat the Rush” and the bomb drops on “On the Rise,” prove that Mika Miko care more about crafting studio albums than they care to admit. No matter—Mika Miko is a band enjoying a well-deserved rocket ride to fame and good cheer, and We Be Xuxa is a perfect transmission back to home base that will still sound good thirty years from now, even if I’m just blasting it on my way to the latest hip all-ages venue in Culver City.

—Dan Collins

Download: Mika Miko “I Got a Lot (New New New)”

(off We Be Xuxa out now on PPM)

Download: Abe Vigoda “Don’t Lie”

(from the Reviver EP on PPM)

Abe Vigoda have recently released their excellent Reviver EP and will be headlining Spaceland for the first time tomorrow. In honor of this momentous development, we present this interview and this contest to win the EP on vinyl! Photo by Juan’s MacBook and interview by fellow I.E.-er Steven Martinez.

From experience, I know that growing up in the Inland Empire comes with a stigma for being out-of-touch and meathead-ish. Did you have to deal with that when you first entered L.A. music or was it immediately welcoming?
Michael Vidal (guitar/vocals): There are definitely a lot of people out there who don’t have a clue. You know, dudes with big trucks and the women who love them. But growing up there, I think we really did our best to distance ourselves from all that. It really didn’t matter. We definitely aren’t like that and I think people feel that right away. We have always been kindly received, despite our hometown. I have really been missing it lately.
You guys played at SXSW just a few weeks ago—did you see any new bands that you particularly liked or old bands you’ve always wanted to see?
MV: SXSW is crazed. The city is crawling. We played eight shows—some of the weirdest shows we have ever played. The vibe is fucked. There is so much music, but everyone is tired and wasted, so no one really devotes any energy to any one band or show. It’s like everyone is distracted. We had a totally great time, though! The corporate gifting was out of control, but I turned that shit around at Wasteland for some extra cash. We got to see a lot of friends we don’t see too often, like Ponytail, Vivian Girls, and Titus Adronicus. The touring we did around SXSW was actually the best part. We did some shows with Wavves, which was awesome, and we played a lot with Women from Calgary, Canada. They sound like Sonic Youth’s Evol and the Shins simultaneously.
You guys are such an active band—you have a release each year for the past three years and a new EP this year. Do you find the audience has changed along with your albums?
MV: I think there are a few people out there who really want us to make really scratchy, dissonant music, like our first record. They probably think we are going totally soft, or selling out. But I think most people get what we are trying to do. Our sound is always moving around. I am way more satisfied playing this crazy melodic music. It’s more about what gets us excited rather than what any audience might think. There is no way you are going to make everyone happy—not in life, and especially not in music.
You were included in Paper’s list of Beautiful People 2009 along with SNL cast member Kristen Wiig, The Hills/The City star Whitney Port and several other seemingly unconnected celebrities. How did you react when you found out you were going to be on that list? Should we expect an unscripted appearance of Abe Vigoda on an MTV reality show some time soon?
MV: That shit is funny! It’s cool. The people who run that magazine are pretty nice. We played a party they had for the issue last night, and it was pretty out of control. A lot of improvised noise and slam poetry. It was strange because it was this glitzy event at a fancy bar, but they had Jennifer and Michelle from Mika Miko playing records and Abe Vigoda perform. We were in charge of all the entertainment. We ended our set with like eight minutes of noise, and Jennifer started spinning ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ over it. I thought the Paper people would be bummed, but I think they are down for some art. Lindsay Lohan was there.
We recently set up an interview of Husker Du’s Bob Mould by No Age. If given the opportunity, what band would you interview and what would be the first thing you asked them?
Juan Velazquez (guitar/vocals): I think I can be honest and say the Smashing Pumpkins. They are a band that we all loved since elementary school. It’s actually how we all became friends because we dorked out over them in high school. Not so into them post-Machina but with that said… still love their stuff even after Mellon Collie. They are a band that changed their sound a lot and I think that’s really awesome, even if the end result is that they suck now. I think I would ask Billy Corgan, ‘What was it like touring with James Iha? He seems like a really funny guy!’ To which he would probably go on some tirade about angels or like absinthe or something. Oh! And I want to know how to write a song as good as ANY track on Siamese Dream.
With the critical success of bands you’ve played with like Vampire Weekend and No Age, has the thought of Abe Vigoda reaching those heights entered your mind?
JV: I’m not really sure if that’s possible for our band! It would be cool, but it’s not really what’s most important. It would be nice to not have to worry about money and be able to play in the band because that’s all we all want to do, but ‘real life’ often gets in the way. I guess anyone that plays in a band would wanna live off of it. It’s strange thinking about your band as a job—it’s cool and awesome and also scary in some ways. To say the least—it is a nebulous and confusing subject, but something that would be awesome to reach!
How would you feel if your next full length went gold?
JV: That’s definitely not a goal mainly because it seems super unlikely—how many copies do you have to sell to be GOLD!? It would be so rad to have a plaque—I would probably give it to my mom and dad and they would FREAK OUT! What happens when you have a gold record? Would Timbaland want to work with us or something?
Would you feel more empowered artistically by fame or relative obscurity? Which one breeds better music?
JV: That is a really good question. I think that some music that is really popular is actually totally awesome right now. There is a lot of major label shit… but not all of it. I think that lately people are interested in new sounds—it’s an exciting time for music. I mean being obscure is cool in some ways—there is mystery and all of that, and also you can do whatever you want. But fame doesn’t necessarily mean that your music is not valid or new or experimental. I guess if you are famous, you can reach more people and in a way that is really powerful, it seems. You could incorporate experimentation and innovation and noise to music that the mainstream would accept and react well to.
You guys are about to embark on a tour of Europe next month—what are you looking forward to the most?
JV: It will be the second time we go out there and if it’s anything like our winter E.U. tour, we should have a blast! Kids out there are soooo stoked on music, it seems—we had some really amazing shows. Some of the best in our life! The food is rad and the people are fucking awesome and it’s so great to just be out there. Being able to travel to other countries and play music is amazing—it’s a dream come true. WE LOVE EUROPE.
If you had to compare Abe Vigoda to a novel, which would you choose and why?
JV: Pretty hard question! I would like to say we are like a Douglas Coupland novel—like Life After God or Shampoo Planet because its existential, painfully contemporary, funny, sad and absurd. Also the structure of his novels is super cool and unconventional—sometimes gimmicky but not in a painful way. And! He is not scared to wear his influences and inspiration on his sleeve—Girlfriend in a Coma is filled with Smiths references. Not sure if all of this relates to our sound, but I just really like his books.

ABE VIGODA WITH THE DRONES AND THE INTELLIGENCE ON SAT., APR. 18, AT SPACELAND, 1717 SILVERLAKE BLVD., SILVERLAKE. 8:30 PM / $10 / 21+. CLUBSPACELAND.COM. ABE VIGODA’S REVIVER IS OUT NOW ON PPM. VISIT ABE VIGODA AT ABEVIGODA07.BLOGSPOT.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/ABEVIGODA.

Download: Abe Vigoda “Don’t Lie”

(from the Reviver EP on PPM)

UPDATE: Contest is over! Thanks to those who entered!

In honor of Abe Vigoda headlining Spaceland tomorrow—which you can read about here—we are giving away a vinyl copy of their recent Reviver EP, featuring a ripping Stevie Nicks cover and an album photo by expert Abe Vigoda photographer Dan Monick. All you have to do is be the first to answer today’s L.A. RECORD TRIVIA CHALLENGE:

At what Southern California mall did Abe Vigoda’s Juan Velazquez have his ears pierced?

TIEBREAKER: What was the name of the store?

Email us at fortherecord [at] larecord.com if you know and see you at the show!

Abe Vigoda “Skeleton”

Abe Vigoda
Skeleton
PPM

It’s hard to stand up for tropical tastes these days—thanks to Vampire Weekend’s near-nuclear proliferation—but Abe Vigoda keep at it better than anyone. Still, the band’s island expertise hasn’t been picked up nearly enough outside of L.A., left behind in favor of Weekend’s Tommy Bahama rock. (At this point, they’ve probably paid off all of their student loans thanks to the hype machine). But that’s okay because Abe Vigoda’s Skeleton is about as good as it gets, launching right from the place that Kid City left off. Reggie’s drumming has always been an anchor, but on Skeleton the guitars are purer than ever, sending out a sound that isn’t so much “bright” or “shiny” as it is the sound of steel, a percussive style that fits as much the psychedelic sounds of T.P. Orchestre Poly-Rhythmo as it does the band’s more no-wave traits. “Live-Long” is a fast classic (bouncing forward to a relatively long three minutes) and closer “Skeleton” comes as close to a sing-along as the band might ever get. The album barely breaks 30 minutes, but any more might be too much–Skeleton is perfectly proportioned.

— Miles Clements