Sonic Youth played one of the last regional dates on their Eternal tour presented by 89.9 KCRW Saturday at the Wiltern. The show was sold out, with an original date on the ticket as Sept. 29, 2009.

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You can just picture the all-ages show behind the skate park under Southern California skies, where Roger, Ryan and Richie honor the tradition of the power trio and create the tableau for skaters to sniff glue and fuck around. Themes of isolation and impending responsibilities will be recognizable to anyone forced to grow up too soon. You’ll nod along to songs like “Product of the Eighties,” “Let The Bullets Through” and “Entitled” and say, “I know this song—I get this.”

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lis
Download: Michael Nhat “I Love Bread” Mixtape

Rapper Michael Nhat’s new self-titled album releases Tuesday, Oct. 27, on How To Be A Microwave and his record release show is this Saturday at the House of Vermont. He presents L.A. RECORD with a mixtape—which he titled I Love Bread—and a story to go with every song.
Mozart “Fantasy [...]

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Download: Sonic Youth “Sacred Trickster”

(from The Eternal out now on Matador)
Via Matador/Beggars—Sonic Youth’s Sept. 29 L.A. date and all other West Coast tour dates have been cancelled due to guitarist Lee Ranaldo fracturing his wrist while playing tennis. The band has rescheduled for a January 8 show in Pomona and a January 9 show at [...]

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The Entrance Band came together around guitarist Guy Blakeslee and spent two years writing their new album on stages across California. They have just signed to Ecstatic Peace and hope to go to towns no band ever visits. They speak now just before leaving for many months of tour. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

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L.A. RECORD is proud to co-present Allison and Tiffany Anders’ annual Don’t Knock The Rock music documentary festival, which starts tonight and runs every Thursday at Cinefamily at 611 N. Fairfax Ave. in July and August. Get the complete schedule and musical line-up—plus clips of all the films!—below!
THUR., JULY 2 at 8 PM: Chicano Rock!: [...]

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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!

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Download: Sonic Youth “Sacred Trickster”

(from The Eternal out now on Matador)
Three months after their last L.A. appearance—in spirit and curatorial form—at Origami, Sonic Youth will arrive in person to play the Wiltern on Tue., Sept. 29, with guests still to be announced. Tickets are available here and more info below:

SONIC YOUTH is set to perform [...]

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A tendril of distorted sound sucked lingering smokers and their friends back inside from The Echo’s sloped smoker’s corral. A man with a ponytail dressed like a turn of the century undertaker in his black 3-piece suit sang with distorted vocals in an unrecognizable language, and played a mysterious wind instrument while his companion—nattily dressed The Bearded Mod—dryly manned some kind of sample board/synth on the almost pitch black stage. They are Hrair Hratchian (the undertaker) and Radwan Moumneh (the mod, a.k.a. Clues’ producer), and are called Jerusalem in My Heart. The effect was that of a muezzin calling the faithful to prayer (look it up on the internets), and boy, were there some Clues believers in attendance ready to worship when JIMH noiselessly exited the stage after just one song.

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The Nocturnes are quick to demolish ideas of Chopin and wistful pianos—by the end of the first song “I Love the Lighthouse Keeper,” 1970s prog rock is clearly a better fit than the 19th century. Non-standard time signatures and abrupt shifts and some unexpected use of synthesizers are all constants on this album, but their aesthetic extends beyond that genre, too. For a duo consisting of Emma Ruth Rundle and Daniel Yasmin, they pack a lot of different sounds into A Year of Spring. Think Sonic Youth, Zeppelin, and maybe even a dirtier, less classical-minded My Brightest Diamond, and you wouldn’t be too far off the mark.

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