[Here’s an installment of Ears Wide Open, a periodic series highlighting

Southland:]

More than two years ago, Sky Parade caught the ears of the L.A.

underground with the song "Losing Control," a joyride of dense, churning

guitars that sounds like Primal Scream getting Spiritualized. You figured good things

were in store for the quartet if there were more where that came from. Now, a couple of

drummers, a lot of sweat and a back injury later, Sky Parade is emerging with a new

album. Appropriately, "Love Is Forever" will be self-released on Valentine’s

Day.

Simple concept here: "Every song is a modern indie rock-inspired love

song," says front man Tommy Dietrick, who spent much of last year fine-tuning the

record — when he wasn’t laid up with a back injury.

Dietrick, a former member of the Brian Jonestown Massacre, credits new drummer Joel

Patterson, who joined a lineup that includes bassist Bobby Bones and guitarist Mathew

Lindgren, with helping him put the pedal to the metal and get the album finished.

Featuring guest vocals from Miranda Lee Richards and Guylaine Vivarat-Goodich

(Molecules), "Love Is Forever" figures to hit the spot for fans of British

psychedelia, or anybody else who misses the Verve. 

||| Exclusive download: "Love Is

Forever" by Sky Parade.

||| Sky Parade opens for Midnight Movies on Thursday at Spaceland.

Photo: From left, Bobby

Bones, Matthew Lindgren, Tommy Dietrick and Joel Patterson.

◊ ◊ ◊

There’s no

shortage of musicians who toot their horns in Silver Lake. Ah, but those who

play horns — they’re noticeable. Take the Minor Canon, a six- or seven-piece

(depending on the night) that have been crowding onto club stages to dispense a brassy

orchestral pop that, while no threat to make the Top 40 charts, ought to find its way

into the hands of an indie filmmaker in need of a soundtrack.

Singer-songwriter Paul Larson has roots in the indie scene that date back to the ’90s,

when he was a member of Strictly Ballroom with Chris Gunst (Beachwood Sparks) and Jimmy

Tamborello (the Postal Service, Dntel). In fact, Larson contributes guitar work to the

forthcoming Dntel album "Dumb Luck," due in April.

"No Good

Deed Goes Unpunished," the Minor Canon’s initial foray into the shadows of pop

melancholy, will be self-released on Feb. 20, and even at its birth the debut album has

a history, since it was recorded at the Silver Lake house where the Postal Service’s

"Give Up" took shape (and, Larson points out, where the movie

"Heathers" was written). Larson and bandmates Ryan Blake, Ben Eisen, Erik

Soderstrom, Mario Frias and Mike Richardson will play the April residency at

Spaceland.

||| Exclusive download: "It Never Was

…" by the Minor Canon.

||| The Minor Canon performs Feb. 15 at the

Echo; the band also performs a record-release show at Sea Level Records in Echo Park on

Feb. 20.

Photo of the Minor Canon by Erin Barajas.

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts: Japanese fun bunch Polysics entertain at the Knitting Factory, with

support from L.A.’s the Outline. … Kaki King brings her distinctive guitar work to the

Hotel Cafe. … And Helmet begins a two-night

run at the Troubadour.

Time for our weekly trip to the record store. Here are a few of my picks, and one

tout by a friendly neighborhood record-store employee:

Top

shelf

Youth Group, "Casino Twilight Dogs" (Epitaph/Anti-):

Don’t hate these Aussies because they’re beautiful … well, their music, that is. Cut

from the same emotional cloth as contemporary bands such as Snow Patrol, the quartet’s

winsome, driving pop sounds as if it could come out of London in 1992 rather than Sydney

this decade. Canny guitar work and singer Toby Martin’s uncanny vocal resemblance to Tim

Booth of James give the album a Britpop feel, but Martin’s imagery is more intimate and

his delivery less theatrical. Listeners who discovered Youth Group because they heard

its cover of Alphaville’s "Forever Young" on "The O.C." won’t be

disappointed by the band’s own stuff.

Other

recommendations

Busdriver,

"RoadKillOvercoat" (Epitaph/Anti-): Project Blowed MC makes good with

a flow all his own, rapping of a wild variety backing tracks.

Young

Love, "Too Young to Fight It" (Island): Maybe the 17-year-old in your

household hasn’t discovered disco pop. Or maybe your inner 17-year-old still has a sweet

tooth. Hum through the cliches; this is your sugar.

The Early

Years, "The Early Years" (Beggars Banquet): Reverb-drenched British

trio make me long for the early days … of Spiritualized, Spacemen 3.

From behind the counter
 
Today’s

Echo Park:

Lily Allen, "Alright, Still" (Capitol): Dominating the

U.K. in 2006, Allen promises to be the hottest female clogging the airwaves this spring.

Filling a much-needed void left by the likes of the Spice Girls, her witty lyrics and

steady beats are sure to please hipsters and teeny boppers alike. A fine choice to shake

off those winter blues.

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts: The Nightwatchman, which is Tom

Morello’s solo project, continues his residency at the Hotel Cafe, with Chicagoan Ike Reilly among his

guests. … The Black Pine headline the Echo.

…  Kissing Cousins, who just

released "EP3," and Wait Think Fast open for the Spider Problem at Spaceland. … Get Set Go finishes off its residency at the

Key Club’s Ruby Tuesday. … Earl Greyhound

rocks El Cid, with support from the

Front.

[Quiet, please — correspondent Margaret Wappler reports on a different kind of

club show:]

If you talked above a whisper at Dustin

O’Halloran’s show last Tuesday, you were proverbially smacked down by a vigilant

army of shushers, a strain of music fan usually found at the opera and not the Derby,

Los Feliz’s swing lounge. But O’Halloran’s evocatively stark piano music featured on his

two solo albums inspires a hushed audience savoring his every keyboard flitter. The male

half of the indie-atmospheric act Devics was

pleased: “Wow, who would’ve thought that L.A. would be the quietest crowd?” the native

Angeleno said.

As O’Halloran’s black-clad figure crouched over a piano

festooned with tiny gold lights, his handiwork was caught by a pen camera hanging above

the keyboard and projected onto a screen. The visuals are a key component to

O’Halloran’s recent work. He contributed two tracks to Sofia Coppola’s lush “Marie

Antoinette” and recently finished his first feature-length score for the upcoming film,

“The Beautiful Ordinary.” He’s also at work on another project, an instrumental layering

of piano, strings and some electronics.

||| Dustin O’Halloran performs

"Piano Solos" Tuesday night at the Derby.

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts: Lou

Barlow headlines at Safari Sam’s. … Eagle and Talon, the Happy Hollows and Twilight Sleep help the Pity Party finish off its January

residency at the Silverlake Lounge. … All Smiles, the nom de tune of

ex-Grandaddy guitarist Jim Fairchild, opens the final night of the Broken West’s residency at

Spaceland. … The Starlite

Desperation rocks the Viper Room. … Xu Xu Fang brings its haunted psychedelia to

the Echo for the final night of the Submarines’ residency … Scott

Windsor of Umbrellas performs at the Knitting Factory. … And recent emigrants to

our fair city To Live and Die in L.A. play

a free show at the Troubadour.

A show featuring Sebadoh with its original lineup, an appearance by ’60s cult hero Roky

Erickson and a homecoming club show by Bay Area pop-punkers the Donnas highlight the 15h

edition of Noise Pop, the five-day festival that

brings some 100 acts to 10 venues in San Francisco.

The official lineup and schedule for the festival, which begins Feb. 27, are due to

be announced Monday.

Erickson’s scheduled appearance at the Coachella Valley

Music & Arts Festival has created a minor buzz; the 59-year-old rocker has a long history

of psychological and drug abuse problems but has rallied in recent years. He made an

appearance at the 2005 South by Southwest Music Festival in Austin. Noise Pop also will

feature a screening of "You’re Gonna Miss Me," a documentary about

Erickson.

Other Noise Pop screenings include "Who Is Harry Nilsson (And

Why Is Everybody Talkin’ At Him?)," the premiere of "Sonic Youth: Sleeping

Nights Awake"  and "Far Off Town: From Dunedin to Nashville," about

iconic New Zealand songwriter David Kilgour.

Noise Pop hasn’t announced its

opening-night lineup at the Mezzanine, but Cake will close the festival with a show for

badge-holders on Sunday at Bimbos.

A strong contingent of Los Angeles bands

will make the trip, including Autolux, Earlimart, the Bird and the Bee, Dios Malos, the

Gray Kid, Lemon Sun, the Oohlas, Sea Wolf, Simon Dawes and the Submarines.

Full lineup after the jump:

Read Full Story

Behind the sheets of guitar and the anguished screams of Orange County hard-core

rockers Thrice lay a folk singer, just waiting to show his roots. Or so Dustin Kensrue has revealed on his solo

debut, "Please Come Home," released this week.

"It’s a niche I hadn’t gone into yet," the 26-year-old singer-guitarist says

of his exploration of folk and blues. "They were obviously songs that didn’t feel

like they would fit in with Thrice."

Some of the material, which sounds as if it could have grown from the same sonic

branches as Uncle Tupelo or Ryan Adams, dates back four years. He’d play the songs at

parties and for friends, and "people kept encouraging me to put a record out,"

he says.

So he and Thrice guitarist Teppei Teranishi burned the midnight oil after the band’s

studio sessions in Orange to record "Please Come Home," leaving the production

comfortably rough-edged. The result is an album that would fit into Kensrue’s personal

playlist — the likes of Tom Waits, Yo La Tengo, Ryan Adams and Miles Davis.

"Thrice is known as a heavy band, but none of the guys in Thrice listens to

heavy stuff anymore, at least not much," he says. "I find myself lately

listening to a lot of jazz or alt-country."

Has the music (released digitally in December) been a hard sell for Thrice fans?

"It seems to have gotten a good reaction so far," Kensure says. "Even

people who were at first nonplused about it have come around."

|||

Kensrue’s two shows tonight at the Silent Movie Theatre in Hollywood are sold out. He

can been seen Feb. 2 on "Late Night With David Letterman."

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts: Local rockers the Willowz join the Black Lips at Spaceland. …

Mezzanine Owls and Lemon Sun open for Robbers on High Street in

an early show at the Echo. … Later at the Echo, Aloe Blacc hosts this edition of

Soundlessons. … Gliss and LoveLikeFire play

the Scene Bar in Glendale. … And I tell myself this is for a good cause: Great White

will perform at the Key Club tonight at an Hal Sparks-hosted event that’ll have some

celebrity sizzle. It’s a benefit to save the baby

seals.

[News tidbit from the dance world:]

Dance promoter Spundae says goodbye

to L.A.’s Circus Disco this weekend. The group

will now lend its long-standing L.A. reputation to Avaland at Avalon on Saturday nights.

To welcome some of the Spundae/Circus fans anxious about the move (as noted on the

message boards), Avaland director of promotion and booking Garrett Chau says Spundae’s

Peter Beckers and Guiv Naimi will host "Localized" in the Honey VIP lounge at

the Vine Street club. "In that room there will be DJs who are programmed by

Spundae," Chau tells Times correspondent Steve Baltin. "The music they’re

hearing will be music they’ll be familiar with and we’ll do that on a continuing

basis." More details as we know them.

[Correspondent August Brown weighs in on some out-of-town visitors:]

The fact that the ever-volatile scuzz-punkers Black Lips recorded their new live album

in Tijuana says all you really need to know about the Atlanta-based four-piece. Known as

much for the R-rated sex and violence of their live performances as for their seething

T. Rex-inspired riffing, the band’s onstage lawlessness finally met its match in the

mythically decadent border town.

“It was one of the

craziest shows we’ve ever played,” vocalist and bassist Jared Swilley says. “We hired a

mariachi band to play and they got [angry] by all the people throwing glass bottles. We

had to keep slipping them money to stay onstage.”

The ensuing live album, “Los Valientes del Mundo Nuevo,” is their first for their

quite-appropriate new label, Vice Records. Though the band’s average age is around 22,

they’ve been honing their blistering and fever-dreamy brand of psychedelia since they

were young teenagers. Swilley says they “didn’t go to college and don’t like having

jobs,” so instead they became veterans of America’s basement dive circuit.

“We used to get banned from a lot of clubs,” he says. “The management at the Knitting

Factory wanted to jump us. But none of the bannings ever stand the test of time.”

Though tales of the band swapping bodily fluids onstage abound, they’ve lately toned

down their antics to focus on playing their instruments competently. Despite their

live-fast-die-young stage ethos, the band wants to stick around long enough to enjoy

their reputation.

“We played a show with this old soul guy who said he wanted to die onstage,” Swilley

says. “I’m the same way myself. I go crazy if I spend more than two weeks at home.”

||| The Black Lips perform tonight at the Echo

and Saturday at Spaceland.

Photo: the Black Lips by Dan Monick.

◊ ◊ ◊

Those white-clad, up-with-pscyh-pop kids the Parson Redheads, have announced their new

album "King Giraffe," will be released Feb. 6. Their next scheduled show is

Feb. 16 at Spaceland supporting the Autumn Defense. Here’s a pretty little something to

tide you over:

Download: "Punctual As

Usual" (live acoustic for UCLA radio)

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts: The Cold War

Kids continue their bicoastal residencies, jetting back from New York City for a

show at Spaceland. … Rodrigo y Gabriela bring

their flamenco metal — yeah, listen in — to the Troubadour, with Marjorie Fair opening. … Gliss joins LoveLikeFire and the Moderates at

the Scene Bar in Glendale. … The Shins will

have ‘em standing in the aisles at a free in-store (6 p.m.) at Amoeba Music. … Of

Montreal plays the El Rey Theatre. … And Veruca Salt is joined by Run Run Run and the

Distants at Safari Sam’s.

Two weeks ago I reported that local indie rockers Division Day caught a nice break — they

were the first signing to upstart label Mercy Records, which planned to re-release their

fine 2006 DIY album "Beartrap Island" in March. Turns out that Mercy never got

off the ground because of funding problems.

So that puts the quartet back to

square one. "As of now touring will still be going on," guitarist Ryan Wilson

said before the band launched a West Coast jaunt this week. Upcoming: next month’s

Monday residency at Spaceland.

Not tired of this gem yet, which you can click

and download: "Colorguard."

◊ ◊ ◊

Punk-pop pistols the Dollyrots are recording their next

album, "Because I’m Awesome," for Joan Jett’s Blackheart Records. The trio now has Chris Black

from Bang Sugar Bang on the drums. … Indie-pop ensemble Let’s Go Sailing’s lovely self-released

debut "The Changes in Order" recently got nationwide distribution through

Fontana (release date: April 3), and the group has a nationwide tour planned starting

with the South by Southwest Music Festival in March.

◊ ◊ ◊

Future reference: Don’t be surprised if KCRW-FM has one more big name up its sleeve for its big

Sounds Eclectic Evening at Gibson Amphitheatre on April 14. The Shins, Lily Allen,

Rodrigo y Gabriela, Cold War Kids and Bitter:Sweet have already been announced for the

show. … The rumors that swirled about Gwen

Stefani playing this year’s Coachella turned out to be baseless. In fact, she’s

going head-to-head with the desert festival: "The Sweet Escape Tour" visits

Gibson Amphitheatre on April 27. It ends at Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre on June 22-23.

Tickets go on sale Feb. 10. … And the other big shindig in the desert, the fifth

annual Joshua Tree Music Festival,

goes off May 18 through 20. Early bird tickets are $60 (for all three days) through

Tuesday. Los Amigos Invisibles, Garaj Mahal, the New Deal, Bret Dennen and the Be Good

Tanyas head a deep lineup.

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts:

Speaking of touring, psych-rock trio the Clean Prophets are kicking one

off behind their self-released "Praise Is Poison"; first stop is Spaceland

tonight, supporting the Colour. … 

Must-see SoftLightes return for Week

3 of its Silverlake Lounge residency; playing the early set is an interesting techno-pop

outfit called Porsches on the

Autobahn. … Love this bill: Foreign

Born opens for Los Abandoned at

the Troubadour. … And Lavender

Diamond holds forth at Safari Sam’s.

Much respect to Perry Farrell. But more often than not Wednesday night at Spaceland

during the not-so-secret show by his new band, Satellite Party, you got the feeling

the needle was on "E."

The 47-year-old rocker, playing a warmup for a scheduled big splash today at the ESPN

Winter X Games in Aspen, Colo., felt more warmed-over than hot during his band’s

hourlong set, even allowing for the fact he was far out of his element, playing an

Eastside club known for its patrons’ practiced, detached cool (read: folded arms) than

the unbridled Hedonism (read: show me your breasts) of the Sunset Strip that launched

him to stardom. Man, that stage must have seemed small.

But you had to be pretty far into your drinks — or simply an unconditional admirer,

and there were plenty of those — to buy into it. The Nineties could indeed be the new

Eighties (look at the Coachella lineup), but the neither the holdovers nor the fresh

crop of revivalists ever try to give you the impression they are selling you new

product.

An early dance number got some bodies moving, and a later by-the-numbers rocker

carried by guitarist Nuno Bettencourt induced the kind of arm-pumping usually only seen

ironically in these parts. Beyond that, however, the proceedings seemed forced, despite

Farrell’s efforts. "It feels like the good old days," he said, acknowledging

the spirit of the nascent bands whose stickers he noticed on the bathroom walls. The

band broke out the champagne and shared with the lucky folks upfront, toasting its

christening.

But good intentions — Satellite Party does have those,

if you read the environmental missives by Farrell on his various websites — and bubbly

weren’t enough to save anybody from the likes of "Awesome," a mawkish ballad

with a chorus stright out of a teenager’s MySpace blog. It felt like a 60 mph fastball

coming from a former Cy Young Award winner.

Satellite Party’s album, "Ultra Payloaded," which features a previously

unheard vocal track by Jim Morrison, comes out May 15 on Columbia Records. It will, no

doubt, chart high in the cult of celebrity, which counts for a lot these days, but I

suspect it will end up like a lot of satellites, aspiring to be a star.

Photo: Perry Farrell of Satellite Party (Kevin Bronson/LAT)

Spaceland’s calendar for

tonight’s Club NME promotion lists the always-entertaining Gram Rabbit along with "the

Solutionists" and some special guests. Turns out the guests are special.

Perry Farrell’s new project Satellite

Party is expected to appear. The ex-Jane’s Addiction mastermind and Lollapalooza
founder has recorded an album, "Ultra Payloaded" (featuring guests such
as Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Flea and John Frusciante, Joy Division’s
Peter Hook and U.K. beatmakers Hybrid, among others), that is due May
15 on Columbia Records.

Satellite Party’s live band, featuring
Farrell, guitarist Nuno Bettencourt, drummer Kevin Figueiredo, bassist
Carl Restivo and background vocalist Etty Lau Farrell, was to make its
live debut Thursday in Aspen, Colo., as part of the ESPN Winter
X-Games. So think of this as a warmup for the slopes.

Two songs are up on Satellite Party’s MySpace page
along with a Farrell blog post that references "Solutionists."
Last-minute hitches are always a possibility, of course, but it will be
intriguing to see the Party’s new music played out.

◊ ◊ ◊

Tonight’s touts: Will

Hoge headlines the Knitting Factory.

… The Valley Arena and Light FM anchor the bill at a Rock Insider-sponsored show at the Silverlake Lounge. … Deerhoof, with Busdriver and Hella, performs at the El Rey Theatre. … And the Leviathan Brothers

head the bill at Tangier.