speed of dark

Friday night Indie Mom and I attended an unusual concert: a rock group performing with live strings at an art museum. L. A.'s own Earlimart appeared in a small and exclusive engagement with a string quartet at the getty center. Afterwards Indie Mom and I asked ourselves, Why don't more people know about Earlimart???

Both of us have appreciated this band since their 2004 album Treble and Tremble, but they have been around a lot longer than that. In the past seven years they have honed their sound to somehow balance hard-hitting rock with a mellow sort of weariness, introducing strings into the mix without getting watered-down or pretentious. The threesome, made up of Aaron Espinoza, Ariana Murray, and Joel Graves, has been working on their new album, Mentor Tormentor for the past year, and last Friday was one of the first times the new songs have been performed live.

All of last Friday's components were extraordinary, beginning with the beautiful Getty Center itself, an architechtural marvel in travertine, perched on top of a hill that miraculously isolates it from the noise and bustle of Los Angeles. The Harold M. Williams Auditorium is an intimate setting more accustomed to classical than rock concerts. The 450 seats were cushy, and the rows were steeply banked so that everyone had a good view of the stage. As we waited for the concert to begin we were lulled by ambient piano and soothing phrases in a monotone voice. You can hear something similar on Earlimart's website (link below).


The backdrop to the stage was a dense starfield punctuated by occasional shooting stars--a reference to a lyric in "Nevermind the Phonecalls." During the concert a cow, a pair of eagles, a trio of pigs, and a tiny galleon, a reference to the band's studio "The Ship," drifted occasionally across the stars.


To a background of strange carnival music and cricket sounds, which resumed between songs throughout the show, the musicians took the stage, with Jason Borger (American Music Club) on keyboards and Derek Brown (Eels) on drums. Aaron Espinoza introduced the Dream String Team, made up of four members of the USC String Machine, and joked that they had drunk up all the beer backstage. The four laughed amiably and did not deny the accusation.

Then the music began. I can't remember when I've been to a show where all the elements of the sound were in such perfect balance. In little rock clubs, if you aren't standing in exactly the right place, some part of the mix, often the vocals, is completely drowned out. Here, all was clear and distinct, and--a blessing to my old ears--loud but not painfully so.

The set consisted mostly of new songs, but there were also a few beloved older ones. From the new album, the songs I recognized:

Answers and Questions (released last year on 7-inch EP, and already favorite of mine. Listen to a 45-second sample here)
Don't Think About Me
Nevermind the Phonecalls
Happy Alone (with Ariana solo on vocals)
Gonna Break It To Your Heart
Everybody Knows Everybody

Those last two are very satisfying rockers. I know I am going to love this CD.
Old favorites included:

Heaven Adores You
All They Ever Do Is Talk
The Hidden Track
Lazy Feet 23

The first three are from 2004's excellent Treble and Tremble. The third is from Everybody Down Here (2003) and the band had never performed it live before.

The most impressive of these to my ears was "The Hidden Track." The soft edges of the recorded version were instead focused and sharpened without losing any of the beauty. The live strings made "Heaven Adores You" truly heavenly and gave "Don't Think About Me" just the right pathos.

The final number, a kind of hootenanny with special guest friends, did not provide a final shining moment, in my opinion, but it couldn't tarnish the rest of the evening. At the side of the stage when the others had left, Aaron and Ariana gave each other a big, congratulatory hug. It seemed like a short show, probably because there were no opening bands and there was none of the usual interminable waiting for equipment to be set up, tested, and replaced when it failed. It was a nice to be at a show where there were no delays between songs due to something gone wrong.

Mentor Tormentor will be released in June or July. Two songs can be streamed at their MySpace page. Buy albums/songs at amazon, itunes, emusic

Earlimart Blog | website | myspace