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WHILE THE Beachwood Sparks' long hair, pearl-buttoned
work shirts and dusty desert shoes may evoke halcyon
days spent cruising Topanga Canyon high on whites, wine
and weed, it's the music they make that really makes
the scene.
Even as every other band in the country is trying to
be the first to assemble the broken pieces of no wave,
punk and the grand canon of sixties psychedelic rock
into something both original and meaningful, the Beachwood
Sparks seem content to sit back and watch it all go
by, posting only an album's worth of bluegrass licks,
ambient folk songs and trippy country-rock serenades
in reply.
 On
the band's new album, Once We Were Trees (Sub
Pop), recorded last winter at J. Mascis' studio outside
of Amherst, Mass., the Southern California quartet pick
up where its eponymously-titled first LP left off. Delving
further into the roots of rock and country, and managing
to summon at times the spirits of Richard Manuel,
Jerry Garcia and Duane Allman, as well
as Roger McGuinn and Gram Parsons, the
City of Angels-based foursome doesn't merely recreate
the jangle and twang of L.A.'s late sixties sound, it
manages to update it as well.
"That's the difference-the banjoes," explains the band's
pedal steel picker, Dave Scher, from the road
in Upstate New York. "It's a whole new host of sounds
for you. Everybody has certain styles that they love,
that's for sure. And we love to play them together.
So what you're hearing is the album communicating itself."
Despite such left-of-lucid statements, in the studio
the band is crystal clear. With the help of mix master
Michael Deming (Lilys), the band has created an album
that sounds both retro and modern by blending the ambient,
strummy folkiness of Mazarin with the richly
American sound of The Band.
However, the album's best trick might be how cleverly
it mixes its country and rock influences with the best
of British sounds from the 60s and 70s. For seconds
on end the band manages to recreate the controlled,
psychedelic freakouts of Revolver-era Beatles or material
from Badfinger's pre-McCartney era. On "The Sun Surrounds
Me the band shifts from a pedal steel-driven figure
to a scratchy psychedelic episode reminiscent of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida."
While on "You Take The Gold," in the blink of an eye
the band goes from sounding like the house band at the
Grand Ole Opry to a bunch mods on Mandrax and Sandoz.
Or as Scher said, "It's like you're saying you're you,
man."
Though the band is spending October and November dashing
around the country in a van in the midst of a 30-gigs-in-60-days
tour, rather than bitch about the perils of life on
the road, Scher prefers to wax philosophic, "It's not
bad, actually. There is a rhythm to it; it's just not
the same stuff you're used to. There's the freedom of
the intellect to have all that time to itself and every
night you get to play music in another town. It's really
excellent."
Allan Kemler for Crud Magazine© 2001
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