Thursday 08.13.09: I WAS A LOVER, DELOREAN WAS A DEALER (Record release show) / VOICE ON TAPE / MOTHERS OF GUT / DALMACIO VON DIAMOND AND THE ENOCHIAN KEYS

I Was A Lover, Delorean Was A Dealer || Listen

It is perhaps a sound one wouldn’t expect from a sunny southern California beach town: Gloom. I Was a Lover DeLorean Was a Dealer isn’t gloomy in the sense of being overtly heavy or even being in the hardcore circuit at all. This sound, a reverb-dunked, taut and eerie indie rock sound that purposely avoids the cliches the group could easily fall into, is experimental only to a point. Fans need not worry of being alienated or scared off. As one newspaper summed up, this Ventura quartet is “Eccentric but familiar, enigmatic yet accessible,” (VC Reporter, 2/12/09).

I Was a Lover has managed to find its spot in southern California, completing its full-length debut album, Strong Drink is Raging, on the eve of a trip across the country.

Pieced together in 2005 in Ventura, the group played through several incarnations but remained focused on its vision: playing what it loved best about independent music but avoiding pre-cut paths that previous bands had set before. In 2009, the group began to find its direction by avoiding the doubling of instruments — instead layering guitar, saxophone, organs, pianos and an upfront rhythm, each falling into its own sonic channel behind singer Christopher Bykowski’s trouble-stirring and haunted vocals. On stage, the group also presents itself in the visual sense, preferring to stray away from the obligatory indie-rock attire and present the unexpected along with its manic stage presence.

With:
Voice On Tape
Mothers of Gut
Dalmacio Von Diamond & the Enochian Keys

8:30pm / $5 / 21+