When you listen to a ton of music, it’s always refreshing to stumble upon a band that sounds completely fresh and new. A couple years back Why? opened for Islands at the El Rey and I had heard from some friends that I should make sure I got there early. They’re on the label Anticon, which is a collective owned by many of the artists. The music would probably be considered indie or abstract hip-hop and most fans are obsessive about all the artists on the label. If you ever see someone with a button or bumper sticker with just an ant on it, they’re prolly an Anticon Head.
The night started in Hollywood with the Gridking Truxtapoz art show at Meltdown on Sunset. Grindking makes skateboard trucks and they got a bunch of up-and-coming artists to participate in the truck design project. Meltdown is a cool comic and toy shop and the large room in the back had a collection of the trucks along with numerous, extremely reasonably priced original art pieces from the designers. We parked out front and slung some cream to people chilling out front or on their way out.
The last time I saw Why? was at the Fonda Theater when they opened for Yo La Tengo. It was a great show and their upbeat music was a nice contrast to the mellow tunes of Yo La Tengo. (Quick fun sidenote When I was at Lollapalooza slinging cream in the press area, I unknowingly walked up behind Georgia and Ira from YLT and offered them ice cream. Once I realized who they were I froze for a sec then told them they were great and thanked them for bringing Why? on tour with them)
This time around Why? was headlining Spaceland with Happy Hollows and Half Handed Cloud opening up. Due to the art show, I was only able to catch a bit of Happy Hollows. By the time Why? went on I was buzzing like a lot of those fans up front at the first show of theirs I was at. Because they loosely fall into hip-hop it’s a bit tough to explain their sound. The setup on stage is Yoni on vocals with some keys and a drum, his brother Josiah on drums and vibes, and Doug on keys, guitar, and bass. The lyrics are usually pretty out there and the songs are catchy as hell.
As far as I could tell, they were playing a few shows around California, their hometown is Oakland, to test out tracks off their forthcoming LP and from their new EP The Hollows. Spaceland is much smaller than the El Rey or Fonda and it was nice to see them in a more intimate setting. The songs from their last full length, Elephant Eyelash, helped keep everything together as they dropped in new songs and expanded some of the older tracks.
At this point, it’s prolly better to just head over to their myspace page and check out the few songs they have there. Then, imagine how they would come across live, with a band. Kinda cool, huh? The good news is that they’ll be on tour for a lot of 2008 including stops at the Natural History Museum in LA on March 7 and SXSW. They’ve also got dozens more shows, in random-ass places, listed on their site. Do yourself a favor and check ’em out, chances are you’ll dig it.
