Grouplove, Milo Greene and DJ Eric J. Lawrence mix it up for Hammer “˜Also I Like to Rock’ concert series
Courtesy of Autumn de Wilde
By Shannon Cosgrove
July 17, 2011 11:51 p.m.
When musicians from New York, London and Los Angeles meet at an art residency on the island of Crete, Greece, it is hard telling what will happen. For the band Grouplove, the name says it all.
The group will be joined by Milo Greene and DJ Eric J. Lawrence for the Hammer Museum and KCRW’s third “Also I Like To Rock” show.
According to guitarist Andrew Wessen, though the members of Grouplove come from various backgrounds, they are drawn together through harmonies, hand-clapping and heart in their music. After leaving Greece, they all moved to Los Angeles to continue making music as a band.
“It’s like best friends skydiving. Our shows are energetic, passionate and pure. There’s a certain release when we play,” Wessen said.
Wessen, the self-professed Baby Spice of the group, said the group often warms up by jumping, huddling and drinking white wine. They also incorporate rapping and country songs into their set list.
“The songs are in a light pop format but with darker grunge energy. There is a crazy chaos, an explosion of sights and sounds,” Wessen said.
According to Wessen, the group brings this kind of energy to both intimate and large shows, whether playing to 180,000 people at Glastonbury Festival or just a few fans after a show.
The band also integrates various art forms into their music, from the album cover art that vocalist and keyboardist Hannah Hooper creates to the video for “Colours” that is based off of a civil war short story.
Milo Greene, named after a fictional publicist the band created to send out promotional emails, shares Grouplove’s multimedia approach to music. Vocalist and guitarist Robbie Arnett said that he likes to write music with a cinematic quality.
Unlike Grouplove, however, Milo Greene has only played a handful of shows, so Arnett said every one is still a new experience.
“We’re not at the stage in our music making where we’re telling people who to vote for,” Arnett said. “It’s all just rooted in human emotion.”
The band retreats to singer-songwriter Andrew Heringer’s grandfather’s cabin in the Sierra Nevada mountains to write and record music. There, the members are not distracted by television, Internet or Los Angeles itself ““ they replace all the furniture in the family room with instruments.
“It’s a free-for-all. We can play at 2 a.m. and not worry about noise complaints,” Arnett said. “We just record and write and eat a lot of cereal.”
Though Arnett said his favorite cereal at the moment is a bit bland ““ Cheerios with banana slices ““ the group has an edgier quality to their music.
“We try to create a soft, melodic vibe and put a pulse underneath it to get people moving and invigorated,” Arnett said. “We want to change it up a little bit to keep everyone on their toes.”
KCRW DJ Eric J. Lawrence, previous music director and general manager of UCLAradio (formerly KLA), said that he also aims to keep the audience’s attention by playing songs that they might think clash.
“Like the famous paintings of dogs playing poker, I combine the notion of high art with ridiculous, fun goofiness,” Lawrence said. “Though KCRW can be very sober, I like to play the Smurfs theme song every once in a while.”
As for what Lawrence will be bringing to the literal and metaphorical table, he said that he puts a chronological twist on cutting-edge alternative music. Putting newer songs in the context of their predecessors, he plays everything from ’30s ukulele songs and ’60s psychedelic jams to ’70s yacht rock favorites and ’80s post punk B-sides.
“I’m not an old school vinyl mix-master, nor am I playing from my laptop. I’m middle school ““ I DJ exclusively with CDs,” Lawrence said.
As KCRW’s music librarian, Lawrence said that he is conscious of the breadth and variety of music out there and is always excited to share gems that might otherwise be swept under the rug.
Lawrence said that Comic-Con weekend may inspire him to play some cartoon theme music on Thursday.
This is not Lawrence’s first museum performance. He has played to an audience of stuffed mammals and live humans at the Natural History Museum’s First Fridays series. But he said that he is still looking forward to not only educating people about music, but also being educated himself.
“It’s exciting to hear young bands that don’t have a ton of studio material yet ““ you’re going to be surprised,” Lawrence said.
