last night I returned to a fav music club of mine in silverlake, spaceland, to catch some good ol athens, ga. acts. actually not really "ol' " , as these bands , I'm sure, are younger than I. plus the "ol" implies bluegrass, or widespread panic. not the case. both bands are from the elephant six collective - or what's left of the collective. I guess they would be 'splinters' of the collective. oh yeah and one is now based in san francisco. opening band was the sunshine fix, featuring a member of the former olivia tremor control. they were quite good. I had never seen these elephant six bands live before, even though I was living in athens when all the core groups were starting to blossom. yes I do kick myself - especially after remembering seeing OTC ' s name playing often and not going even once to see them. I also get similarly upset hearing about jeff mangum's performances at JitteryJoe's. I went their often, but not once to see music at night. so I have vowed not to miss the "show" boat here in L.A. which brings us back to last night. sunshine fix were great. poppy, happy, slightly psychedelic. very 1967, but there were also acouple of T-Rex (y) type riff tunes that didn't quite fit in to the other stuff. another cool thing is all the musicians took turns playing every instrument, except the lead singer, who didn't play the drums.

** light digression into comparing facial expressions to music genre's.

ok, so if you're watching a psychedelic band, say pink floyd, ever notice they don't smile often - instead they try to look strange , dress a bit odd, but the face pretty much stays flat. no real emotion. psych. bands of that era tended stare blankly into camera, sometimes with mouth open..... you've seen it.

then you get, say, metal. they look like they just sat down on the shitter. ozzy ozborne in sabbath vids and even solo stuff later -- that's a takin a pooper face! ted nugent -- strainin and pushing to get it out in every picture.

country singers - where did that wry smile come from in their videos? it starts with some type of half ass wink at the camera, then a lift of the chin and a side smile as the camera pans in front of them. what the hell is that?

of course country leads to country-gospel-christian singers. these guys are the best. best facial movements ever. hands down. ever seen 'em? on TV with a purple curtain behind 'em? concrete hair. their range of facial expressions from one moment to the next could only be duplicated bent over in a proctologist's office.
who told them to first do this? and why do they ALL do it?

fascinating. now back to the story.

so sunshine fix were very talented musicians. great harmonies. perhaps the best harmonies I've seen live.
oh yeah their faces. pretty happy , I'd say. lots of smiling.

next up were the headliner's call and response. three females up front with one male guitarist and a male drummer. I've never seen a happier group of people play live music in my life. these folks grinned and laughed through the whole show. the music was 70's soul-funk-pop. check out the tune _roller skate_ and you'll see what I mean. harmonies again were outstanding. I'm just not used to seeing more than 3 people harmonize on stage - and I rarely see that. almost all of them sang. that alone blew me away. the bass player was a tall female who would not stop grooving her body - especially the head , neck, shoulder and feet area. when she'd make these cool changes, she'd look out into the audience and give that look like she knows the person she's lookng at and they're -sharing -an- inside- joke- smile. she also had some looks like those looks you see in people where they're trying some new dance move. eyes big, lips puffy, kinda like a jagger pose.

very entertaining and quite good. and, even if they would've sounded awful, they were so damn cheery I had no choice but to be happy afterwards, which is what you want, no?