Today, we have a world premiere music video by two of the hardest-gigging musicians in Memphis. Seth Moody and Graham Winchester are Turnstyles, and if you’ve been out and about in the last few years, you’ve probably seen the garage-surf duo.
“As a band, and particularly a duo, Turnstyles has played so many random shows, from big stages to the corner of someone’s humid basement,” says Winchester, an acclaimed drummer who has accompanied everyone from Jack Oblivian to Devil Train. “But we always try to see the positive with every single show, and with that mentality, the music always takes us to a higher spiritual place.”
“Don’t Break The Dam,” is the first of many planned singles from their upcoming double LP on Black and Wyatt records. The video was conceived and directed by Coco Moody, and features cameos from Coco and Seth’s daughter Sulli and son Baker.
“I’m so glad Coco conceptualized a fun and funny video out of the lyrical message,” says Winchester. “Seth had the lyrics to the song over 20 years ago, but we just recently teamed up and put the words to music. I suppose the message here is that you can take a bad situation and gripe your way into a much worse place, hence ‘breaking the dam.’ I love how Coco used a blacklight room in the video to depict that preferred headspace. I’m also glad to have her making videos for us in general.”
Hop in the van for this world premiere from a pair of Memphis originals!
If you would like to see your music videos featured on Music Video Monday, email cmccoy@memphisflyer.com.
If you find yourself in the waiting room of the Utopia Animal Hospital, cast your eye over the informal exhibit of nature-inspired artwork there. The studies of wolves, foxes, and other creatures in near-tropical landscapes dotted with neon trees and flowers will draw you into their own universe. But what’s really striking is the art’s backstory: It’s all created by badass no-wave rocker Alicja Trout, perhaps best known as Jay Reatard’s collaborator in the Lost Sounds, later a key creator behind such propulsive bands as the River City Tanlines and the Sweet Knives.
Completists also know of Trout’s other works, which mine a different sonic territory, going back to the sweetly naive-yet-arch synth-pop of The Clears, and her solo singles on Loverly Music, under the name Alicja. That side of Trout, now known as Alicja-pop, was still going strong in 2016 with the release of Rats (Home Recordings 2009-2013), its sounds echoed by cover art depicting the artist up against a wall with a synth. Reflecting on the look and feel of that album, Trout says she was striving “to make a cover that fit the aesthetic of the music I was associated with.”
Which brings us to Howlin’, Alicja-pop’s new LP on Black and Wyatt Records, which sports a cover more in-line with her fantastical animal studies from Utopia. The songs, too, have an earthier feel, even if the overall mix of guitar-driven and synth-driven music is consistent between both albums. (Indeed, the versions of “Shadow Hills” on both releases are nearly identical.) And the album is already turning heads. As Henry Rollins himself has said, “Howlin’ is not only a great collection of songs, but balances her considerable skills excellently. It’s a very cool record.”
“Balance” is the key. Though Rats certainly featured guitar-heavy rockers, Howlin’ ventures further into the sonic possibilities of the guitar, from the classic rock strut of “Glass Planet, Blank Space Mind” to the wistful ostinatos of the title track. And there’s ecological balance as well: Both the album cover and the title song reflect Trout’s deepening embrace of the nonhuman world, or what Trout calls “natural inspiration.”
“It could just be progressing through life, getting older. I used to love city life, but the noise started driving me nuts,” she says. In contrast, she found respite in nature. “There’s an escape when you cultivate your wild garden. And I’ll obsess on different animals.” One need only look at her paintings of dogs, wolves, and foxes to see it. “They’ve always interested me as being the top of the food chain before humans came and controlled all that. They’re the main balancer in the ecosystem, the wisest hunters. They have a complex group and pack. And they also get along with humans. Even going as far as human children being raised by wolves. People don’t give canines credit for their abilities and sensitivity. So I think some of that little world was getting incorporated into the art.”
By “art,” Trout means both her visual and musical ventures. Taking it a step further, she considers the creative act itself to be an expression of nature. “Just making music, what’s guiding you?” she asks. “It’s nature that’s guiding you. How do you pick what chord goes next? And why do those three or four or five chords all sound good together? It’s just something having to do with nature, the same way you throw a bunch of zinnia seeds in the ground and they all grow together, all a little different, yet similar. And everyone agrees that they’re pleasing: The bees and different creatures come to them, and this different system is going on. I think it’s related.”
That natural reverie may be why, when asked if these songs emerged from the isolation of quarantine, Trout can’t quite say. “I just try to go into this space of alone time where it’s almost like meditation, except you’re doing something the whole time. And I really can’t place where I was in time at the time because the memory in my head is just this space of recording. It has nothing to do with what’s going on around me. So the memories from 2015 and 2018 and 2021 would all look the same in my head.”
Alicja-pop will play a record release show with full band at B-Side Memphis, Friday, November 12th.
Javi Arcega is living the dream. The frontman of Memphis-based Latinx psychobilly band, Los Psychosis, is pleased to release the band’s debut LP Rock and Roll Dreams on Memphis-based Black and Wyatt Records.
“I had no clue that this would ever come back again,” Arcega tells me, referring to live music in a, if not post-pandemic, at least post-crisis world. Now, fresh off a performance at Black Lodge’s Telethon fundraiser and having just released his band’s first full-length record, it would seem Arcega and Los Psychosis are poised to make the most of a world that, once again, sways and hums with live music.
Arcega wears a lot of hats — songwriter, bandleader, guitarist, occasional bassist, business person. He’s ginned up opportunities for Los Psychosis while working as a sound tech at other bands’ gigs. In fact, it was while Arcega was running sound at a Toy Trucks concert that folks from Black and Wyatt approached him about releasing the Los Psychosis record. “They asked me to cut 1,000 copies of the record,” Arcega remembers. “They told us they had already gone to some of our gigs.”
But, for all Arcega’s extensive work on the project, the saga of Rock and Roll Dreams is one that involves multiple Memphis studios, businesses, and media personalities. “We also had a handful of people who had a lot of faith in us. Like Lee Grant,” he says, thanking the host of WEVL’s The Modern World and Mood Swings programs, who helped fund additional studio time. “We couldn’t have made it without him.”
But Grant is just the latest in a line of local music luminaries to inspire Arcega. “I half-assed it through my teenage years,” the singer admits. “I had a few mentors who said, ‘You need to get your shit together if you really want to sound good.’” Jim Duckworth, who once played in Tav Falco’s Panther Burns and has worked as a session musician, was one such mentor. “I used to play in a band with him,” Arcega says.
Los Psychosis cut some of the album with Memphian Toby Vest in the producer’s chair. “I really liked what Toby did,” Arcega says, before uttering the oft-repeated musician’s lament: “At that point the lineup was kind of funny. I guess it’s always been kind of funny.” As so often happens, lineup changes forced a pause on recording. Later, spurred by interest from Black and Wyatt, Arcega sought out a studio where the band might finish the record. “We decided to finish the rest of the record at Sun Studios with Crockett Hall.”
The end result is something special — a shot of adrenaline and take-on-the-world enthusiasm. As wonderful a soundtrack it makes to cooking dinner (I can verify), Rock and Roll Dreams is a tantalizing invitation to see the band perform these songs live. Lap steel, organ, and backing vocals are used to excellent effect, creating a layered sound that fleshes out the raucous rock-and-roll of the band. “Glittered Eyes” is enough to raise even the most placid listener’s heartbeat as it pairs swooping lap-steel lines with a frantic drumbeat. “Astral Dreams” is chugging, sultry stuff that would make The Cramps proud. In the end, the album sounds like what it is — the culmination of years’ worth of hopes and dreams.
For more information on Rock and Roll Dreams, check out blackandwyattrecords.com.
I probably shouldn’t be springing a Russian Reversal on you so early in the work week. But the character played by Taylor Barrett Moore in “Don’t Be So Easy” would really like to know what a girl like you is doing in a place like this.
Director Tony Manard’s video for Toy Trucks’ first garage rock blast from their Black and Wyatt Records release Rocket Bells and Poetry features Moore hitting on all the women in sight. Yeah, you know the type. Even a psychedelicized shirt can’t save this guy’s game. Take a look:
Music Video Monday: Toy Trucks
If you would like to see your music video featured on Music Video Monday, email cmccoy@memphisflyer.com.
