Hawks

Despite rumors of its untimely demise, L.A. country is, in fact, still alive and well. It’s just gone underground – or rather, taken to the skies. I See Hawks in L.A. is that rare local bird, an Americana act in a city where rock rules the roost. “[We’re] sort of mavericks,” states lead singer Rob Waller (at right, with Shawn Nourse, left, Paul Lacques and Paul Marshall). “Sometimes people will say, ‘Oh, I see hawks’ and you tell your hawk stories.”

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The Hawks new album Hallowed Ground hit the big #1 on the Freeform American Roots chart in May, narrowly beating out folk goddess Eliza Gilkyson and Texas standard bearer Hayes Carll. FAR charts are compiled from maverick roots country DJs around the globe, the ones that play exactly what they feel like playing.

Far left of left lefty Paul L and his further left mom are quite pleased at this review that appeared in Counterpunch:

Robins WeepBy RON JACOBS

Some days I wake up and the music I hear in my head is the chorus to Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” All day long I hear that lonesome whippoorwill until night finally falls, the midnight train whining in the distance. It’s not that I’m lonely or anything, mind you, yet that haunting chorus becomes the day’s soundtrack.There’s a band out of southern California that renders music as uniquely forlorn as any Hank Williams tune. The name of that group is, somewhat mysteriously, I See Hawks In LA. Composed of founder Rob Waller on acoustic guitar and lead vocals, guitarist Paul Lacques, former Strawberry Alarm Clock bassist Paul Marshall and percussionist Shawn Nourse, I See Hawks In LA bring experienced musicianship (and many experienced guest musicians) to their work. Echoes of the Byrds and Gram Parsons and even The Holy Modal Rounders inform the music this group makes while its lyrics touch on themes of war, peace, freedom, family and that greatest topic of all, love. Sometimes the lyrics are full of humor and sometimes they are full of sadness. Sometimes they sing of the counterculture and sometimes one hears ironic commentary on today’s commercial culture of brands and empty meaning. Waller’s vocal delivery is a countrified alto that capably evokes whichever emotion the song hopes to convey.

Click here to continue reading ROBINS WEEP—–

Bo Diddley has passed on. Another giant enters the great unknown.

I was fortunate to get to play and record with the man in the mid-1980’s, as part of The Bonedaddys. Arguably the first World Beat band in the U.S., The Bonedaddys fearlessly mixed African, funk, New Orleans, hillbilly, Cajun, and Zydeco rhythms and original songs. We got to open for a dazzling variety of international and American roots legends, and became road buddies with Burning Spear and The Neville Brothers, among others. We got a lot of schooling out there.

Our lead singer King Cotton introduced Bo Diddley to the Bonedaddys, and we played several packed out shows together in Phoenix and L.A., at the late great Palomino and the Music Machine, and on the Joan Rivers Show. At our first and only rehearsal, Bo’s road manager, a towering man in a suit that no doubt few said no to, stopped me and Phil Gough, the other guitar player, in mid-song. “Bo don’t play that no more.” He was referring to the famous Bo Diddley beat.

What were we to do? It soon didn’t matter, as the rehearsal consisted of very brief run throughs of the hits, and then a long jam.In concert, it was one long improvisation, kicked off by a guitar line from Bo, and we’d fall in behind him–not just hard driving beats, but often spacey, dreamlike wanderings that had the audience and the band transfixed. Bo was clearly an artist, stretching his own boundaries, with no interest in looking back. When we played the hits, we did indeed sneak in the signature clave on guitar. It seemed cool. The scary manager was pleased with the wild crowd reaction and spared our lives. Us Bonedaddys were in hog heaven.

We wrote and recorded a song with Bo, called “Say, Bo” that’s finally come out 20 years later, about the long river from Ghana rhythms to American funk.Several of us went into the studio with Bo to record tracks for the movie “Tapeheads,” which is hopefully in the vinyl bins at Amoeba Records. Bo showed us the features of his latest trademark square guitar, which was loaded with internal electronics, including a phase shifter, and weighed a ton. Between takes Bo was sketching constantly in his pad. We recorded Bo’s “Surfer’s Love Chant,” and some other tracks. Bo nodded at me to play the fills and solos. Me? Are you sure? Well, okay.

Bo signed my metronome. He didn’t need one. He was one. — Paul L
p.s. this was just posted on YouTube, Bo & Bonedaddys on the Late Show, 1987. I was on the road with my polka band Rotondi, watched it from a hotel room in Buffalo, that’s the great Larry Knight subbing for me, check out young and pompadoured Juke Logan on the harp:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v

By RON JACOBS
Counterpunch.org

Some days I wake up and the music I hear in my head is the chorus to Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” All day long I hear that lonesome whippoorwill until night finally falls, the midnight train whining in the distance. It’s not that I’m lonely or anything, mind you, yet that haunting chorus becomes the day’s soundtrack.

There’s a band out of southern California that renders music as uniquely forlorn as any Hank Williams tune. The name of that group is, somewhat mysteriously, I See Hawks In LA. Composed of founder Rob Waller on acoustic guitar and lead vocals, guitarist Paul Lacques, former Strawberry Alarm Clock bassist Paul Marshall and percussionist Shawn Nourse, I See Hawks In LA bring experienced musicianship (and many experienced guest musicians) to their work. Echoes of the Byrds and Gram Parsons and even The Holy Modal Rounders inform the music this group makes while its lyrics touch on themes of war, peace, freedom, family and that greatest topic of all, love. Sometimes the lyrics are full of humor and sometimes they are full of sadness. Sometimes they sing of the counterculture and sometimes one hears ironic commentary on today’s commercial culture of brands and empty meaning. Waller’s vocal delivery is a countrified alto that capably evokes whichever emotion the song hopes to convey.

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The word was out that it was a good spring for desert flowers, and so Paul L and Victoria hit the road on an early March dawn, surprising ourselves at such a disciplined departure. We were breakfasting amidst the rock climbers and hard to pigeonhole hipsters at The Crossroads in Joshua Tree by 8:30 a.m. What a treasure is The Crossroads, enabler of high desert gentrification though it may be. And who are we, after all, if not the gentry?

Eastward, northward through 29 Palms and the Marine bars and tattoo parlors, eastward on Amboy Crater Road, past The Palms bar, so strange to see it in morning sun, and wondrous to see the wildflowers, for they are indeed lining the cracked asphalt and blanketing the sands among the scrub. We turn left at the big curve, then miles straight northward through desert hills and eerie salt flats, distant booms from artillery drills, and we behold:
Amboy Crater, with a dusting of green, surrounded by fields of flowers. It’s all true.

We drove north into the East Mojave reserve. This is the Old Mojave Road, an ancient Indian trail used as a wagon trail, then a truck route through the 1950’s:

Gram Parsons has been dead for roughly 35 years, and yet he can still be heard all over Hallowed Ground, the latest Big Book Records release from I See Hawks In L.A. Hallowed Ground is precisely the “Cosmic American Music” Parsons would have loved. The band effortlessly blends the three-part harmonies, fiddles and weeping steel of country/roots music with the driving drums, heavy reverb and fiery licks we associate with more rock-oriented offerings. Flavor the whole mess with zydeco, Tex-Mex and even some Celtic flourishes and you’ll get an idea of how much ground Hallowed Ground covers. On this outing, the Los Angeles-based quartet is further reinforced with a handful of hired guns, including guitarist Rick Shea (Dave Alvin) and pedal steel whiz Dave Zirbel (Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen) whose licks are sure to stir memories of the late Sneaky Pete Kleinow.

Suffice to say, these boys can all play like the devil, but what really sets I See Hawks In L.A. apart from the others who play in the same sandbox is their willingness to deal with themes that fall decidedly outside of country music’s traditional comfort zone. Instead of predictable ditties about dead end jobs and no good women, Hallowed Ground offers songs that dabble in ecology, metaphysics, time travel and for the romantics in the audience, a lovers’ stroll that ends in a suicide pact. My favorite has to be Ever Since The Grid Went Down, a wry, picture-postcard of life in post-Apocalyptic California that just might become a survivalist anthem if/when this country finally goes to hell in a bobsled.

Very highly recommended for fans of the The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Byrds, and the aforementioned Dave Alvin. Absolutely essential if you refused, on principle, to buy Long Road Out Of Eden retail simply because it was sold exclusively at Walmart and Sam’s Club.

“Southern California is a land of strange, dangerous and beautiful contrasts. A mountain lion prowls outside the tract home bedroom of a teenage girl while she talks, oblivious to its existence, on her cell phone. A rattlesnake slithers across an empty shopping mall parking lot on a hot summer night while the employees count up the days profit and turn out the lights. While paparazzi chase the latest talent free celebrity, a talented, literate bunch of soulful musicians create honest and wise roots music for the ages. I See Hawks are indeed one of California’s unique treasures.”

— Dave Alvin

I See Hawks in L.A., Hallowed Ground (out May 20):

“I really liked a lot of these alt-country rockers’ last album, and this one continues to display versatility, variety and power, with an intriguing dystopian science-fictional bent in the lyrics. “

–Ken Barnes, USAToday

http://blogs.usatoday.com/listenup/2008/04/

The politically and socially-themed country rock’n’roll of I See Hawks in LA continues on its 2008 album Hallowed Ground, whose back cover shot of a wilted group of flowers against an out of focus Los Angeles skyline sums up the sentiments about trying to keep it all together in a harsh series of environments. If a listener’s reaction to songs with fairly direct messages like “Carbon Dated Love” and “Environmental Children of the Future” will definitely vary person to person, there’s no question that the quartet has the kind of easygoing but sprightly sound down that defines what 21st century roots music that isn’t afraid of modern recording technology sounds like, whether it means the crackle of feedback or simply an appreciation for clear sound.

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