Reviews

Hawks main vocalist and co-writer Rob Waller has been known to say country never died, it just changed names. But the California country rock of this band, one of the finest on the scene, takes some by ways down back roads from L.A. to Bakersfield clear up to Marin County, making them heirs in my book not just of the Byrds and Burritos but Workingman’s-era Dead and New Riders. This group of songs doesn’t quite reach the heights of the best of Grapevine to me, but is more consistent and fully realized. The opener “Motorcycle Mama” is not the Neil Young song, but makes reference to it the final chorus. Slices of life songwriting laced with passion and humor (try “Slash from Guns N’ Roses”) and the by now required ode to cannabis (“Barrier Reef”) show the band to be at a peak, musically that is. Pedal and lap steel, psychedelic guitar solos and the excellent fiddling of Brantley Kearns (the fifth Hawk?) flesh out the solidly written tunes, making this a must have disc. And check out their website for note worthy blog reports from a down to earth band on the move.

four and a half stars
www.freighttrainboogie.com
Reviewed by Michael Meehan

Everybody knows your name at L.A.’s oldest restaurant and bar.

By Margaret Wappler
Times Staff Writer
L.A. Times
April 13, 2006

In the swampy back room of Cole’s P.E. Buffet, L.A.’s oldest restaurant and bar, the downtown dive feels like a small-town church. Lights beam through stained glass while the audience sings “amen” with the ragtag country band I See Hawks in L.A., some with their eyes closed, some holding hands.

It’s the kind of moment that defines Cole’s, a welcoming beacon occupying a stretch of 6th Street, an area jaunty with downtown hucksters by day and spookily desolate by night.

On this particular cold and drizzly Friday night, everyone’s wearing peacoats and sweaters. But despite the New England wear and weather, this is definitely L.A. When the Hawks’ Rob Waller and Paul Lacques harmonize about an SUV flipped over on the 405, the crowd whoops in knowing, ironic tones.

The dimly lighted Cole’s, ratty and elegant with its old-fashioned signs advertising buttermilk for 15 cents and tiled floor covered in wood shavings, has many identities. But most of all it’s a downtown institution embraced for its cheap beer, easy conversation and family-like ambience. Forget the Standard and its ilk, with prickly doormen, VIP rooms and overpriced martinis du jour, or hipster hangouts such as Pete’s or the Golden Gopher, which feel more like annexes of Silver Lake. Cole’s, open since 1908 and famous for its French Dip sandwiches, is where a discerning drinker can find authenticity in all its junky splendor.

Scrappy, young and fiercely tightknit, the Cole’s Friday night crowd is drawn to roots, blues, country and folk-rock with retro style but modern bite. Amy Farris, Kenny Edwards and Mike Stinson have played here, plus Carlos Guitarlos, tonight content to observe in a sozzled haze from the sidelines.

I See Hawks in L.A. have played nearly every Friday without amps and only one microphone since 2003, letting the starch acoustics and attentive room carry their golden-hued music.

“Cole’s is full of ghosts and history,” singer and guitarist Waller says, pointing to a booth where, according to legend, Mickey Cohen and Bugsy Siegel bet on cards.

“We’ve played in a lot of clubs and here it’s so real. We get to choose who we play with, there’s no sound man messing things up, no cover. We just pass a bucket around and we do all right. It’s just turned into something magical.”

Many of the Hawks’ fans feel the same. Rye Baerg, a UCLA student who lives in West L.A., has been coming to see the band play at Cole’s for a few years. “To me there’s something very honest about their music. And something very L.A.,” he says. “Whenever I listen to them outside the city, it makes me think of here.”

Outside of the back room, the rest of Cole’s is content to listen to night manager Ali Mazarei’s iTunes with its head-scratching mix of Turkish dance music, Guns N’ Roses and Coldplay. For the first time, someone has hooked up the TV to a live feed of the Hawks’ performance in the back, but no one pays it any mind. Patrons buzzed on Chimay, the de facto house beer, crowd into red leather booths and chatter aimlessly about work, friends and lovers, while barflies ages 20 to 50 cling to the mahogany bar or each other.

Chuck Dedeu, the bartender from Spain who calls Cole’s his home away from home, has a bandage wrapped around his elbow from the blood drive Cole’s hosted earlier in the day in memory of Laura Esguerra Adams, a bartender who died last year.

Mazarei has reluctantly managed Cole’s for nine years as a favor to his aunt and uncle, Gitti and Marty Benishti, who bought the bar 27 years ago. But he’s also had the biggest hand in rebuilding Cole’s. In the mid-’90s, Cole’s didn’t have the customer base to stay open past 8 p.m. Though Mazarei was smart enough not to change its comfort food-heavy menu with most items priced around $5, he brought in some bands, a first for the bar.

Steadily, as downtown gentrified and the Pacific Electric building that houses Cole’s rented out lofts, the establishment’s fan base grew. Now it stays open every night until 10 p.m. and often later, if there’s a party or a show.

Though Mazarei regularly greets orders with a grunt, there’s no denying his affection for many of the regulars. He knows all about them: Allan eats the same meal everyday, a turkey plate with a side of broccoli. Celia writes about downtown on her blog. The USC guys play poker with Mazarei. Cole’s has become his social life.

“It’s a community help-out kind of bar,” he says. “It goes past employees and customers. If I’m busy, people help me out and step behind the bar.”

He also admits it has its drawbacks. “This place is worse than Cheers,” he groans. “Everyone knows everyone’s business. I went on a date on Sunday and some of the regulars tried to meet me at the place. I had to change my plans at the last minute to throw them off my path.”

But while he’s in Cole’s, Mazarei belongs to the customers and they belong to him. Mona Shah, a 30-year-old regular who lives in one of the Pacific Electric lofts, finds comfort in the bar’s cast of characters.

“We’re all living here, this weird place,” Shah says about downtown L.A. “Cole’s has been here for ages and ages but none of us has. These cast members are like my family. I feel safe here.”

Margaret Wappler may be reached at weekend @latimes.com.

HOUSTON PRESS
March 9, 2006

Try as you might to avoid the heinous hippie-cliché “cosmic” when describing the music of I See Hawks in LA, when the melodies, lyrics, harmonies and licks take over, you’ll find yourself lost in some greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts moment. The Hawks’ new disc, California Country, would make an appropriate score for Thomas Pynchon’s Vineland: The pace is trance-inducing, the stories transfixing, the vibe completely Californian.

“Slash from Guns N’ Roses” doesn’t just mock L.A. life–it bitch-slaps the entire concept of West Coast pop, and “Barrier Reef” is the best anthem to Cannabis sativa since “Humboldt” (from the previous Hawks record, Grapevine). These guys even have the cojones to snipe at the Lone Star State in the form of “Houston Romance” (which they swear is mostly true). And, really, who could disagree with a lyric like “Texas City, Corpus Christi, it’s not the humidity, it’s the humanity / it’s not the insensitivity, it’s the insanity / Corpus Christi, Texas City?” This will also certainly be the only alt-country disc this year to contain a line like “Nixon was headin’ to that big white house / and the bombs would soon be droppin’ on the children of Laos.” Seldom has there been an album with such joyous music-making, such corrosive, acid-etched lyrics. Way cosmic.
— William Michael Smith

Extraordinary album.
— Michael Simmons, L.A. Weekly writer

Ja, so kann’s laufen, wenn man aus einer Bierlaune heraus und ohne große Ambitionen ein musikalisches Projekt aus Spaß an der Freude ins Leben ruft und im Laufe der Jahre zu mehr als einem bloßen Geheimtipp der südkalifornischen Alternative-Countryszene heranwächst.
Unglücklicherweise blieb mir die Combo mit dem außergewöhnlichen Namen I SEE HAWKS IN L.A. bislang ebenfalls unbekannt. Doch schließlich darf man sich auf die wohlgemeinten Tipps der europäischen Roots-Gemeinde verlassen, und sich kurz darauf ganz unvoreingenommen am pressfrischen Exemplar des dritten I SEE HAWKS IN L.A.-Albums erfreuen. Rob Ellen, der schottische Mentor und Agent der Kalifornier, durfte sich dann, befragt nach meinem ersten Eindruck, auch über ein relativ euphorisches ‘Love at first sight’-Statement meinerseits freuen.

Die HAWKS, die durchweg auf die Songwriter-Qualitäten ihrer beiden Köpfe, Rob Waller und Paul Lacques vertrauen, machen es einem aber auch sehr leicht, sie zu mögen. Sie spiegeln quasi sämtliche Vorzüge, die eine mitreissende Country-Band benötigt wider: Lust und Laune, tolle Songs, die gleichermaßen Tradition und Moderne vereinen, beeindruckende Vielfältigkeit und Geschicklichkeit im Umgang mit ihren Instrumenten, variabel gestalteter Gesang samt ansprechender Harmony-Vocals, völlig unerwartete musikalische Überraschungsmomente und ausgefuchste Lyrics, die fernab jeglicher Klischees die Finger z.B. in politische Wunden legen, amerikanische Historie verarbeiten oder auch mal mit einem zynischen Lächeln die L.A.-Celebrities auf’s Korn nehmen.
Allein die Texte der HAWKS sind derart unterhaltsam, dass sie schon zum Tipp des Monats ausreichten. Doch eine absolute Top-Band zeichnet sich letztlich dadurch aus, dass sie anspruchsvolle Lyrics mit der nötigen Portion Esprit und musikalischem Know-How transportiert. Und dies gelingt I SEE HAWKS IN L.A. auf ihrem neuen Album “California Country” vorbildlich und mit wohltuender Leichtigkeit.

Die Kalifornier decken die komplette Bandbreite der amerikanischen Country-Musik stilecht ab. Ihr Spektrum reicht von Country-Rock bis Honky Tonk, von Bluegrass bis Folk und pendelt ständig zwischen ernsthaften und amüsanten Themen. So schaffen es die HAWKS mitsamt ihrer erlesenen Gästeliste, die u.a. auf Namen wie Chris Hillman, Rick Shea und Tommy Funderburk zurückgreift, ein spannendes und mitreissendes Album zu komponieren und setzen die Meßlatte für die zahlreiche Konkurrenz wieder ein Stückchen höher.
Wenn man überhaupt noch vom Insiderstatus dieser Combo sprechen darf, dann sollte sich dieser demnächst in alle Winde zerstreuen. Jedenfalls würde ich mich nicht wundern, sie demnächst in den Euro-Americana-Charts auf den vorderen Plätzen zu sehen.

— Frank Ipach, (Impressum, Artikelliste), 13.03.2006

“Well, get a load of this: coming on like a more muscular version of the Flying Burritos, the Hawks have all the ingredients that’ll have you purring with happiness. The country roots come through strong but they like to rock a bit too; the lap steel of Paul Lacques plays a leading role and there’s frequent two and three part manly country harmonies. There’s banjo, mandolin, dobro and fiddle but also swirling organ and electric guitar solos for the rock side of the equation. So, we’ve got country rock here, re-configured for the new century and harder edged, musically at least, than the Eagles/Poco etc. school of country rock.

“The songs are written for the most part by Paul Lacques and Rob Waller, the latter being the lead vocalist. They have a knack of writing songs with a singalong hook that disguises a frequently dark lyrical heart; they’re not exactly bleak but they do take a sceptic’s view of the world. In ‘Midnight in Orlando,’ disillusioned with Disneyland and the self-improvement conference he’s attending, the protagonist heads for the swampland : ‘where at least I know what’s dead; the animals they don’t greet you, they just eat you instead.’
“As that indicates, they pick unusual material; perhaps most surprising is ‘Byrd From West Virginia,’ a song of praise and affection for the aged Senator Robert Byrd who has been trenchant and persistent in his opposition to Dubya’s Iraqi adventure. The most fun is ‘Slash From Guns’n’Roses,’ which takes the mickey out of L.A. society in a gloriously over-the-top folk ballad as rock and roll style.

“This is fun stuff, and a good sound to have around – especially if you’re a fan of the pedal steel.” ********* 9 STARS OUT OF 10

–John Davy, Whisperin & Hollerin, UK

Can you read Dutch? If so, click here:Kosmische country met aparte songteksten.

“These freewheeling lords of California psych country approach their music almost as if it were a portal, an unseen threshold that, once crossed, promises a wholly unpredictable experience. Based on an instinctive, atavistic fixation with primal forces and the beauty of nature, the Hawks’ singular style always operates on an epic scale, exploring weird panoramas of hallucinatory metaphor with a sound as much traditional hillbilly as it is accelerated lysergic-rock spontaneity. With high doses of surrealism from the twisted brain trust of maverick songwriters Rob Waller and Paul Lacques and the solid country foundation provided by veteran bassist Paul Marshall and brilliant fiddler-mandolinist Brantley Kearns, any flight taken with the Hawks assures a view to startling new perspectives. Up, up and away.”
— Jonny Whiteside, L.A. WEEKLY

L.A. Weekly Pick of the Week, July 22, 2005
Though he’ll forever be remembered for the satirical “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother,” made famous by Jerry Jeff Walker, legendary Texan Ray Wylie Hubbard — the headiest headneck of the Outlaw Movement — wrote dozens of killer, smart songs. More recently, he’s chosen “to play in the mud,” perfected his slide-guitar technique, waxed lyrical about “The Knives of Spain,” and cracked wise in the anti-yuppie howler “Screw You, We’re From Texas.” I See Hawks in L.A. are our hometown cosmic cowboys; like Ray Wylie, they’re equal parts spiritual seekers and honky-tonk storytellers, creating an American West of honor and wisdom. Does that ethos exist in a time of spilt blood? Did it ever? It does tonight at McCabe’s. (Michael Simmons)

by Josef Woodard
Santa Barbara Independent
July 7, 2003

TWANG TOPOGRAPHIES: Alt-country got its “alt” less through a conspiracy among alternative-minded artists than by the inverse influence of a mainstream country scene grown slick and stagnant. Just recently, Santa Barbara audiences have been visited by fine maverick twangers: self-made and highly-musical Texan Lyle Lovett played the Chumash Casino last Friday, and, at SOhO, the acclaimed neo-country-rock band outta L.A. known as I See Hawks in L.A. made its Santa Barbara debut. The band has been rightfully compared to the Flying Burrito Brothers, Gram Parson’s pioneering country-rock outfit from the early ’70s.

The parade of alt-country (a genre which most of its brightest stars bristle at) continues Saturday at the Lobero, with Todd Snider, the next victim in the Sings Like Hell series. Snider is a salty-tongued wise guy with a natural songwriting skill, minimal commercial potential, and relatively little fear. He was good enough to grab the ear of one of his biggest heroes, John Prine, who signed the protégé to the Oh Boy! label, co-run by Prine.

There’s something very restless and American about Snider, a Portland, Oregon native who went South-literally-as a music-loving teenager. He has moved around the land since making his 1994 debut (and scoring a fluke hit was his grunge satire “Talkin’ Seattle Grunge Rock Blues”). Of late, Snider has landed in a town he loves enough to have devoted an album to: East Nashville Skyline. No, Snider is not dissing Dylan, an admitted icon to Snider. Rather, Snider is singing the praises, in wild and poetic terms, of his adopted hometown of East Nashville. It’s the funkier, more Boho counterpart to Nashville proper, across the river.

Meanwhile, way out west of Nashville, our own piece of earth has proven fertile ground for new country hybrids. Not for nothing has Bakersfield-home of Buck Owens and Merle Haggard-become “Nashville West,” and folks like Dwight Yoakam staked their claim in the Pacific Standard Time zone. There are plenty of worthy country-rock artists and players hereabouts, as heard in the Gram Parsons tribute at the Bowl last summer, and in bands like I See Hawks in L.A.

Anyone expressing surprise about the easy fit of country-folk musical traditions and Southern California isn’t paying attention to the larger, longer picture of life here. Gather ’round, children, and hear the nostalgia-checked tale of a once-agrarian terrain where suburban sprawl and mini-malls now reign (burrito) supreme. Los Angeles, the city which grew from stolen water in a spot God never wanted a city, is still enveloped in vast natural topographies, from the Santa Monica Mountains to the desert wonderland of Joshua Tree.

Closer to home, orchards and farmland once prevailed where neighborhoods and nearly all of Goleta now command top real-estate dollar. Slobbering developers seek yet more depletion of all things natural, and we cling, ever more firmly and desperately, to unspoiled enclaves worth saving: Ellwood Mesa, the Gaviota Coast, the San Marcos foothills, and any scrappy vacant lot you might find (an endangered species).

So we may feel a tiny sting of recognition hearing the line “I know that we’ll never see trees that used to be,” as I See Hawks’ Rob Waller sings on “Hope Against Hope,” the opening track of the band’s inspired latest album, Grapevine (Western Seeds Record Company).

Asked a leading question about the strong sense of place in his songs, including the new album’s “Humboldt” and “Grapevine,” Waller took the bait: “We’re a regional band with global aspirations,” he said. “In my opinion, songwriters-and writers in general-are better suited to being localists than globalists. Your work might just end up universal if you pay very close attention to the specific people and places in your immediate environment. Look at William Faulkner, he wrote novel after novel about his mythical ‘postage stamp of soil’ in central Mississippi. It’s unnecessary to comment on the global impact of his work.”
Got e? fringebeat@aol.com

I SEE HAWKS IN L.A. BRINGS ITS TWANGING SOUND AND POETIC LYRICS TO SOHO
By Josef Woodard
Santa Barbara News-Press
July 3rd, 2005

What’s in a band name? Plenty, in the case of the oddly monikered, critically acclaimed alt-country band I See Hawks in L.A. They will make their Santa Barbara debut Wednesday at SOhO, with former Santa Barbaran Gina Villalobos opening. If the name evokes a mystical, natural atmosphere mixed with the built-in cultural references associated with the abbreviation L.A., it has done its job.
Like a hawk over the metropolis, the band creates a unique twanging musical palette, part country and part rock. It’s a perfect local brew for a city where hawks and showbiz hacks coexist. Musically, the band operates in the long shadow of country-rock legends like the late Gram Parsons, and his early 1970s band, the Flying Burrito Brothers, and is a focus of the current neocountry-rock sound out of Los Angeles.
Of the name, pedal steel guitarist Paul Lacques explains, “The band formed, at least conceptually, on a trek through East Mojave desert preserve, and we do write about the desert and other surrounding vistas with great regularity. We were talking about all the hawks we’d seen over the skies of L.A. recently, and decided that would be the band name.
“The hawk is our informal bearer of omens,” Lacques notes, “and they show up at key moments in our lives. When we were recording our first album, they popped up all the time, even in movies we were watching. One landed near my feet in San Francisco when we were mixing the record.”

When the band formed a few years ago, a country music leaning came naturally, but members weren’t sure how that instinct would manifest itself.

“We knew we were forming a country band,” singer-songwriterguitarist Rob Waller recalls. “In that sense there was a mandate. But, hopefully, our sound is always developing organically. It would take the fun and spontaneity out of it if it wasn’t.” Adds Lacques, “We knew we wanted to form a country band, and we weren’t fond of what was coming out of Nashville, but beyond that, it’s been blind instinct.”

The band’s musicians have played in a variety of groups and in a variety of musical directions. Country music was a common interest, though they don’t pretend to have come up from C&W soil. “My family didn’t listen to much country music,” says Lacques of his musical background, “but we had a Glenn Campbell record and a Roger Miller record that we wore out. I got into country via bluegrass guitar and The Grateful Dead.”

For his part, Waller was weaned on classic rock, beaming in on the only decent radio station in his hometown of Rochester, Minn. He grew up on a musical diet of Led Zeppelin, The Beatles and The Rolling Stones and “came to country and folk music later on when I got serious about songwriting, because that’s where the really good songs lived. I love Zeppelin. They rock. But the lyrics are pretty cartoonish. The country and folk guys — Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Merle Haggard — they’re really talking to you very intimately about their immediate experience and, ultimately, that’s what I’m most interested in doing as a songwriter.”
Coming west to L.A., Waller found himself naturally attracted to the older tradition of country-flavored rockers in the areas, especially Parsons and The Byrds.
“Gram just wrote so many good songs and The Byrds experimented with adding psychedelic sounds to country and folk,” he says. “The Byrds’ harmonies are also just so devastatingly good and that’s something we work very hard on in our band.”
Waller believes that there is a definite link between music and the environment out of which it grows. That idea is particularly relevant to the sound and imagery in I See Hawks in L.A.
“I believe that the ground has a sound,” he says. “We all know what New Orleans music sounds like. There’s a sound that creeps up through musicians’ feet when they stand on that soil. Why fight it? If I lived in New Orleans I’d make a different kind of music than I’d make in New York or Memphis or L.A.
“We’re all just plants after all. Certain kinds of sounds grow better in this Los Angeles soil, this Los Angeles climate. We’re just trying to grow native plants here, musically.”
I See Hawks in L.A. made an impressive splash with its debut, eponymous album from 2001, and has continued a gradual upward course with its fine second album, “Grapevine,” released a year ago.
From the beginning, the music press came courting.

Richard Gehr wrote in the Village Voice that “their music, driven by the fine steel guitarist Paul Lacques, is sinewy yet poetic — more nihilistic than decadent, with an urban-desert poetry all its own.”
In the L.A. Weekly, Johnny Whiteside stated plainly that “the driving-force duo of singer Rob Waller and guitarist Paul Lacques have cooked up one of the most audacious sounds the Golden State has ever produced.”
What’s the fuss about? It has to do with the unusual sonic-poetic chemistry between the songs and the sound. Sweet down-home vocal harmonies, fiddle and other country touches are part of the story. Also, the searing, surreal texture of the pedal steel in the band adds greatly to the overall band sound.
What is about the pedal steel that so magically colors whatever music it touches?
“The fact that it’s never actually in tune,” Waller deadpans.
Lacques says half-jokingly, “You have to be obsessive-compulsive to even attempt pedal steel, so the insanity of the player is the most important element.”

Alt-country is a thriving, if semiunderground, subculture within music. I See Hawks in L.A. is one example of a band which may have little hope of having an impact on the standard, Nashville-governed country scene, but it’s not that they intentionally cling to life in the margins. “We certainly seek a wider audience,” Lacques says, “and we’re not trying to be deliberately obscure or ‘alternative’ in our music or lyrics. If we could write a Nashville hit, we just might do it, but I think our DNA is missing a few strands for that.” In the modern parlance, they may be “off-the-radar,” in terms of any mainstream attention or airplay. But Waller clarifies that, in the current multifaceted musical cosmos: “There are a lot of radars these days. We’re very present on some, completely absent on others. “I suppose we’d like to make more money and feel we deserve it, but I imagine most people probably feel about their careers. There’s something very satisfying and enduring about the grass-roots development of a band — or any artistic, political or religious movement. The convictions that drive true believers are the most powerful of all. “People come to hear us because they’ve heard our songs and connected with them. Sometimes very deeply. That’s plenty satisfying for me.”

A Little Bit Country, A Little Bit Rock And Roll
by Jennifer Savage
Arcata Eye  
June 17th, 2005
“I set I See Hawks¹ new album, Grapevine, on ³repeat all² a week ago and haven¹t tired of it yet. Full of straightforward country rockers, pretty atmospheric tunes I could drop Drive By Truckers, My Morning Jacket, Merle Haggard, but I don¹t want to narrow their sound down that way each song tells a little story of its own. They even bring out the jawharp on ‘Humboldt’ how could it not be love at first listen?”

San Jose Mercury News 
I See Hawks in L.A. and Rick Shea
San Francisco, Felton and Monterey
Ever wondered what would have happened if Gram Parsons hadn’t flamed out and the Burrito Brothers were still playing? I See Hawks in L.A. has it all — twang, distortion, backbeat and lyrics that blend cowboy poetry with an ironic vision of the West. Throw in Rick Shea, the former guitar player for Dave Alvin’s Guilty Men and a helluva country songwriter, who’ll open and then sit in. You’ve got a can’t-miss double bill that should make you forget taking out a second mortgage so that you can afford to see the Eagles this summer.

California Country
by Bob Doran
North Coast Journal
June 16, 2005
Here in Humboldt you see them all the time: hawks perched on a freeway sign or a light pole scanning the grass in the center divider searching for prey. They serve as a little reminder that nature perseveres despite the urban overlay. And it’s the same thing in Los Angeles. Thus the name of the band, I See Hawks in L.A.

“That’s exactly what the band’s name is all about,” said Paul Lacques, calling while on a break from his day job. “It’s also about our declining awareness about our natural surroundings. We ask our friends and people at our shows if they ever see hawks in L.A. Almost all of them say no. But all you have to do is look up. I still see them every two or three days. That lack of awareness keeps us from making certain decisions we have to make soon if we want to survive as part of this natural system.”

Lacques started the band in 2001 with his brother Anthony and Rob Waller. “We’ve always loved country music and I’ve been in country and bluegrass bands since the ’70s, but at that point we were coming from very different bands. I was playing in a band called the Aman Folk Ensemble. It was a touring group that had been around for about 40 years supporting a folk dance company — very eclectic world music and all without electric instruments.

“Rob and Anthony were coming out of a rock band called The Magic of Television. They played roots music with a country feel and were moving toward more country. They did a couple of Gram Parsons covers and countrified versions of Lou Reed songs. They were flirting with country but hadn’t made the leap. The three of us decided we’d try the straight-ahead country approach.”

With its crying pedal steel and close harmonies, the latest I See Hawks in L.A. album, Grapevine, brings to mind that classic era of California country rock, late ’60s records like The Byrds’ Sweetheart of the Rodeo.

Lacques doesn’t mind the comparison. “Sweetheart of the Rodeo is one of my favorite records and there’s no denying that The Byrds and the Burrito Brothers influenced us. We also do some pretty straight ahead old-time bluegrass stuff, which will show up a little more on our new record. There are many influences cross-pollinating.”

Among the songs on the Grapevine disc is one titled “Humboldt,” a paean to the county and its local cash crop. “I’d be glad to plant corn in the ground, but corn don’t go for $3,000 a pound in Humboldt,” sings the vocalist, stretching the county name through several bars.

“I know we’re not being fair to the region,” said Lacques. “We’ve all been through there, but it’s certainly painting an imaginary landscape. It’s not like writing about Los Angeles, which, unfortunately, I know like the back of my hand.

“We come from many ideologies. I’d say Rob and I are very far left, really far. Our bass player’s a libertarian and we have huge political arguments, but we all agree that the government should leave people alone. We all feel the hammer coming down and America slowly turning into an oppressive society with a powerful central government.

“We particularly feel that laws about people’s personal behavior should be eliminated — the drug laws in particular are a major disgrace. People should be able to decide for themselves whether they want to alter their consciousness or not. I hope we don’t exploit the image of the county or people of Humboldt, but the theme is that people should be free to do what they want.”

by Buddy Blue

Mainstream country clearly contends for recognition as the most wretched music extant on the planet today; we all recognize this, no? The alt-country movement, on the other hand, is undoubtedly preferable, if characterized by three well-defined schools with issues of their own. They are:

1.) The self-serious arteests who perform with one foot in tradition and the other in contemporary, derivative  trendiness, inevitably becoming abysmally over-rated, cherished darlings of the rockcritc set despite sounding as if they believe playing music some gallant mission with earth-shaking ramifications, as opposed to something so frivolous as, oh, say, actually having fun. Exhibit A: Son Volt.

2.) The frat-boy-sensibility-having, white-trash-chic funsters, whose sophomoric sense of humor inexorably celebrates double-wides, methamphetamine abuse and semi-functional automobiles, and who glean tremendous pride in their studiously cretinous persona and lack of musical skill, but who have a wonderful time entertaining their heavily-tattooed, halitosis-afflicted fan base. Exhibit A: Supersuckers.

3.) The piously retro singer-songwriter who slavishly assumes the sound and appearance of Merle Haggard, Hank Williams or Johnny Cash, and who shamelessly plagiarizes the songs of one or more of the above, while employing a group of ace sidemen from Austin to camouflage the fact that they can’t play a note and possess nothing original whatsoever to offer. Exhibit A: Wayne Hancock.

  Happily, an antidote to all this alt-unpleasantness appears Saturday night at Acoustic Music San Diego in the form of a group curiously christened I See Hawks In L.A. Where the alt-schools above draw their inspiration from the honky tonkin’ ’50s and/or post-punk ’80s, the Hawks’ sound derives from the nascent country-rock merger of that most musically fertile of decades: the ’60s, an era oddly ignored by most alt-slingers.
  On the Hawks’ second and latest album, “Grapevine,” one encounters the thrill-seeking, psychedelic cowboy sensibility of the Grateful Dead and New Riders of the Purple Sage; the cactus harmony and ghost town steel guitar of Gram Parson’s Byrds and Flying Burrito Brothers; the earnest, pastoral songcraft and time-honored instrumentation of Johns Stewart and Prine.
  “We don’t want to be all about old Cadillacs and wife-beater T-shirts,” says singer/guitarist Robert Rex Waller Jr., who’s joined in the Hawks by guitarist Paul Lacques, fiddler Brantley Kearns, bassist Paul Marshall and drummer Shawn Nourse. “On the other hand,” Waller says, “we don’t feel the need to dress up like Gram Parsons, either. I love Gram Parsons, but I don’t have to put on a Nudie suit to prove it. With some people, the fashion aspect is as far as it goes; their music doesn’t even necessarily reflect that (love of Parsons).”
  Nope, the Hawks are hardly about fashion, vintage or otherwise. Variously bearded, balding, bounteous-bellied and bespectacled, this isn’t a group to dazzle with image; these guys are all about the music. It’s no coincidence that most of the acts name-checked above hail from the Golden State, either.
  “Our vision is as a California country outfit, writing songs about the whole Californian experience,” Waller says. “There’s also the aspect of the effect California had on country music, adding electricity and sort of a psychedelic sound. Bands like the Byrds took roots music and paid homage to it very respectfully, but also added vocal harmonies, effects and other experimentation. Those are the two streams that came together for us; country music with that rich, reverby, psychedelic thing.”
 The multi-generational Hawks range in age from thirties to fifties, helping to strike an uncommon balance between veteran instinct and youthful daring; members have worked with an array of artists from old-time country icons Rose Maddox and Hank Thompson to contemporary roots music heroes Dave Alvin and Dwight Yoakam. Just don’t try to lump these guys in with the usual alt-county suspects.
  “People talk to me like they think we’re doing the same kind of thing as Son Volt or Ryan Adams, and I really don’t understand where that comes from,” protests Waller. “I can’t even listen to that stuff!”
  You are not alone, Mr. Waller.

I See Hawks In L.A., June 4 at Normal Heights United Methodist Church, 4650 Mansfield Street in San Diego, 7:30 p.m., $15 – $20, (619) 303-8176.
Buddy Blue is a San Diego musician, writer and all-around curmudgeon. His Blue Notes column runs weekly in Night&Day in the San Diego Union Tribune