Artists starting with L

The Expanding Universe

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Laurie Spiegel, “The Expanding Universe” (Unseen Worlds, 2012; original release 1980)
Fascinating and beautiful solo electronic pieces. Like Terry Riley’s “Rainbow In Curved Air,” there’s a simple pop-melodic sensibility that makes the austere minimalism really sparkle, but this is actually more texturally/rhythmically diverse.
Try CD 1: 5, 7; CD 2: 1, 4, 9.
1/13/13

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Fever In Fever Out

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Luscious Jackson, “Fever In Fever Out” (Grand Royal, 1997)
Featuring a founding member of the Beastie Boys and released on their label, this all-female quartet offered its own version of the Beasties’ pan-NYC bohemian funkateering. But LJ’s take was more lyrical and elusive – where the Beasties wanted to be Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, LJ wanted to be ESG. This third album has their most elegant music, deceptively serene but bursting into visionary moments, like a sunrise breaking across the corridor of a Manhattan street.
Try 1, 5, 8, 11, 14
5/5/12

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Pretty Ugly

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Lunachicks, “Pretty Ugly” (GoKart, 1997)
Fourth and best album from these ‘70s-inflected NYC scum-punk women. Big holler-along hooks and a gonzo/trash-culture bad-girl sensibility that’s halfway between the Dictators and the Shangri-Las adds up to a big, beautiful hard-rocking, Bronx cheer in the face of the world.
Try 9, 13
1/23/14

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Tears On My Pillow And Other Hits

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Little Anthony And The Imperials, “Tears On My Pillow And Other Hits” (Accord, 1982; original release late ‘50s/early ‘60s)
These guys epitomize the try-anything/who-cares fun and abandon of the interlude between rock’s “great” eras – doo-wop, bubblegum-mambo, r & b speed-blasters, it’s all here and it all works.
Try 1/1, 1/ 2, 2/1
10/2/18

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Babysitters On Acid

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Lunachicks, “Babysitters On Acid” (Blast First, 1990)
From one of the most austerely arty labels of its time, pure drooling rock-and-roll fun. The Lunachicks came from Queens, and there’s a bit of the same outer-borough trash-culture primitivism here that was all over the first Dictators LP, and the same cherry-bomb-in-the-mailbox sense of mischief. But where the Dic’s were moving from beer-stomping ‘70s hard rock to hammer-down punk, the ‘chicks were making the same move, but in reverse; this thing blasts relentlessly with a rusty, serrated slag-metal edge, and a gleeful feel for a NYC gone even more absurd and apocalyptic in the 15+ years since Go Girl Crazy!
Try 1/1, 1/ 2, 1/ 3, 1/ 4, 1/5, 2/2, 2/ 4, 2/ 5
11/10/16

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Penthouse

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Luna, “Penthouse” (Elektra, 1995)
Second album from Dean Wareham’s post-Galaxie 500 outfit, and it’s a fine effort. Television/Velvets-style strum-drone pop (Tom Verlaine guests here) refined into a stylish-yet-gripping groove of life in end-of-the-century NYC.
Try 1, 5
1/23/14

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I Could Live In Hope

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Low, “I Could Live In Hope” (Vernon Yard, 1994)
Pioneering “slow-core” band, playing big, resonant post-punk-inflected rock with lots of wide-open spaces, brilliantly shuddering drone-chasms, explosive dynamic shifts, blizzards of guitar-shards. Good music for long winters.
Try 1, 7
10/13/11

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I Could Live In Hope

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Low, “I Could Live In Hope” (Vernon Yard, 1994)
One of the most beautifully bleak (and influential) records of its era, Low’s debut is slow, stark, steady, single guitar lines and quiet voices against a subtle, deliberate rhythm section. The best moments hit like sunlight on a desolate, snowbound landscape.
Try 1, 9
7/29/13

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Forever Changes

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Love, “Forever Changes” (Elektra, 1967)
A kind of bridge between the rhapsodic, overloaded pop of the Pet Sounds-era Beach Boys and the hard-driving, nihilistic explorations of the Doors, this L. A. psych masterpiece is alternately passionate, haunted, ecstatic and terrifying.
Try 1, 6, 7, 10
8/23/12

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Da Capo

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Love, “Da Capo” (Elektra, 1966)
B-side is a long jam; A-side has what I think is the peak work of this form-shattering L. A. pysch-pop combo, the sinister pummel of their garage beginnings still present, the lush flowers-of-evil soundscapes of their great 1967 “Forever Changes” LP already in bloom.
Everything on the A-side is great, but start with A/2, A/6
7/29/14

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