La Luz

Seattle’s La Luz recorded their debut EP, Damp Face, in a small trailer on a hot August day. But barring the inevitable “no-AC-in-the-van” summer tour calamity, La Luz runs cool. Their brand of coolness isn’t about distance or affect; it’s a mood, and—sue me, but I’m about to totally rip off Zelda Fitzgerald: Something about this music vibrates to the dusky, dreamy smell of dying moons and shadows. So yeah, that kind of cool. Still, La Luz’s live shows, more than most these days, are about connection. It’s evident that the four ridiculously talented ladies on stage are not only playing music with each other, but for each other. And they engage their audience as well. Like a proper punk band—which they are not— they give you shit for not dancing. They convey a gritty self-possession, a sense that they’ve been there and back again. And, like the expert, but seemingly effortless, surf licks and meandering bass lines that rise and fall throughout their songs, their mocking is playful and dreamy and disarming enough to get most of the crowd (and sometimes the keyboard player) dancing down the center line of a soul train. But as any half-assed Freudian will ... more...