Freaky-hillbilly-punk-rock-hippie-love
The Evangenitals range from poetic to profane at Mr. T’s Bowl
By Bliss 11/20/2008
Billing themselves as “the love child of Frank Zappa and Stevie Nicks,” the Evangenitals fly the freak folk, alt-country, hippie love and punk rock banners, cite influences from the Violent Femmes to Dolly Parton and Devo, and are thoroughly allergic to pigeonholes, which isn’t that surprising when you consider the band’s original members started making music more or less on a dare while working at a Silver Lake sex toy company.
At the time, songwriter/lead vocalist Juli Crockett, vocalist Lisa Dee and guitarist Brett Lyda were living in an apartment complex near Mr. T’s Bowl in Highland Park, which has since become a home away from home. Per Crockett, a onetime amateur LA district champion boxer and playwright/director with prodigious amounts of energy, their band name was a product of a work-related brainstorming session. It’s gimmicky, but it set the tone for the irreverence that’s become an Evangenitals hallmark. This is, after all, the boho crew that transformed OutKast’s “Hey Ya!” into a whispery country-noir ballad, skewered Ron L. Hubbard’s legacy in “Ode to Scientology” (“I want to be clear/ I want to be here/ Whatever it costs to stop this aching”) and whose promo poster (for last year’s “Everlovin’”) featured band members arrayed in a tableau evocative of the Last Supper.
It’s also the band that learned by doing — first at open mic nights, then at myriad clubs across LA. And Crockett & Co. swiftly learned how to use laughs to provoke tears. “The Work Song” transforms the recitation of a bland daily schedule into a mantra as poignant as it is funny. Wisecracks take a back seat on “Time to Go” (“If this is love then I’m sorry we’re in it”). “I Just Forgot” blames the tragedy of Orpheus and Eurydice on male ADD with a sweet country lilt over a tick-tock rhythm that gradually evolves into an audience sing-along.
Things have changed since their beginnings five years ago; Lyda, for instance, has departed, and ubiquitous Eastside guitarist Henry Bermudez has signed on. But the collective resistance to pigeonholing remains. Crockett’s likely to snarl like a punk rocker one moment and then yodel the next, while pulling off an odd dance that’s part Appalachian stomp and part shadowboxing bravado. Her harmonies with Dee occasionally suggest a more tuneful Freakwater, but they so exuberantly flout genre conventions that what starts out as a pretty ballad can end up a raucous, multi-instrumental jam. It’s hard to know what to expect from their live shows — and, while their recordings are fine, the Evangenitals are best experienced live.
The Evangenitals play a pre-Thanksgiving Thank You show at Mr. T’s Bowl, 5621 1/2 N. Figueroa St., Highland Park, 9 p.m.
Wednesday. Seeing Thingz, We You and Under the Asbury are also on the bill. Call (323) 960-5693 for details. www.evangenitals.com.
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