These two tracks are from the new Camper Van Beethoven album El Camino Real. Release date June 3rd 2014.
I was recently in Highland Park a neighborhood of what might be loosely referred to as Northeast Los Angeles. I was there to record an episode of Marc Maron’s immensely enjoyable podcast WTF. I realized I was not too far from the apartment where the “Playing on a flying saucer over Los Angeles” story took place as chronicled in #68 The Long Plastic Hallway-Playing on a Flying Saucer with the Talking Heads. Funny. Regrettably I failed to tell Marc Maron this story in our interview.
It seemed like all throughout the 1980s every couple of years I would end up at some strange party in this area of Los Angeles. Some weird mix of rich people, hipsters and low lifes. Socio-economically strange as well. On the east side you have the extremely wealthy enclaves of South Pasadena and San Marino. I mean really rich. Like Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos corrupt ex-dictator rich. Indeed this is where the former filipino president and his wife lived after being overthrown. Various relatives of the Shah and other members of foreign oligarchs seemed to settle in this area. And of course the wayward scions of New England establishment fortunes. I assume dwindling fortunes cause they always lived in some decaying mansion. Think grey gardens.
But back to geography. To the north you have Glendale and Pasadena. To the south high-rises of Downtown. To the west Los Feliz and Hollywood. All relatively affluent places, home to power brokers of various kinds: banking, entertainment, military-industrial academic (Cal Tech/JPL) and political. But in the middle of this are a series of neighborhoods like Highland Park, Eagle Rock, Atwater Village, Montecito Heights, Mt Washington and others without name. Within these neighborhoods you have poor areas, usually in the flatlands, and up on the hillsides are nicer houses and generally wealthier people. Not Imelda Marcos 15,000 pairs of shoes rich, but not as poor as the folks in the flatlands.
It was in a relatively new and nice compound near the top of one of these hills that I occasionally attended parties with a few of the the punk rockers from the Inland Empire. I don’t know who in my IE group of friends got the original introduction but somehow we were on the guest list from time to time. The hostess was a woman reportedly from spain, but I always wondered about that because most of the cars were tagged with Mexican “La Frontera” licenses plates. The rumor was she was variously the daughter, mistress or wife of some gangster. This was the early 1980′s and the Mexican and Colombian drug cartels hadn’t really made any headlines, so we always assumed that our host was connected to the Sicilian Mafia. Which somehow made it seem safer.
Regardless these were pretty typical LA parties, mostly booze and a little bit of drugs in the back room somewhere. Some impossibly arty musical ensemble. Inevitably someone was keeping time on an oil drum or some other large piece of metal. Guitars, Synthesizers and a often more than one bass player. At least one of the band members was always from the UK.
One night we all went outside because there was an enormous brush fire in the Angeles National forest that had worked it’s way down into the foothills of Pasadena. It may have even been the La Tuna fire that burned parts of Verdugo Mountain between Burbank and Glendale. It looked like the end of the world. But this only seemed to enliven the guests.
Their are two songs on the record inspired by these parties and their mysterious hostess. It Was Like That When We Got Here is largely about the party on the night of the fire. I Live in LA is about the hostess.
Buy album at your local indie record store
Or
It was Like That When I Got Here
It was broken on the floor
It was like that when we got here
A piece was stuck in to the door
It was like that when we got here
There was this girl I kind of know
It was like that when we got here
In an Army Uniform
It was like that when we got here
I’m a mess baby and you’re a mess baby
So why can’t we be more than friends
You and I were meant to be together
I’m a mess baby and you’re a mess baby
So why can’t we be more than friends
You and I were meant to be together
An Endless pool of summer light
It was like that when we got here
Pasadena burning bright
It was like that when we got here
A phoenix rising from the smoke
It was like that when we got here
The mountains rising up in flames
I’m a mess baby and you’re a mess baby
So why cant we be more than friends
You and I were meant to be together
I’m a mess baby and you’re a mess baby
So why cant we be more than friends
You and I were meant to be together
It was like that when we got here
It was like that when we got here
It was like that when we got here
It was like that when we got here
I Live in LA
She comes in like a star
Wearing jewelry and fur
with her own entourage
hanger-oners in clogs
From some small town in spain
Its never explained
Sufficiently
Or the security
I live in LA
Come and see me someday
You can stay at my house
I’ve got plenty of space
I live in LA
Come see me someday boy
If you wanna have a good time
A good time with me
Black SUVs in the drive
tinted windows and guards
Cowboy boots and shaved heads
Italian suits tattood necks
the party rages inside
but its never explained
Sufficiently
Oh boy I hope its not too late
I live in LA
Come and see me someday
You can stay at my house
I’ve got plenty of space
I live in LA
Come see me someday boy
If you wanna have a good time
A good time with me
Done ever ask where i’ve been
Dont ever ask where the money comes from
Dont ever ask who I am cause it cant be explaind
Sufficiently
Or the Security
I live in LA
Come and see me someday
You can stay at my house
I’ve got plenty of space
I live in LA
Come see me someday boy
If you wanna have a good time
A good time with me
I live in LA
Come and see me someday
You can stay at my house
I’ve got plenty of space
I live in LA
Come see me someday boy
If you wanna have a good time
A good time with me
© 2014 Camper Van Beethoven
Filed under: Uncategorized