LOS ANGELES, CA- Back in October, I saw the U.K. band Shame rock The Teragram. As I’m organizing the photos I took this year, I noticed that I neglected to post my thoughts and photos of one of the bands that opened for them: Goon. Shame on me.
A quartet of Kenny Beck, Drew Eccleston, Christian Koons and Caleb Wicker, Goon is based out of L.A. and their music is a dreamy, lo-fi wash of alt rock sonics. I had read somewhere that their frontman Kenny is an accomplished painter and after I checked out some of his paintings, I really got a sense of who he was and where the music comes from. For the most part, his paintings are abstract yet based in reality, which mirrors the musicality of Goon’s music. Bits of brightness filled out with shades of the sludgy, Goon’s music uses a splash of everything that’s on the sonic palette.
It was my first time catching the band live, and I dug the vibe that their music imbued on the crowd. It almost felt like I was back in the 90’s at a club gig and Pavement were on stage. That’s the vibe I got. Layered, fuzzy and loud guitars filled the room as Kenny’s nonchalant vocals subtly pierced through the buzz. Though I’m not fully educated on GOON’s entire repertoire, I have the sense that a majority of their setlist came from their heavier, grungier, 2016 EP “Dusk Of Punk”.
With two EP’s under their belt, next year looks to be a significant step in this band’s evolution as their debut full length is scheduled to be released in early 2019 by Partisan Records. The two tracks they release in 2018 (“Enter Bethel Admissions” and “Choke Throat”) seem to follow the generally lighter vibe of their 2017 EP Happy Omen, so I’m interested to see how much of their new album has got that loud, layered sound that hypnotized me at the Teragram.
Follow Goon on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
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