In the last century, back when people paid for music there was this thing called “College Rock.” It might be difficult to imagine a time when the word “college” had connotations outside of crushing debt or students yelling at each other microaggressions (and full-ass adults acting like the idea of teenagers feeling strongly about stuff was some sort of national crisis), but what can I tell you; we were promised jetpacks and couldn’t really imagine a future where electric cars would be mainly associated with South African oligarchs and neo-nazi hentai enthusiasts. Anyway, in this gossamer—admittedly kinda dumb—time, “college rock” just meant “guitars played by reasonably clever people with messy hair who, if they were as awful as all the actually popular rock stars, had the decency to keep that awfulness to themselves.” Often, but not always, it also meant “from England.” Simple, solid, bittersweet and honest rock music, for young people who hated the radio but didn’t want to wear a subculture uniform every time they went to the mall.
Escape Artist Lovers are a duo who, while perhaps unconcerned with what they wear to the mall, do play an honest (and bittersweet) rock music. And it’s clever. And their hair is messy. Rakish even. And, yes, despite being from California, they also do sound like they have a fair amount of UK bands in their respective record collections.
Rain Phoenix and Kirk Hellie have known each other for over a decade, but only recently started collaborating as Escape Artist Lovers. They make a rock duo that sounds like a white gospel group covering Moe Tucker (or Lou at his naive-sweet-toothiest) from orbit around the sun.
Tone of bio intro aside, both Hellie and Phoenix have a background in counterculture that skews earnest. Since the 1990s, Kirk— has been a sideman for the likes of Steve Jones and Glenn Branca, collaborated with various artists including Atticus Ross/Jehnny Beth/Mogwai, and has fronted his own bands (a couple of which were dropped by some of the finest major labels of the time)—has balanced a love of C86 sun-dappled melancholy with thoughtful experimentation. As for Rain, she’s been the picture of positive actualization since she was a kid; growing up awash in the arts starting out with her brother River Phoenix in Aleka’s Attic, she collaborated toured or worked with artists ranging from Michael Stipe (and REM), Gus Van Sant, to the much underrated Alternative Tentacles band, The Causey Way, then went on to front her own bands papercranes and Venus & the Moon before making her first solo record ‘River’ produced and co-written by Hellie.
With Escape Artist Lovers, Hellie and Phoenix have taken their extensive record collections and filtered those timeless songs through lifetimes of hard knock optimism and an unflagging belief in the power of an insinuating chorus to transform the soul.
With Phoenix’s high delicate chime intertwining with Hellie’s cooly romantic restraint— it hardly matters who built the vehicle or who is the co-pilot. The destination is what matters. On a track like “Hey Motherfucker,” what matters is where the song lives; a creche, with Darklands (and maybe that one song with the strings, about being friends with fish, off Nevermind), playing as a lullaby in the background.
Escape Artist Lovers’ reverence for their art damaged heroes might be easy to take for granted. Not everybody opened for Sonic Youth on their 18th birthday (I don’t have the exact numbers in front of me, but it’s a short list) and not everybody has been a much sought out sideman with the not exactly uncompetitive Los Angeles music scene. But for the two artists in question, their roots are their roots are their roots, and it would be rude to deny it and, listening to their new songs, impossible. Even divorced from the collaborations and inspirations that lives spent laboring in bohemia has afforded them, the duo take on the music of strangers (Jesus and Mary Chain, Dream Academy, “No New Tale To Tell” era Love & Rockets, the Beatles/VU/Ramones holy trinity, Crocodiles, Mazzy Star, PJ Harvey, Green On Red, Galaxie 500, The Replacements, Opel, Husker Du, etc.) and treat them as family. The result is less a recreation of ‘70s Laurel Canyon, ‘80s Paisley Underground, ’90s alt songcraft and sonic exploration, than a continuation. Hellie and Phoenix aren’t operating in the shadow of history, they’re basking in its sunlight.