Experimental Audio Research @ Silverlake Lounge January 20, 2007
Experimental Audio Research (aka E.A.R.) is Sonic Boom's (formerly of Spacemen 3 and currently of Spectrum) droney analog synth side project. This is the first time I had ever witnessed Sonic do is E.A.R. thing live. I'm not entirely sure he's ever done it in L.A. before.
After opening sets by Fuxa (who I missed) and LSD and the Search for God (who I saw and they bored me to death), Sonic set up his gear on two tables. It basically looked like 3 analog synthesizer units, about eleventy patch cables, and a mixer. He greeted the audience and thanked them for coming and started. He spent the next 40 or so minutes generating different audio waveforms layered on top of each other, panning them left and right and basically creating a pretty psychedelic atmosphere inside the Silverlake Lounge. The "piece" performed seemed more along the same lines has something from the last E.A.R. album, Worn to a Shadow. Earlier E.A.R. material had a different feel to them.
I think a few people were expecting Sonic to perform some Spacemen 3 and Spectrum songs. But this definitely wasn't the case since it was clearly advertised as an E.A.R.
When the piece had finished, Sonic thanked the audience once again and informed them that he'd be doing a DJ set at The Echo (down the street). I would have gone if I thought I wasn't going to have to pay another cover to get into The Echo. Needless to say, I didn't.
Good show and it was great to finally experience it after buying E.A.R. records for 10 years.