Alexander And Or The Xanders Are the Best Band You’ll Never See Live
Courtesy of Alex Stevens
2020 was a big year for home recording projects. Musical instrument retailers literally couldn’t keep up with how many people were ordering keyboards, microphones, and compact recording interfaces. The influx of self-produced albums, demos, and mixtapes released during this time proved to be one of the more positive results of this period of isolation.
Alex Stevens, a visual artist and musician, was visiting Los Angeles for the month in March 2020. He had been living in New York then and was hoping to play a one-off show with a couple of his old bandmates while he was in town. That all changed when the entire country was placed on national lockdown later that month.
Courtesy of Alex Stevens
“Covid hit and I was more or less stuck in L.A.,” Stevens explains. “I decided, maybe as a challenge or out of nostalgia, to start composing things in a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) and really return to my bedroom pop roots, which I hadn’t done in about 10 years.” Then he enlisted his aforementioned bandmates, drummer Trevor Rounseville and guitarist Matt Lemberger. The three had previously played together in P.C.D.C.
Stevens also recruited vocalist Beth Imai, who writes and performs with her own band, Sabals. “Beth was really great as someone who could actually sing, which I struggle with,” Stevens admits. “She came up with a lot of amazing melodic and lyrical responses to the songs and then also was able to help vocalize some of the melodies I was trying to work out in some of the songs and lyrics.”
The band, dubbed Alexander And Or The Xanders, crafted an album by tracking one piece at a time. Stevens would generally build a skeleton with samples, programmed drums, and a few chords on synth or guitar before adding his bandmates to the mix. “It was just a lot of sharing garbage back and forth,” he says, “And having people come by and record a bunch of takes. Then I just started chopping and layering. Layering, layering, and then refining.”
Courtesy of Alex Stevens
The resulting album, “Where We Are @ & Where We're Going,” goes far beyond the limits of the “bedroom pop” category. Its seven tracks are epic, immersive, and difficult to classify. Driving percussion, winding trails of delay, and thick layers of guitar weave in and out of each other. Synthesizers drone on through an ocean of reverb. Imai’s celestial vocals are mixed like an instrument, sharing almost equal space with the other elements instead of being at the forefront. Some songs are dreamy, some are haunting, most are both.
Courtesy of Alex Stevens
“Wonder 3.1 -I'm To Dead To Drive Remix With Michaela But Better,” the final track on the album, features vocals from Stevens’ niece, Michaela Goodloe. In fact, Stevens built the song from a series of recordings he made and sampled from one of Goodloe’s performances. Over the course of seven and a half minutes, it builds from a simple drone to a dense tapestry of tumbling rhythms and meditative chaos.
“Where We Are @ & Where We’re Going” was released on vinyl last month through Fall Down Laughing Records. FDL has built a strong roster of artists from various genres in recent years, including La Puente grind / powerviolence outfit Presser, Mentone Beach rock ‘n’ rollers Fantasy Lane, and Los Angeles crasher crusties Dust Collector, to name a few.
Courtesy of Fall Down Laughing Records
Label brain Derrick Harlan admits that he pressed The Xanders to vinyl simply because he wanted to own a copy. “In 2020, my housemates had recorded a pandemic project with their friend Alex,” he explains. “I had the opportunity to listen, and thought to myself ‘This is special.’ I knew I had to get this record, and the quickest way for me to do so was to put it out myself. Who knew it would take 4 years to see completion, but I'm glad we took our time.”
The bittersweet truth about this album is that it will likely never be performed live. Stevens looks back on the project in the context of its creation. “So much of it was just segments of fucked up life,” he says, “Me trying to assemble connection. Maintain relationships and just keeping things going. It seemed necessary and artistic in the moment. I don’t know [if] that translates or needs to translate live.”
Instead of performing these songs with the band, Stevens has shifted his focus to visual accompaniment. He produced a simple yet surreal video for the first track, “Gets Going,” which will hopefully be just the first of more to come. He’s asked several friends to make more videos in response to the songs.
Courtesy of Alex Stevens
“I asked people to respond visually, not with any intention,” he says. “Similar to the way the album was made, I just want to see what comes back.” Stevens is working on an exhibition for late Summer or the Fall, combining all of the videos and music. In the meantime, you can order a copy of “Where We Are @ & Where We’re Going” from Fall Down Laughing!
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