The Fat Angel Sings

With a sound oscillating between psychedelic pop and space rock, Triptides’ album “Alter Echoes” channels both The Byrds at their most hallucinogenic and Floyd at their most cosmically composed while creating something immediate and new. The band has established itself as a preeminent part of the Los Angeles new wave psych music. With “Alter Echoes,” they pull away from the pack, thanks to the quality of their song writing, performance and production.  

Triptides have become a staple of Southern California’s sun-baked, surf-tinged psych-rock scene over the last decade, and now the Los Angeles trio is gearing up to release a new album called Alter Echoes, due next month via Alive Naturalsound Records. Today, the band continues to live up to its name with a dreamy, hallucinogenic new single premiering below. “Perhaps the most laid back track on the record, ‘Moonlight Reflection’ is a love song gliding through the darkness of a clear night,” vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Glenn Brigman says.

The track opens with a breezy, undulating intro, but the first verse sets the scene: “In the dead of night, see the moon reflecting the light / Do you feel alright? Don’t run and hide.” Brigman’s spaced out vocals are barely tethered to the instrumentation below. Eventually those vocals give way to a heady, transcendent guitar solo the kind of guitar solo that begs to be performed outside on a warm summer night. “We drew upon the dreamy moods of Erasmo Carlos,” explains Brigman, “and the heroic melodies of the Isley Brothers, letting the vocal track ebb and flow while the lush chords glisten in anticipation of the climactic conclusion: a final jet-phased guitar solo that ascends like the first light of a new day.”

“Moonlight Reflection” is the second single off Alter Ehoes following the more driving “It Won’t Hurt You,” which arrived last month. Both tracks follow a string of singles and double-singles released over 2019 and 2020. 

For our new record, we decided to create something more organic, performing together in a classic Hollywood studio and recording it live to tape,” says Brigman. “We wanted to make sure we were expressing the true sound of the three of us in a room before elevating the recordings with additional overdubs.”

The band recorded the album at Boulevard Recording Studio. Formerly the Producer’s Workshop then Westbeach Recorders, the studio was upgraded in 2010 when engineer Clay Blair decided to revamp it. “I came across this Craigslist ad,” Blair told an interviewer in 2016. “It said, ‘Recording Studio.’ There was only a picture of the building outside.” In its previous eras, the studio hosted Pink Floyd, Ringo Starr, Bad Religion, Blink-182, and plenty of other pop, rock, and punk hitmakers (it also housed Epitaph Records at one point).

“We kept the writing spontaneous and let our influences drift from 70’s fuzz rock (‘Hand of Time’) to bossa nova (‘She Doesn’t Want To Know’) to electric jazz (‘Another Dream’),” says Brigman of Triptides’ new material. “Through our collaborative mind we were able to weave these vibrations together to form “Alter Echoes.”

Alter Echoes comes after the self-described “sun-warped psychedelic rock” band’s 2018 albums Visitors and Estrela Magica (with Winter), as well as 2017’s Afterglow. Triptides is led by multi-instrumentalist Glenn Brigman, the trio is rounded by bassist Stephen Burns and drummer Brendan Peleo-Lazar.

“Moonlight Reflection” is out February 5th. Alter Echoes arrives March 19th via Alive Naturalsound Records.