I SEE HAWKS IN L.A.

mp3s at www.myspace.com/iseehawksinla
and www.iseehawks.com, reviews bio below:

HOUSTON PRESS
March 9, 2006

Try as you might to avoid the heinous hippie-cliché "cosmic" when describing the music of I See Hawks in LA, when the melodies, lyrics, harmonies and licks take over, you'll find yourself lost in some greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts moment. The Hawks' new disc, California Country, would make an appropriate score for Thomas Pynchon's Vineland: The pace is trance-inducing, the stories transfixing, the vibe completely Californian. 

"Slash from Guns N' Roses" doesn't just mock L.A. life--it bitch-slaps the entire concept of West Coast pop, and "Barrier Reef" is the best anthem to Cannabis sativa since "Humboldt" (from the previous Hawks record, Grapevine). These guys even have the cojones to snipe at the Lone Star State in the form of "Houston Romance" (which they swear is mostly true). And, really, who could disagree with a lyric like "Texas City, Corpus Christi, it's not the humidity, it's the humanity / it's not the insensitivity, it's the insanity / Corpus Christi, Texas City"? This will also certainly be the only alt-country disc this year to contain a line like "Nixon was headin' to that big white house / and the bombs would soon be droppin' on the children of Laos." Seldom has there been an album with such joyous music-making, such corrosive, acid-etched lyrics. Way cosmic.
       
                     -- William Michael Smith

L.A. WEEKLY

"These freewheeling lords of California psych country approach their music as if it were a portal, an unseen threshold that, once crossed, promises a wholly unpredictable experience. The Hawks? singular style operates on an epic scale, exploring weird panoramas of hallucinatory metaphor with a sound as much traditional hillbilly as it is accelerated lysergic-rock spontaneity. Any flight taken with I See Hawks In L.A. assures a view to startling new perspectives. Up, up and away."
                                                                                   --Jonny Whiteside

                                                                                                                                                                             
"With its new album 'Grapevine,' the evocatively named band I See Hawks In L.A. has secured its place at the head of the city's country-rock and psychedelic cowboy faction."
       
                                            --Richard Cromelin, Los Angeles Times 

"Do two great groups constitute a, you know, scene?  Along with Beachwood Sparks, the Hawks have updated Southern California country rock.   Their music, driven by the fine steel guitarist Paul Lacques, is sinewy yet poetic--more nihilistic than decadent, with an urban-desert poetry all its own."
                                      -- Richard Gehr, Village Voice

"Grapevine" named to Best of 2004, 2005 lists:

                     No Depression Top 100 CDs of 2004 
           Philip Van Vleck, Village Voice
                     Freeform American Roots DJ Poll (#6)
           Bliss, Pasadena Weekly (#1)     
           W.M. Smith, No Depression      
           The Miller Tells Her Tale, SpydaRadio (UK) 
             WNCW Listener's Poll
             KZSU (Stanford) Top 11                             
           Insurgency Country (Germany) 
           Lost Saloon, WRIR (Album Of The Year)
                     Music Without Boundaries, KPRI
           Freight Train Boogie Listener's Poll
                                Kay Clement, Don Grant, Freight Train Boogie  
                       Vielen Dank Top Ten, Netherlands
           The Music Never Stops, Barry Smolin, KPFK
           TwangCast Top 10
             Top Ten Concerts of 2005, Best New Artist 2005,
                                       Mark Whittington, San Jose Mercury News

Formed in 2000 by Rob Waller and brothers Paul and Anthony Lacques during a philosophical discussion and rock throwing session on an East Mojave desert trek, I See Hawks In L.A. wrote their first batch of songs and then sought advice from local country rock guru David Jackson, sideman with John Denver, Dillard and Clark, and Emmy Lou Harris.

Jackson set up a few mics and recorded Rob and Paul, playing along on bass.  This demo turned into featured songs on the Hawks eponymous debut on now-defunct Ethic Records, featuring legendary fiddler Brantley Kearns (Dwight Yoakam, Dave Alvin, Hazel Dickens).  The CD established the Hawks signature sound: high lonesome three part harmonies, twang guitar and unadorned acoustic arrangements, with lyrics musing on mortality, whales, and the geography of pre-apocalyptic L.A.   I See Hawks In L.A. received rave reviews, made the F.A.R. Alternative Country Chart, and continues to get regular airplay.   With its experimental spirit and wide ranging musical influences, the record tweaks some traditionalists.  But most agree that th