It's always great when a rock band reminds us how unnecessary a guitar can be. Had we declined to mention it, you probably wouldn't have noticed the absence of the axe in Mr. Elevator and the Brain Hotel's kaleidoscopic jungle of barreling drums, lumbering bass and screaming organ. Hatched from the South County music scene, fraught with jangly surf rock acts, the trio was an anomaly in its sun-soaked surroundings. Even tracks with titles such as "Staring At the Sun" managed to skip the beach entirely—opting for a heady, San Francisco psychedelic sound, hinged on trance-inducing grooves, squalls of white noise and ominous,... More >>>