“All Yours All Mine (Dark Days Mix)” (ASHRR song)

ASHRR2_crop — ASHRR, image courtesy the artists

ASHRR, like some of the most interesting artists from Los Angeles, highlights the experience of the side of the City of Angels that isn’t romanticized on television or in movies. The group’s sound reflects the unusual and surreal qualities of the city’s unique blend of geography and culture as a place where many go to pursue their dreams but finding it far different than anything they would have assumed. ASHRR’s musical vision is more in line with William Friedkin’s and Jeffrey Lee Pierce’s own depictions of Los Angeles and not that of Beverly Hills, 90210 or even Bret Easton Ellis’ nihilistically lurid depictions of the city and its culture. The music video for the group’s song “All Yours All Mine (Dark Days Mix)” is an apt companion to its darkly rich synthesizer melody with a plot like something out of Black Mirror or the new Twilight Zone with a man encountering duplicates of himself at home and lurking about even when he manages to escape the scene in his car into the night. Musically the song is also something like an R&B-inflected, late 80s Depeche Mode song, the aforementioned melody drawing a wide-ranging, pulsing sonic arc. That dynamic suggests the rhythm of night driving and the way street lights can serve as an almost hypnotic strobe to induce an introspective mood. Watch the video on YouTube and follow ASHRR at the links provided.