Best Coast

Description

Combine the sophisticated chill of a New York City winter with the girlish, laid back romance of California in the summertime and what to you get? The answer is Best Coast, the latest musical endeavor by perennially cool, self-described "weird girl" Bethany Cosentino. Best Coast was born when Cosentino decided to come home to LA after a time in New York City, to get a fresh start at living in the place she knows best - California. Quickly garnering praise from critics and listeners with the single "Sun Was High (So Was I)," Cosentino was approached by UK-based label Blackest Rainbow, who released her now sold-out tape Where the Boys Are. Although Best Coast began in her bedroom, with Cosentino recording demo's all on her own, she soon realized that she could use a little bit of help getting the vibe exactly right. For this she enlisted Bobb Bruno, a staple of the LA music scene who has previously recoded bands like Mika Miko and Abe Vigoda, played with the likes of Nels Cline, and opened for PJ Harvey and Wilco. Cosentino and Bruno have been friends since Cosentino was a teenager, and she knew right away that he was someone she could trust with her project.

Best Coast sounds the way music sounds when it comes over the beach from the parking lot, where the cutest boy in school is getting out of his car. The perfect combination of that naive and nervous excitement of a youthful crush and the fuzzy, think reverb of having been around the block at least once before, Best Coast evokes a nostalgia for the California of Gidget and dates at the soda fountain without forgetting that it is that same California that would later spawn Charles Manson. Cosentino is constantly playing with these dichotomies, as well as toying with the line between childhood and adulthood. By embracing the innocence of summer, of crushes and of the sometimes silly sadness of first heartbreaks with sophisticated songwriting and an impeccably well-crafted sound, Cosentino has captured what makes California great.