C.D. Singles Club #50 – Elaine Lachica – Behind My Mind

When I listen to Elaine Lachica, I can’t help but think of Jessie Torrisi.

Strike that – when I listen to Elaine Lachica, I can’t help but think of her music in the same way I think of Jessie Torrisi’s music. Clearly, Lachica’s careful big city lounge sound is as different from Torrisi’s earthy Texas swing, but both artists put out well-crafted and sincerely good and lovely songs, but in doing so keep things as indie legit as any other pitchfork darling of the week. That is, like Torrisi, Elaine puts out a straightforward sound that is just as indie as any hyper-kinetic and cacaphonous track that Animal Collective puts out. (Before our readership bolts, let me be clear: I am in no way slagging Animal Collective. I’m just saying that being indie is more than having a complex or at least non-mainstream sound; it is also about a certain artistic ethos, at least in how art is produced.)

The opening track on Lachica’s forthcoming album, I Think I Can See The Ocean, “Behind My Mind” could be easily mistaken for a recording by some music school kids looking for part-time gigs to pay tuition in swanky nightclubs in the Catskills. At least, you could make that mistake until you hear about the indie rock pedigree of her backing band, which features regulars from acts like New York Dolls and Antony and the Johnsons, or the fact that her foray into professional musicianship was initiated when, as a toddler, she fell in love with a Cocteau Twins single. (A toddler!) While she may have subsequently trained at the Peabody and the Royal College of Music and is currently teach singing at a prestigious New York university, she’s kept her art very real, which is as indie as it gets. Just ’cause you rock doesn’t mean you can’t be serious, right?

Elaine Lachica’s I Think I Can See The Ocean drops on February 23rd via Stunning Models on Display.

Elaine Lachica – Behind My Mind