Earlimart

L.A.’s Earlimart sounds like a lightweight version of Californian psych-pop bards Grandaddy, which is not an official slight. Grandaddy guitarist Jim Fairchild is a new addition to the band, and he and front man Aaron Espinoza co-produced Treble & Tremble, Earlimart’s new album. The disc’s title is way apt: tinny guitar strums and creamy keyboard plinks glued together with lots of white-noise tape-deck hum and forlorn lonely-instrument buzz, topped off by Espinoza’s quavery vocals, which aren’t quite as little-man-in-a-big-world as Grandaddy singer Jason Lytle’s or Flaming Lip Wayne Coyne’s but inspire plenty of hangdog pathos nonetheless. Live, they’re a little snoozeworthy but in a way stressed-out studio engineers will likely appreciate.