Earlimart: Treble & Tremble (Blueberry Wax | 180 gram)

Los Angeles-based Earlimart have released a 20th anniversary, first time ever on vinyl, edition of their acclaimed fourth full-length album, Treble & Tremble, and will celebrate with an intimate performance at Scribble in Highland Park, on November 23, their first live performance in a dozen years. With support from longtime friend and collaborator Jason Lytle. Order the 20th anniversary vinyl edition here. Tickets on-sale here.

Earlimart’s Treble & Tremble is a reaction to someone leaving the room without saying a word. It’s a lush, haunting affair informed by loss, but with a determined effort to let go and move on, tying clean knots from a tangle of loose ends. With numerous references to telephones, reports, conversation and music itself, Treble and Tremble is about communication and how we fail to communicate. Yet, amid the white noise, the record is also a celebration of the moments we break through.

“At its heart,” says Earlimart singer/songwriter Aaron Espinoza, “it’s a record about love.”

Treble & Tremble was produced and recorded by Espinoza, Murray and Jim Fairchild (Grandaddy) at Espinoza’s studio The Ship, still home to a collective of like-minded artists expertly hidden amongst the hot bed of cool kids in Glassell Park, CA. The Ship studio – constructed by Espinoza, formerly employed as a carpenter among several other amusing vocational diversions – has also earned a reputation outside of Earlimart, hosting sessions by Ben Gibbard, Silversun Pickups, Grandaddy, FIDLAR, Weezer, Folk Implosion, the Breeders, Kevin Parker and more, over the years.

Treble & Tremble is filled with the warm, breathy vocals and expansive arrangements that has earned the band’s full seven album discography critical praise from journalists and peers alike. Crafted by piano-driven melodies, layered in a patchwork of guitars and strings, the finished tracks are the accomplished efforts of Espinoza’s expanding production expertise. The record’s greatest moments come in repeated listens, when the peppered distortion and crackling noise lifts to reveal striking parts inescapably missed.

Unwavering and accepting, Espinoza closes Treble and Tremble on “It’s Okay to Think About Ending,” easing in with a simple piano and vocal melody before unfolding into something understated yet gorgeous, its orchestral instrumentation delicate and offering the album’s most poignant simple request: “Take care of your heart.”

A sentiment that certainly rings true today – 20 years on – Earlimart’s Treble & Tremble is as important as ever.