Photograph © Diana
Adams
Love as Laughter started as Sam Jayne and whatever sounds he put together on a series of multi-track cassette recorders, glorious love-pop-mess. Now Love As Laughter has morphed into L\A\L, a band that features Dave Schneider on drums (Dave was once in the seminal combo Lync with Sam; he also drums for Satisfact) and guitarist Jessica Espeleta.
L\A\L is beyond what Love as Laughter once was; this is a new breed of bleeding gums rock'n'roll that has no equal in time.
The two previous L\A\L 45s (the Fever ep and "I'm a Bee" single) give an indication of what is on the way in: Large American Distortion played by pale lit cross-dressing (cotton and polyester) hipsters.
#1 U.S.A. is what is happening with L\A\L in 1998, the rock'n'roll record Mick Jagger has privately admitted he wishes he had made. If Batman and Robin were blasting the batcave, playing their Japanese Les Paul copies with plastic nipple guitar picks through atom-powered amplifiers, they might qualify for an opening slot on the L\A\L #1 U.S.A. promotional tour. They might be eligible to clean Sam Jayne's boots.
When you listen to #1U.S.A., you will play it loud, and the resulting turmoil will cause you to behave with rampant teen abandon. You will skip school and not give a darn about how it'll look on your permanent record. You will catch slow blues fever and fail your next drug test. #1 U.S.A. is the noisy rockin' counter-culture soundtrack for a century's end.