Ganglians

Falling somewhere between the noise-pop of bands like Wavves and Woods and the blissed-out psychedelia of the Beach Boys, Sacramento, CA’s Ganglians features Ryan Grubbs, Kyle Hoover, Alex Sowles, and Adrian Comenzind. Grubbs encountered Sowles after relocating from Portland, OR to Sacramento, where he also crossed paths with Comenzind, who in turn connected him with Hoover. The four began exchanging home-recorded tracks, and when Grubbs received an invitation to perform live, Hoover, Comenzind, and Sowles stepped in as his supporting players. Their moniker arose from fusing “gang” with “aliens,” unrelated to any anatomical reference. Much of 2008 found them laying down material, resulting in a debut single—a limited-edition split 7" alongside Eat Skull—that surfaced in January 2009 via Dulc-i-Tone Records. Momentum built swiftly, marked by a slot at that year’s South by Southwest festival in March, followed within weeks by both a self-titled EP and the full-length Monster Head Room, both issued in May on the hip lo-fi label Woodsist. Whereas the earlier Ganglians release had been abrasive and self-recorded, Monster Head Room benefited from the guidance of an engineer friend who shaped a cleaner yet simultaneously innocent and trippy sound. The group spent the summer on the road, including a performance at the Smmr Bmmr festival in Portland, before rounding out the year with a 7" on Captured Tracks in October. Shortly afterward they signed to Lefse Records, and in 2011 they enlisted Dirty Projectors’ producer Robby Moncrieff to helm their second studio album, Still Living.