Astrologer's Imperial Bedroom

GUEST POST + NEW 30-SONG PLAYLIST: Andrew Cline

Sep 03, 2024

Andrew Cline and Candy Caballero-Cline of Astrologer.

Phoenix is an island unto itself; a place where warped artists are born in the oppressive desert sun.

It is the primordial home from whence I sprang in 1986, too late to revel in the heat-exhausted art scenes of yore, but wholly immersed in its legend.

In 1998, my father got me a Tascam Portastudio MKII to record my own fledgling attempts at music, unknowingly planting the flag for a new-and-sovereign nation in My Inner World: The Nation of Recorded Sound. God bless him for that.

Like many of you, dear RTL readers, I spent much of my adolescence hunkered down over my four-track machine, learning how to write songs to learn how to record them.

I made discographies that included all my progress and fleeting whims; sound collages, pop songs, jokes, warbling nothingnesses. In my youth and ignorance, I rarely, if ever, dubbed these sonic adventures to tapes that would play in one’s boombox, leaving me an invisible body-of-work that only I would ever listen to, directly from my Tascam. I imagined myself a star in My Inner World.

This mindset was omnipresent in the making of Astrologer’s latest album, Astrologer Fleetwood Sprawl (Lolipop Records). It is a homespun shambles, the kind of album that is made without the input of, or consideration for, the outside world. It is the sound of friends, living together in an apartment complex, hanging around, having a laugh.

Like my youth, spent in my imperial bedroom, the lion’s share of what we made began on a Tascam four-track machine, as we wiled away hours in the purple-orange Phoenician evenings of 2023. Every feverish idea found its way onto the tape until it simply became the album I always wanted to make: the album of my teenage dreams.

In celebration of the fulfillment of this dream, I was invited to make a list of 30 of my favorite lo-fi/bedroom/eccentric pop songs, a request I was only too happy to oblige!

This playlist provides context for my existence, where I come from, and insight into the type of artist I am. It includes the weirdos of Phoenix’s storied past (Meat Puppets, Sun City Girls), my beloved foundational influences (Paul Westerberg, Elliott Smith), and an excellent smattering of bedroom greats for all time (Kelley Stoltz, The Bevis Frond, etc.)

I hope this transmission finds you well, from My Inner World to yours.

1. Outrageous Cherry – “Sign of the Times”

A couple years ago, I had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with Bobby Harlow, the wildly talented multi-hyphenate artist, while recording at the Lolipop Records compound in LA. At some point in our rambling conversations about what makes a record ‘great,’ he introduced me to the shambolic expanse that is Outrageous Cherry. They did everything I want to do, first! They even covered “Days” by Television when I was still in high school. My envy of their leader-genius Matthew Smith knows no bounds. If you’re out there Matthew, we love you!

2. Elliott Smith – “The White Lady Loves You More” / Paul Westerberg – “$100 Groom”

I couldn’t possibly choose to highlight either of these artists above the other; they are too important to my development. When I was 16 years old, there were no two songwriters I wanted to copy more than Paul Westerberg and Elliott Smith. Their sincerity, introversion, and ambivalence to the music industry at large spoke deeply to me as a young man. When Elliott Smith died, I stayed home from school and cried like he was my best friend. The truth is, he was.

The Replacements were my favorite band the day my father dropped the needle on his worn copy of Sorry, Ma, and remained so for many years. They’re on this list, too, in demo form, but I felt it more appropriate to highlight a song from Westerberg’s criminally under-appreciated bedroom album, Folker. The album comes closest to being in sonic alignment with Westerberg’s personality and perspectives, in my humble opinion.

3. Serene Dominic – “I Prefer”

I covered a song called “Out of Control” on Fleetwood Sprawl, written by Phoenician polymath Jaime Paul Lamb and performed by his unjustly-forgotten band The Gnomes, but I could just as easily chosen to cover a song by the equally-wonderful Serene Dominic.

He represents the best traits of the eccentric Phoenix I come from. He has made a nearly-unbroken stream of music since he began recording in the 1980s, and ventures often into theatre, performance art, and criticism. He’s probably making an album as we speak!

4. Family Fodder – “Cold Wars”

My wife and partner in Astrologer, Candy Caballero-Cline, came into my life in early 2021 after independently going on sabbatical from our hometowns to the mountains of northern Arizona. She left LA to set out on her own, while I narrowly escaped Phoenix. By the by, when we met at the haunted Hotel Monte Vista in Flagstaff, Arizona, she introduced me to this wonderful band. I fell in love, on both counts.

5. The Frogs – “Layin’ Down My Love 4 U”

What can one say about The Frogs except that they did whatever they wanted to, no matter how inflammatory or controversial! Like other projects on my playlist that remained relegated to the underground (R. Stevie Moore, the Bevis Frond, etc.) The Frogs were steadfast and true to their vision, typically at the expense of the possibility of a successful career had they only compromised it. They certainly didn’t lack the talent or wherewithal. Alas, being true to oneself is the mark of a great artist, in my opinion, and The Frogs are exemplary of this philosophy. And they’re silly!