Lo Moon: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert

Dec. 5, 2018 | Suraya Mohamed -- They drove into the NPR garage crammed into an extended cargo van, 9 feet tall, instruments and luggage crammed all the way to the ceiling. They didn’t use all of that gear, but even on this mainly acoustic, stripped-down set, Lo Moon radiated a signature sound — intimate and demonstrative, haunting yet uplifting, an old-fashioned rock beat under glimmering guitar and keys, overlaid with beautiful, textured vocals. Lead singer and instrumentalist Matt Lowell says this journey began 5 1/2 years ago with “Loveless,“ the last song in this set. He created the demo version in a basement studio in New York, moved to Los Angeles and then linked up with Crisanta Baker (guitar, bass, keyboards and backing vocals) and multi-instrumentalist and principal guitarist Sam Stewart. They spent months in a backyard shed with gear and guitars everywhere. There they learned to feed off each other, sometimes jamming on two-chord drones for six hours straight without even saying a word. With the l