California Vacation

For my spring break I went to Hermosa Beach, CA. Since I had no idea what to do in terms of nightlife, I checked all the live music venues I know of in the surrounding area. It just so happened that Iration, a Hawaiian reggae band that I have seen before and wrote about in a previous post, was holding a CD release party at the Roxy in Hollywood. Even though I've already seen Iration, I really enjoy their old roots reggae sound and thought their new album release party would be a really cool event. I am EXTREMELY glad I decided to attend this event, because I discovered a new band that I have been listening to a lot recently. Zen Robbi, a Long Beach, CA based rock/blues/funk/jazz/reggae band, was one of the opening acts for Iration, and completely stole the whole night to me. Their fusion of many diverse genres of music is awesome, and quite different than the kind of music that was being played that night, which surprised me that they were on the ticket. To go along with their tunes was their impeccable style, which was very typical of the SoCal scene, and combined with their music created a groovy environment. I enjoyed their performance so much that I went to the Merchandise booth during Iration's set and purchased a CD -Heavy Lies the Crown- and shirt. Zen Robbi has three CDs out right now, all of which can be purchased on iTunes or Amazon. "Heavy Lies the Crown" was the only one available that night, and has been on repeat for a couple of days and will be for a while. While all of the tracks are worth listening to, my favorite has to be track #2, "Dance Of The Matador." I would easily recommend this band to anyone who appreciates up and coming bands with excellent instrumentals and quality songs filled with fun. Attached is a video of Zen Robbi's song "Black Jack Guru" from their CD release party at the Roxy back in February. They played this song at the concert i went to also. Enjoy

Black Jack Guru (Live at the Roxy 2/2/10) - Zen Robbi