Bad Weather California

Eclectic alt-folk purveyors Bad Weather California draw influences from '60s psychedelia, reggae, and African music traditions to create a soundtrack worthy of any freakout or happening. The group began in 1998 as the collective the Love Letter Band, who released a handful of records on Boyracer frontman Stewart Anderson's 555 imprint, but following various lineup changes renamed themselves Bad Weather California (their first choice, California, was already in use by a Los Angeles-based roots rock outfit). The band is comprised of core members singer/guitarist Chris Adolf, guitarist Adam Baumeister (Littles Paia, DJ Freedom Hater), bassist/guitarist/backing vocalist Joe Sampson (A Dog Paloma, Wentworth Kersey), and drummer Logan Corcoran (M Pyres, Team Awesome). Adolf and Baumeister met through the late-'90s home recording community, and by 2002 a mutual friend linked up Adolf and Sampson. Bad Weather California toured with Mount Eerie in fall 2006, offered a single for Happy Happy Birthday to Me a year later, and acted as the backing band for Daniel Johnston in a rare spring 2008 gig. The following winter, the band played with Akron/Family for the first time, the beginning of what would be a long relationship between the two groups, and soon after released its full-length debut, Young Punks, on the States Rights label. As 2011 arrived, Bad Weather California called on Akron/Family singer/multi-instrumentalist Seth Olinsky to record sophomore album Sunkissed at High Bias Studios in Detroit, tiding over fans in the meantime with a limited-edition demos/concert recordings LP on St. Ives. The rest of 2011 saw the band touring with Meat Puppets and releasing a single for Fire Talk; as the following year began, they hit the road with Akron/Family and released Sunkissed on Akron/Family's own Family Tree label.