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California Sounds: Hear new music from Jahkoy, Leslie Stevens and Lustmord

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We’ve got bad news for Hank Williams Jr., who famously sang that “If heaven ain’t a lot like Dixie, I don’t want to go.” Shangri-La, it turns out, more resembles California. The good news for Williams? Evidence cited below suggests that even if he’s not happy with his fate, he can at least continue his Williams family tradition in the afterlife.

Jahkoy, “California Heaven (feat. Schoolboy Q)” (Def Jam). The 22-year-old Toronto emigre Jahkoy Palmer recently landed in Los Angeles, and on “California Heaven” the R&B singer lists in a love letter to the city the many reasons why he headed south.

As Jahkoy makes his case that “Heaven must be somewhere in California,” the slow groove track, produced by longtime Usher collaborator Rico Love, propels lyrics that update the orange-crate art themes that during the early 20th century painted Southern California as Utopia. (Warning: The below clip contains cussing.)

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“They party on the weekdays in L.A.,” sings Jahkoy, repeating the line with wonder at the notion of such a place. “I swear they know all the DJs/ Walk in the club and don’t pay/ Man, they must be so paid in L.A.” (Oh we are, Jahkoy, we are.)

A few verses in, Los Angeles native Schoolboy Q enters like a hustling Huell Howser to advocate on his hometown’s behalf -- kind of. Specifically, Q celebrates his Southern California bedroom prowess by rapping bars that have little to do with our fair city per se — although at one point he does suggest cruising down Figueroa Street while having sex in his Rolls-Royce, which isn’t a bad way to spend a Sunday morning -- but everything to do with making love with an L.A. woman.

“There’s nothing but angels out there — a place filled with angels, I swear,” sings Jahkoy to close. “They say come and join us/ The weather’s much warmer/ Heaven’s California.”

Leslie Stevens, “Everybody Drinks and Drives in Heaven” (self-released). The Los Angeles singer-songwriter Leslie Stevens’ version of heaven features fewer palm trees and less ocean breeze and more woozy cruising and heavy boozing.

Stevens used to lead a terrific country band called the Badgers, whose 2009 album “Roomful of Smoke” is a lesser-known gem, and she has long been a regular at the city’s singer-songwriter clubs such as the Hotel Cafe, the Bootleg and the Grand Ole Echo series.

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After taking time off to raise her baby daughter, she just issued her long-delayed solo debut. Called “The Donkey and the Rose,” its nine songs contemplate nature, love and getting drunk in the afterlife.

“Everybody drinks and drives in heaven,” declares Stevens with heavy twang, naming “Mother Mary, Jesus too, Washington and Martin Lu” as fellow revelers. The uptempo song continues while the singer details the blessed debauchery.

Most other laws apply, she sings, but there are no hangovers or headaches. “When it rains, it rains Champagne in heaven/ And Jack & Coke’s made with cocaine in heaven/ When you crash your car and meet your death/ the angels all have whiskey breath/ And they bring you up/ To drink and drive in heaven.”

Even better? “No condoms, no birth control/ Because everybody’s dead, you know/ Driving like a bat out of hell in heaven.” Elsewhere on “The Donkey and the Rose” the artist is more contemplative, and she uses her pitch-perfect tone to explore minor key heartbreak and other earthly concerns.

Lustmord, “Astronomicon” (Touch). The Welsh experimental noise composer — and avowed atheist — who records as Lustmord relocated to Los Angeles a few decades ago, has designed sound for films including “The Crow,” “From Dusk ‘Til Dawn” and “Tank Girl,” and collaborated with musicians including the Melvins, Coil and Tool.

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Lustmord (Brian Williams) has little time for heaven. On his new album, “Dark Matter,” though, he shows an affinity for the heavens, and the results are eerily astounding. Composed using an audio library of cosmological activity collected by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA and private sources, the three long, free-floating works on the album use sound recordings of outer space to create monolithic layers of tones and textures.

“While space is a virtual vacuum,” writes Williams in the liner notes, “it does not mean there is no sound in space.” Rather, he explains that it “exists in space as naturally occurring electromagnetic vibrations.” Some are within the range of human hearing; those that aren’t, Williams filtered through software to bring them within a discernible range.

The 20-minute “Astronomicon,” above, suggests hell-based existential anxiety, not Leslie Stevens’ consequence-free heaven. Lustmord’s music has come to define an experimental sub-genre called dark ambient, which is fitting. The low-frequency wooshes, creepy clangs and buzzing swarms within combine to suggest some coming Armageddon.

There’s a lot of terrible music out there. For tips on the stuff that’s not, follow Randall Roberts on Twitter: @liledit

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