The Blow
Luke Hearts Khaela


He called me Doll Eyes
He called me Sunrise
He called me Hearty Thighs
He called me Super Size
He called me Heat Lamp
He called me Summer Camp
He called me... Just that once and then he never called again.


"Hey boy," Khaela Maricich sings coyly over the programmed jams finding their way out of Jona Bechtolt's laptop, "why you didn't call me?" The song, track one off the Blow's (formally just Khaela, who was formally Get the Hell Out of the Way of the Volcano) latest extended player Poor Aim: Love Songs is an electro pop groove.

Khaela is standing a mere two feet away from me (opting to perform on the floor rather than the stage), and I can't help but be reminded of the crush I've had on this girl since the first time I heard her voice on the Microphones' "Oh, Anna," floating effortlessly a top a mountain of distortion; it is a fact I was reminded of no less than an hour prior to their performance as she sang along to an instrumental version of "Michelle" at a small sushi diner we dined at a few blocks from where she's currently performing.

Why wouldn't any boy call her? She answers with her own opinion seconds later with a list of possibilities. "A) you're gay; B) you got a girlfriend; C) you kinda thought I came on too strong; or D) I just wasn't your thing, no ring." Regardless, as I see things, this girl must surely be feeling a bit sore, as it is a bit of a fall from Heaven. She sings through the better parts of her previous outings, Bonus Album and The Concussive Caress, or Casey caught her Mom Singing Along with the Vacuum, and the new material, her (their) best to date while dancing and occasionally making eye contact with me.

The first in the Pregnancy Series, the album is, according to States Rights Record's Web site, "a concept EP dealing with misdirected love, failed love songs, and love's failings," but it's also an iPod DJ's dream. It's crafted with pop moments suited to not only be included on a hipster's mix album next to the latest indie-diva Annie, but some songs, like the stuttering "Hock It," could easily get mixed in the shuffle with Xtina or Brit Brit.

"You don't know this," she jokes after singing a song she claims she actually wrote in the hopes of Aguilera someday recording it, "but most songs by pop stars are written by indie girls."

And she's found the perfect musical mate in Jona, who also makes his own music as YACHT, and has played drums for Devandra Banhart.

"He won't admit it, but Jona is a fucking amazing drummer," Kheala tells me. Allegedly, he briefly played with Diddy for an eventually aborted rap/rock album, and was almost coursed into recording drum tracks for The White Stripes. I don't know about his drumming, but the boy's mind blowing energy (shakin' his groove thang like Beck on acid), bizarre stage theatrics (at one point he attacks his laptop with a toy alligator) and '80s break beats all compliment Khaela's open-hearted songs very nicely.

"A few years ago, I said to my friend… 'I would actually rather find somebody to make music with than somebody to date. I mean, if we could make really good music together, that's what I would rather have. Fuck the sex,'" Khaela recently wrote in her blog, The Touch Me Feeling.

There's a certain innocence that comes with the Blow (whose name comes from a time Khaela heard a little boy refer to the wind as such); the naivety, the unironic blog-like style of Khaela's words, and the youthful nature of the duo's real-life actions (I'd tell you how the two met, but they explained it to me with hitch-pitched, squeaky voices in the car with music playing in the background) that's completely unpretentious and very infectious.

Hell, I might not even have a crush on Khaela as much as I do the Blow themselves. As she sings on "Come on Petunia," a hip-hop jam that transforms an old Police staple, "Every little thing she does is magic/Everything she do just turns me on." I can't wait to see what the group has in store.

And Khaela, you can call me anytime.