BULLETIN.
"WELCOME TO THE ROOM" Musical Escape at the Santa Barbara Bowl
Khruangbin’s psychedelic “A La Sala” tour turns the Santa Barbara Bowl into an open-air dreamscape
Khruangbin onstage. Photo by Nicole Johnson.
by Nicole Johnson
On May 21, Texas indie rock trio Khruangbin cast a hypnotic spell over the Santa Barbara Bowl, transforming the elevated amphitheater into something between a living room and a lucid dream. On tour for their fourth studio album, “A La Sala”—Spanish for “to the living room”—the band made good on the name, crafting an intimate, outdoor sanctuary from the Bowl’s iconic hilltop setting.
Set high above the coastline, the venue’s stone-flanked stage and descending seats open a window to endless sea and sky. As the sun melted into the Pacific, Khruangbin’s echoing guitar twangs and wispy snare taps floated into the horizon, a haze of rainbow lights and warm smoke curling around the trio as if summoned.
Shoulder-to-shoulder in general admission, my 14 friends and I grooved to the band’s genre-bending sound—a style so fluid that it’s become a category of its own in our house and on the music scene.
Hailing from Houston, the trio—composed of lead guitarist Mark “Marko” Speer, bass guitarist Laura Lee “Leezy” Ochoa, and drummer Donald “DJ” Johnson—defies borders, pulling from a portfolio of global influences like Iranian pop, Thai rock, and American soul. They’re famous for reverb-heavy riffs, honey-thick slow burns, and liquid funk grooves; and “A La Sala” followed suit, brewing a sonic alchemy fit for the open air.
Mark "Marko" Speer and Laura Lee "Leezy" Ochoa. Photo by Nicole Johnson.
Tracks like “Fifteen Fifty Three” stretched out with mesmerizing viscosity, while songs like “May Ninth” cascaded like rolling hills, sounding like a formal invitation into the bliss of late spring—or, on this night, early summer. Psychedelic sounds and vivid sights transported us to other places entirely: a balmy summer in the tropics, a South American jungle trek, or a Texas backroad trip. Yet we had nowhere else to be but here, now.
Bassist Laura Leezy, famous for never repeating an outfit, donned a light blue top and pants set, layered with a long tutu that bounced playfully as she swayed—and sometimes jumped—about the stage. As always, both guitarists sported their signature wigs and fringes: Leezy’s a pin-straight inky black bob, and Marko’s a head of dark wavy locks.
The pair are never seen or photographed without their wigs on, adding to their already enigmatic personas. Despite their mystique, Khruangbin’s performance felt deeply authentic, offering an intimate peek into their studio recordings, and dare I say, their souls.
Laura Lee "Leezy" Ochoa and Mark "Marko" Speer.
Photo by Nicole Johnson.
Khruangbin during a set. Photo by Nicole Johnson.
As they continued, each song unfolded like a dream: some funky and free, others with a measured quietude—but none exercising caution. “A Love International,” a leading single released before the full album and a personal favorite of mine, mesmerized with bold lead guitar lines that were equal parts spicy and sultry. “Farolim de Felgueiras,” a meditative and almost haunting guitar solo, broke up the set like a restorative exhale.
Before the show, I reread something Leezy said about the album’s title: “A La Sala” was a phrase she shouted around the house as a young girl to gather her family in the living room.
“That’s kind of what recording the new album felt like,” she said of making the record. “Emotionally there was a desire to get back to square one between the three of us, to where we came from—in sonics and feeling. Let’s get back there.”
And that’s exactly where they took us—not just to their beginnings, but to ours too. When crowd-favorite “Time (You and I)” came on near the end of the set and sparked a full-lyric singalong (a treasured rarity, since the Khruangbin’s songs have few lyrics), it felt, to my friends and I, less like a concert and more like a homecoming to years past, when the tune was a soundtrack to our Santa Barbara salad days.
Mark "Marko" Speer and Laura Lee "Leezy" Ochoa. Photo by Nicole Johnson.
As we enter our final weeks as UC Santa Barbara seniors, Khruangbin infused an everlasting warmth into a night I’m already nostalgic for; a dream I never want to wake up from.