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Best Of 2012, Guest Editors: Beachwood Sparks On The Integratron (A Southern California Landmark And Geomagnetic Vortex)

As 2012 has come to an end, we are taking a look back at some of our favorite posts of the year by our guest editors.

They burned brightly, but briefly. Now, they have rekindled the flame. For Beachwood Sparks, the metaphor is all too easy and all too apt. The band’s discography is succinct: two albums, plus an EP and a few singles. There wasn’t much, but there was something indelible about those records. They took the cosmic American music of the Flying Burrito Brothers and Byrds, added the bittersweet sounds of middle-period Beach Boys and Sister Lovers Big Star, then turned them into a sun-dappled, dreamy, psychedelic brand of alt-country. But by 2002, Beachwood had run its course, and the group disbanded amicably, five years after it formed. Now a decade later, Beachwood Sparks—guitarists Farmer Dave Scher and Chris Gunst, bassist Brent Rademaker and drummer Aaron Sperske—is back with The Tarnished Gold (Sub Pop). The quartet will also be guest editing magnet magazine.com all week. Read our new feature on the band.

Scher: Eighteen Ley lines intersect … three deep underground desert rivers … a geomagnetic vortex known by bipeds since time immemorial. Clouds circle like the end of Ghostbusters around the area occupied by the dome. The brainchild of Van Tassel after going on an intergalactic cruise with Sol Ganda. Sacred architecture. Low-frequency emissions permeate the area, amplified by the the Integratron‘s design, and the tones coming from the crystal bowls. A sound bath for you and your cells. The Integratron may not have been completed to do the cell revitalization it was intended to do, but it still has plenty to offer. A heavy experience.

Video after the jump.