It should be well established at this point that the Garden Amp in Garden Grove is one of the best places to see a gig in SoCal during a pandemic. That said, this excellent indie-rock bill is going on in the adjoining indoor Locker Room. Still, there’s plenty of outdoor space to enjoy.

The California band with a jumbled name, Crossing I’s Dotting T’s, released their self-titled debut EP in August of which frontman Matt Mucerino said:

“This EP is inspired by the death of my cousin/best friend who left us at the age of 21 due to cancer. ‘See You At Your Funeral’ is specifically about him, and the remaining songs talk of depression, anxiety, questioning society, the inevitability of death, as well as just simply not feeling wanted in certain moments. It is a mixed bag with no one main influence, but we took inspiration from a lot of 90’s alt rock bands like Nirvana, The Pixies, Foo Fighters, Jawbreaker, as well as newer bands such as Joyce Manor, to create a blueprint for what Crossing I’s Dotting T’s will sound like. It is Grunge meets Emo meets Alt-Rock meets Pop-Punk. A quick 4-song EP, there is something for everyone on this.”

Elsewhere on the bill is S8nt Elektric, Velvet Starlings, Fencer, Jordi, and the awesome Broken Baby. The latter were on the cover last year, and singer Amber Bollinger said of the pandemic:

“It gave us time to rewrite our album. We had our album done in 2019, and then lockdown happened and we were like, ‘Fuck. What are we going to do with this?’ We basically scrapped four or five songs, and rewrote them. We got rid of songs and wrote new ones, and that upped the ante for us. Also, we realized that we couldn’t tour and get out, so how could we connect with the music scene around us? That’s when we started doing little collabs. We did one with Tummyache and the split with Egg Drop Soup, just to bring the community closer together. I hate saying it, but the pandemic was great for our creativity at least.”

The event takes place at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, January 15 at the Garden Amp.

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