Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor want to psych you out

Two songs into the set, Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor singer and guitarist Sean Morrow queries the quaint, intimate crowd at PJ's Lager House: "How many people were at the Last Supper?" After a few chuckles a voice in the back shouts, "Twelve!" "That's more people than who showed up here tonight," Morrow chuckles. The small gathering is unusual, as the trio has been enjoying a stretch of really good and crowded shows. But despite that, they stormed through their set as if feeding on the energy of a roomful of sweaty, fist-jacking fans — a rock show by definition.

Morrow cradles the microphone, fiercely staring out into what singers stare out into, which now can only be the abyss, intoning of dark things. As he shakes and scrapes his candy-red guitar, he periodically twirls various knobs on his effects board — which looks rather like a space shuttle cockpit. Eric Oppitz stands firm, his huge hands wrestle out guttural bass notes, while Rick Sawoscinski pounds his drums with a kind of tribal patience. All the while trippy images bounce about the stage via projectors. The whole thing's a neo-psych headfuck: sometimes groovy and illuminating, other times downright creepy.

The Livonia-based Sisters crew has turned heads in and around these parts for the last few years. They've rocked Austin Psych Fest, Blowout and, back in April, opened for (and maybe even upstaged) the Black Angels. Now they're set to release their sophomore album, the aptly titled Spectra Spirit, this Friday, Nov. 11, on Detroit's cleverly monikered and intensely local New Fortune Records (Ricky Rat, the High Strung, the Boxing Lesson). Then they're off on an East Coast tour beginning in Cleveland. 

Some backstory: Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor rose in 2009 from the ashes of garagists' SikSik Nation; same exact band, different name. 

Why the name change?

Where SikSik Nation would throw a barrage of neat, tri-minute toe-tappers at you, Sisters aim to, as Morrow once put it, "give you life in an hour." 

But isn't Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor a bit unwieldy for a band name? It even has more words than the band does members. ... 

No, Oppitz says. The hefty moniker definitely catches people's eyes. "People often say to us: 'What do I do, fucking trip acid before I see you guys?"

In the basement of Morrow's place out in Livonia, the band has set up a recording studio, which they've christened Space Camp Studios. Originally, the cozy, low-lit, all-analog spot was built to capture the band's lengthy jams, but they've also taken to recording local bands such as Pewter Cub, Haunted Leather and Bright Echo.

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