Their atmospheric guitar rock has taken a while to catch on, but now at least one music publication has labeled them 'the new queens of the underground.'

After nearly six years on the local scene, Warpaint had little to its résumé: one EP, a rotating cast of drummers and a string of dead-end day jobs.

Stella Mozgawa, however, wanted in. A session drummer who had toured her native Australia with Devo, there was little doubt Mozgawa had the chops. Yet singer-guitarist Emily Kokal was skeptical, and there were five words she needed to hear first.

Mozgawa recalled how she leveled with Kokal, essentially asking the singer for the gig last fall at Silver Lake's Stella Café: "I said, 'I'm ready to be poor.'"

And thus, Mozgawa had said the magic phrase needed to gain entry into an atmospheric rock quartet whose future even an optimist would have likely deemed perilous.

"Here was Stella, who made money and made a living," Kokal said Tuesday at dinner with her bandmates at Hollywood's Sushi Ike. "We were really broke. I didn't want her to think that she could do this on the side. She had to commit. So when she said she was ready to be poor, we were cool."

If afforded time, the songs of Warpaint, which don't build so much as materialize, are full of lurking surprises. With intricate guitars that stress patience and ambience, perhaps it's no revelation that it's taken Warpaint, whose members range in age from the mid-20s to early 30s, nearly seven years to have anything resembling a career.

The band last year inked a worldwide deal with storied British independent Rough Trade, a label associated with dream-pop act the Raincoats and '80s alt-rock forebears the Smiths, among many others. Since aligning recently with the Beggars Group, a consortium of sorts of independent labels that includes Matador Records, 4AD and XL, Rough Trade has become increasingly active, and is doing so at a time when the Beggars Group has set its sights on Los Angeles.

"We were looking at a lot of artists to sign who are based in L.A., and we still are," said Miwa Okumura, an L.A. native who relocated here one year ago from Beggars' U.S. headquarters in New York City to open an Echo Park outpost. "There's a growing music community here. It's always existed, and I get that. But there's so much going on right now."

The FYF Fest marks the unofficial close of the outdoor rock 'n' roll festival season in Southern California, bringing it to an end with dissonant guitars, vocal yelps, disaffected beach-bum punks and even a song or two inspired by the Civil War. Thirty bands and three stages, the all-day affair at the L.A. State Historic Park falls somewhere between a neighborhood block party and Chicago's Pitchfork Music Festival, taking a smaller, more targeted approach to the multi-act bill.

Plenty of it is adventurous, and some of it is even a bit tuneless. Yet the celebration of the underground, the niche and the weird is also a bargain. Tickets started at $20 for early-bird buyers, and in the days leading up to the fest, now in its second year in Chinatown, have risen only to $30. 

Rare, indeed, is an affordable all-day fest that is as pridefully left-of-center as FYF. With a bill built for discovery -- as well as one that contains plenty of local heroes -- Pop & Hiss breaks down the must-see-acts and those you may want to investigate, time permitting. The hour-by-hour guide is below.

According to NME, Warpaint, our local practitioners of wooze rock, will be releasing their Rough Trade debut in October. "The Fool" will come out Oct. 26 in the U.S. (and Oct. 25 in the U.K.) with production by Jon Brion collaborator Tom Biller, who also recently manned the mix for the Liars' fantastic "Sisterworld" album.

The new record should be the crowning touch on a great fall for the L.A. quartet: They also snagged a high-profile opening slot with the xx, the current darlings of minimalist indie R&B. The two bands will be passing through the Hollywood Palladium on Sept. 22.

In addition to Biller's work, "The Fool" also features mixes from Siouxsie Sioux and New Order DJ-collaborator Andrew Weatherall, and Adam Samuels, who has worked with John Frusciante, a key advocate for Warpaint (he mixed their Manimal Vinyl EP, "Exquisite Corpse").

Track listing for "The Fool":

"Set Your Arms"
"Warpaint" *
"Undertow"
"Bees"
"Shadows"
"Composure"
"Baby"
"Majesty"
"Lissie’s Heart Murmur" *

-- Margaret Wappler

*By the way, Pop & Hiss is very encouraged by any band that references its own name in song, as well as heart murmurs; we have one too.

Updated: We added the U.S. release date of Oct. 26.

Photo: Warpaint. Credit: Rough Trade

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The gauzy L.A. quartet Warpaint just landed one of the most plum opening slots on the fall touring circuit. In September and October, the band will warm up crowds for the xx for 10 dates across America and Canada, including a Sept. 22 stop at the Hollywood Palladium. The xx, we can confirm, are putting on one heck of a show these days, so bravo on that booking, Warpaint.

Hopefully, the sight of all those thousands of sad, black-clad kids will prod them to finish their much-awaited debut full-length with local producer Tom Biller for Rough Trade. Full schedule after the jump.

-- August Brown