Thursday, Marsha and I caught Six Organs of Admittance at the Mohawk in downtown Austin. It was a chilly show for a chilly night. I'm a huge fan of Ben Chasny's recorded music, via both Six Organs and Comets on Fire, but the Thursday night show lacked the range and subtlety I associated with that work. Chasny was accompanied by his SO, Elisa Ambrogio (of Magik Markers), and I wondered after the show if the almost-hostile extended feedback jams were a manifestation of tension between them. Understand, it wasn't horrible – they both know how to "play" feedback skillfully, and it's the fuzzier aspects of Six Organs and Comets that I really love. But this show felt overall like a downer; Chasny seemed pissed off, and when the crowed wanted more, he shrugged it off, saying something like "maybe I'm a dick, but we're done." Headdress and My Education opened the show. Headdress was good but a little monotonous... My Education was very good... they made me think of the old Jerry Goodman/Jan Hammer collaboration.
Several vids on Youtube from the great Black Rebel Motorcycle Club performance we caught at La Zona Rosa a week ago...
We don't get out much, but we made a point of catching the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club at La Zona Rosa last night. Marsha wasn't quite sure why I'd picked this particular band to draw us out of our lair, but as we staggered away from the band's phenomenal marathon three-hour-plus set, a third of which was encore, I asked her if she got the point. "You didn't know they were going to be that great," she said... and I had to admit it. Who could've known? The BMRC simply took over the house and blew the roof off, and they were treated to the typical Austin-audience enthusiasm... I figured they weren't accustomed to the raving fan attitude the found at La Zona, where everybody knew their songs, even their more obscure first couple of albums. After they played a couple of songs for the encore, they realized they couldn't stop, so Robert Been would lean. exhausted, bemused, on the speaker after each song and ask the frenzied audience what's next... Heard live, the music was explosive and tight, busy with creative licks and chops and hooks; at one point Marsha said it reminded her of sixties psychedelica, but to the band's sound was mature, i.e. their own despite the obvious influence of bands like Jesus and Mary Chain. (Photo above is a promo from the BRMC web site, and not from last night's show... however I notice the band's web site has a space for fans to upload photos from each show. Here's Austin's.)
My friend Josh Baer has organized a benefit for DonorsChoose, which is "a simple way to provide students in need with resources that our public schools often lack." Just heard that he has tickets left - the benefit's next Sunday, it's for a great cause, and it'll be a terrific evening of music by Stills and Rachel Loy, plus a special guest. Stills, son of Stephen Stills and Veronique Sanson, is an excellent musician who's played with the Jayhawks, Ryan Adams, and (currently) Richard Ashcroft. [Link]
Gina SaputoA non-SXSW music note: my brother's been telling me for years about Gina Saputo, who grew up in his Springfield, Oregon neighborhood and went on to be a very solid jazz singer. I've heard her recordings before, and they were always good, but he just sent me a link to an online music video that's a very tasty bit of jazz rock. This is great, hoping to see her play Austin sometime.
The Holy Modal Rounders just might've been the greatest sixties band, or at least the band that best personified the combination of psychedelic visionary giggle and subversive anarchy that merged into the Great Lost Vibe of sixties subcultural evolution. Something was happening that you can really read about our hear in a song, you had to feel it, and hopefully you can get a sense of it through a Rounders documentary that Ed Ward's just told me about, called Bound to Lose Always a fan of the Rounders, I've never seen them play, and I'm amazed/delighted to see that Pete Stampfel and Steve Weber are still playing. Many know them only through their whacky "If you want to be a bird," from "The Moray Eels Eat the Holy Modal Rounders," a tune everbody heard because it was part of the "Easy Rider" soundtrack. Lots more to hear...
When fiddler Peter Stampfel collided with guitarist Steve Weber during the "Great Folk Scare" of the early sixties in New York, the two musicians formed a powerful bond based on their shared fascination with American roots music and early psychedelia. Dubbing themselves The Holy Modal Rounders, these eccentric outsiders have been playing their unique brand of psychedelic folk for over four decades, barely surviving on the fringes of the music industry while drawing a dedicated following of luminaries and lunatics. From their origins in New York's Greenwich Village folk scene and their involvement in the Easy Rider soundtrack, to the lost years of constant drug use, endless touring and a final shot at redemption, Bound To Lose recounts the unique forty-year history of these true American originals. With startling intimacy, Bound to Lose also documents the band's arduous, amusing, and sometimes heartbreaking struggle to capitalize on their recent resurgence in popularity, culminating in an unpredictable 40th anniversary concert in Portland, Oregon. More than just a chronicle of an obscure band, Bound To Lose is a raucous celebration of a lost American outlaw subculture as it draws its final rebellious breaths.