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Saturday, July 25, 2009
Austin musician performs in Iranian protest at UN
Corpus Christi native Fared Shafinury, who leads Austin band Tehranosaurus, spent Saturday in New York City as part of the Global Day of Action, protesting human rights abuses and a questionable election in Iran. Watch part of Shafinury’s solo set, above, in front of the United Nations.
“The only word I can use to describe the day is ‘beautiful,’” Shafinury, 26, said Sunday. The NYC event was organized by United 4 Iran, led by former Austinite Mani Mostofi. “Everything surpassed my expectations,” said Shafinury, who met Mostofi, also a second generation Iranian, while they were students at UT. “The organizational skills and effort were exceptional. Kids were working around the clock.”
Shafinury did interviews with CNN and Voice of America radio after his set, where he sang an original song based on an Iranian poem called “Bani Adam” (or “Children of Adam” in English). “When President Obama addressed the Iranian people, he recited the same poem,” Shafinury said. The words are etched into the Iranian embassy at the UN.
After graduating from UT in 2006, Shafinury spent two years in Tehran, where he recorded the album “Behind the Seas.” The album is currently looking for a label, either in the U.S. or Europe, though six songs have been released on an EP.
On Tuesday, Huffington Post ran this interview of the musician, whose band played a sold-out show at the Cactus July 15.
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Castanets at Mohawk
Indie folk/blues musician Raymond Raposa, aka Castanets, has been releasing albums on Sufjan Stevens’ Asthmatic Kitty label since 2004. Stevens appears on his last album, and covered Castanets’ song “You Are the Blood” for this year’s Red Hot charity compilation “Dark Was the Night” (one of the year’s best, also featuring Spoon and the Dirty Projectors, among others). At the end of June, Raposa shared a bill with Austin’s Explosions in the Sky and Canadian indie rockers Constantines on the Central Park SummerStage. He’ll release his fifth album in September.
Raposa, who was joined onstage by a three-piece band Friday at Mohawk, included “You Are the Blood,” as well as a selection of songs from his other albums, in a set that at times exchanged some of the quieter, folk-infused moments of his studio work with a much darker and noisier outlaw country sound. This was the mood of most of the set, which began with “Three Days, Four Nights” from the “Cathedral” album, and also included the hard-edged “Prettiest Chain” and “Good Friend Yr Hunger.”
The best moments on stage came when a deeply focused Raposa led the band off into reverb-drenched psychedelia, a small loss of control that many indie folk musicians are hesitant to explore. As interesting as those moments were, however, they were something the too-short performance could have used more of. While there might have been a reason for such an abbreviated set, it felt odd that someone with such an extensive catalog and a new album on the way didn’t spend more time on stage.
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Ex-Austinite inducted into Rockabilly Hall
Congrats are in order for Joyce Harris, who grew up in New Orleans, but lived in Austin in 1960 and ”61 while recording such regional hits as “No Way Out” and “Dreamer” for Domino Records. The salty belter, who currently lives in Louisiana, was recently named to the Rockabilly Hall of Fame in Jackson, Tenn.
Domino was the first Austin record label, formed by 11 folks who met at night school and each chipped in $5 a month to get started. The company issued 16 singles, some featuring white singers backed by black bands, before dissolving in 1961. “The Domino Records Story,” a European import, collected all the singles, including biggest label hit “You Cheated” by the Slades, in 1998.
Harris debuted with a rockabilly version of “I Got My Mojo Working,” backed by the Daylighters, featuring Smithville’s Sonny Rhodes on guitar.
These days Harris plays mostly bluegrass. Here’s “No Way Out,” with Harris backed by the Daylighters, featuring Sonny Rhodes:
