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SXSW review: Kings Go Forth at Galaxy Room Backyard
Remember when Indiana Jones was descending into the forbidden tomb and sees the floor crawling? “Snakes,” he moans. “Why did it have to be snakes?”
I knew just how he felt as I prepared to hoof it across downtown to see the Kings Go Forth at the tent-covered Galaxy Room Backyard: “An outdoor venue…why did it have to be an outdoor venue?”
Fortunately, the adult-strength dose of hot-buttered soul, R&B and funk that the 10-piece band from Milwaukee served up was an ideal remedy for the blue norther that dropped temperatures 40 degrees overnight. To the Wisconsin band members, it probably seemed like a day at the beach.
The band, which featured horns, keyboards, congas and three vocalists, including frontman Black Wolf, went from zero to 60 faster than a runaway Toyota. If they had any ballads, they kept them to themselves, instead serving up a handful of tracks drawn largely from their forthcoming album, “The Outsiders Are Back.”
The instrumental fanfare that brought the vocalists on morphed into the funk-flavored “Get A Feeling.” Shades of Motown, Stax-Volt Memphis-simmered soul, New Orleans horn and percussion grooves and gritty Southern R&B informed tunes like “Paradise Lost,” “You’re the One” and “One Day.” Another track, “I Don’t Love You No More,” sounded like it was lifted from the James Brown playbook, with its fuzz-laden guitars and tight groove.
Black Wolf’s playful falsetto, with its echoes of Curtis Mayfield and Aaron Neville, made an arresting counterpoint to the tongue-in-groove lockstep arrangements and crisp musicianship. Fellow vocalist Don Fernandez also had a couple of impressive solo turns and bassist/band leader Andy Noble kept the bottom locked down.
With a healthy neo-soul scene having arisen in Austin in the past year or two, it’s easy to see how Kings Go Forth could easily become valued additions to the local scene. Now if they’ll just play indoors next time …
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SXSW scene report: Austin Music Awards/Texas Sheiks
The Texas Sheiks play a tribute to Stephen Bruton.
Photos: Scenes from the Austin Music Awards
Austin Music Hall
7:55 p.m. Saturday
The annual Austin Music Awards (aka, the Bob Schneider Canonization Ceremony — he’s up for archbishop this year, I think) kicked off on a new night, but at the same don’t-be-late 7:55 p.m. start time.
The first act, the all-star acoustic music ensemble known as Texas Sheiks, had a special poignance for the local music fans in attendance. The Sheiks represented one of the final projects (the other was the soundtrack to the film “Crazy Heart”) to bear the imprint of singer/songwriter/guitarist/producer Stephen Bruton, who died after a long siege of cancer last year.
The Sheiks, helmed by acoustic music veteran Geoff Muldaur, and starring local luminaries like pianist Johnny Nicholas, steel player Cindy Cashdollar, bassist Bruce Hughes, Muldaur’s mentor Jim Kweskin and others, was conceived of as a way for Bruton to stay in touch with his musical lifeline and to distract him from the rigors of radiation and chemo. Sadly, Bruton died before either the Sheiks’ record or the “Crazy Heart” soundtrack saw the light of day.
“What started being a diversion ended up being a tribute,” said emcee Andy Langer.
“We didn’t know we were making a record,” recalled Muldaur from the stage. “We were just getting together to have some fun.”
And so they did on Saturday, launching into a jazzy vintage lament, “The World Is Going Crazy,” with Muldaur on vocals and featuring a hot dobro solo from Cindy Cashdollar. A rousing jump-blues take on “All By Myself,” featuring Johnny Nicholas on vocals and guest pianist Floyd Domino followed.
By way of introducing jug band music godfather Jim Kweskin (who also guested on the album), Muldaur said, “When he was 19 years old, Stephen and a friend left Fort Worth and drove to the Newport Folk Festival just to see this guy.” Kweskin is getting on up there, but his nimble guitar playing and easy vocals belie his years, as he demonstrated on the playfully ribald Bob Wills song, “Fan It.”
After bassist Bruce Hughes essayed one number (whose title I didn’t catch), the group wrapped up their brief set with a swinging blues/gospel-flavored Bruton original, one which the Sheiks did not feature on their record. “Walk By Faith” probably came as close to being Bruton’s personal mantra as anything else he ever read or sang: “You got to walk by faith and not by sight.”
Wherever he’s walking now, Bruton is taking note of the accolades for “Crazy Heart” and the outpouring of affection from fans, friends and peers and he is, make no mistake about it, eating it up with a spoon.
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SXSW scene report: The line at Antone’s for Big Star Tribute already down the block
At 7:05 p.m., the line was already down the block (Lavaca) at Antone’s, presumably people lining up for the Big Star - Alex Chilton tribute, scheduled to being at 12:30 a.m. The show is badges only.
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SXSW video: Rachael Ray’s Feedback Party
Austin American-Statesman writer Addie Broyles spoke to Rachael Ray at her Feedback Party, where Bob Schneider, Andrew WK, She & Him and others performed on Saturday.
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Leon Russell canceled tonight
Due to the weather, Leon Russell’s show at Threadgill’s tonight has been scratched. Promoters are looking for a new date to reschedule.
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SXSW panel: ‘I Never Travel Far Without a Little Big Star’
12:30 p.m. Saturday
Panelists: Jody Stephens, Big Star/Ardent Music LLC; Andy Hummel, Big Star; Ken Stringellow, Big Star (mach 2); John Auer, Big Star (mach 2); Chris Stamey, Modern Recording; Tommy Keene; moderator Bob Mehr, Memphis Commercial-Appeal; John Fry, Ardent Studios.
Originally intended to discuss the legacy of Big Star, in light of the 2009 box set Keep Your Eye On The Sky, the panel was nearly cancelled in the wake of frontman Alex Chilton’s death on Wednesday, as was Saturday night’s scheduled Big Star concert. However, drummer Jody Stephens decided to forge ahead in tribute to his late bandmate, and the panel carried on with the addition of Ardent Studios founder
John Fry, participating via Skype.
Chilton was never scheduled to appear at the panel, looking back on past glories not being anything he ever willingly indulged in. He was, however, well aware of the long, strange trajectory by which Big Star went from being a music-business casualty to an indie rock icon.
At a latterday Big Star show, after Chilton and Stephens teamed with the Posies’ Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer to reconstitute the band, Fry recalled that Chilton told the crowd that they were about to play some new songs: “If you don’t like ‘em now, don’t worry. You’ll love ‘em in 30 years.”
The 90-minute session was filled with such Alex anecdotes, along with some discussion of his upbringing in a musical and artistic household and a rough outline of his eccentric career path. Fry shared his memory of first meeting a teenage Chilton when he was sitting around waiting to lay vocals on top of Box Tops rhythm tracks. He recalled Chilton’s growing frustration with recording other people’s material in that band as his own songwriting talents developed, while Stephens and original Big Star bassist Andy Hummel reminisced about when they and Chris Bell enlisted Chilton in their group, Ice Water, which mostly played covers at frat parties and department-store openings.
With Fry, they talked about the recording of Big Star’s first album, when everyone was working together enthusiastically toward a common objective and Bell and Chilton were at the peak of their creative collaboration.
“They were both alpha guys, and their talents were along similar lines, but they worked together very seamlessly,” Hummel said.
Fry explained how the downward spiral of Stax Records and the Memphis music scene affected the band, while Chris Stamey made what he called a “revisionist” plea for more careful consideration of the superb musical choices and performances on the third and final Big Star album, recorded after Bell had left the group. He recalled how his dBs bandmate Peter Holsapple used to make Big Star a litmus test for
girlfriends, and once ordered a young lady from his house for showing an utter lack of appreciation. Especially fascinating was Stamey’s account of how Chilton came up to New York to play a Valentine’s Day show in 1977, slept over on a cot in the tiny room Stamey rented with his girlfriend — “and just stayed,” becoming a mentor for Stamey and for a while participating in the fertile scene at CBGBs and Max’s
Kansas City.
The panel spent a fair amount of time elaborating on Chilton’s image as mercurial and curmudgeonly. Fry said over all the years of their friendship, he always enjoyed a cordial relationship with Chilton. Stringfellow recalled: “He let you figure him out. He sort of kept his cool, he didn’t explain himself, but he was very consistent.”
Stamey said Chilton just really didn’t have it in him to maintain the fictions that govern many social relationships, but you could always count on him to be honest — although he did have a smalll set of favorite sentences to salve the feelings of bandmates after a performance didn’t go well, two of them being “It couldn’t have been better” and “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
In his sorrow this past week, Stamey said, he’d been trying to think of funny things, and one was perhaps the best and most telling anecdote of the panel. He and Chilton had had a falling out for a while, and then Stamey finally spoke to him by phone in New Orleans, where Chilton lived for the last decades of his life. Chilton had a
job at the time washing dishes, and told Stamey how he had been explaining his theory of the world to a co-worker, who told him “Yeah, Alex. You’re right and the whole world is wrong.”
“You know, Chris,” Chilton said. “I really think he was onto something.”
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SXSW video: Saturday afternoon scene report
Matthew Odam with Austin360.com details South by Southwest happenings on Saturday, while Sydney Wayser of Brooklyn, N.Y., plays Dominican Joe’s.
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Todd P’s MtyMx festival kicks off in Monterrey, Mexico today
The morning after the South by Southwest Music Festival concluded last year, famed New York-based concert promoter Todd Patrick — who had just thrown his fourth series of free outdoor shows at East Side venue Ms. Bea’s — packed up his bags and ventured with some friends down to Monterrey, Mexico. There, they ate tacos, relaxed and savored the city’s low-key charm. That day, Patrick, concerned that his increasingly high-profile SXSW shindig may come under fire from fest organizers, had the idea to pack up his party and move it south of the border.
That idea — and several long months of working logistics in his New York apartment — culminates today, as Patrick’s MtyMx kicks off in Monterrey. More than 50 bands — including both SXSW bands making the trip south and Mexican bands — will play across two stages from today to Monday, March 22 at an abandoned drive-in carved into a hillside. The site boasts camping and a visual arts display.
Despite the overlap of dates and artists — SXSW artists including Health, DD/MM/YYYY, Liars, Neon Indian, Andrew WK and many others are playing the festival — Patrick insists his festival isn’t intended to be adversarial to SXSW.
“Ideally they wouldn’t overlap at all — but there are people who live there who wouldn’t be happy with it starting on Sunday and running until midweek, and you have to respect that. It’s never been about trying to steal South by Southwest’s thunder,” said Patrick a few days out from MtyMx. “I don’t care about that. It’s about taking advantage of a situation, about taking advantage of what’s in front of you.”
“What’s in front” of Patrick is a wealth of touring bands congregated hours from Austin who face the difficult prospect of booking post-SXSW dates in nearby cities against a horde of competitors. MtyMx offers bands leaving Austin the chance to play better-attended shows against less competition than they might face in other cities in Texas, Oklahoma or New Mexico. That’s how he pitched it to more than 400 bands, with over 200 expressing interest. Patrick said the festival was also an attempt to correct misconceptions about the safety of Mexico and to present the world with images of Mexico’s burgeoning indie rock scene. He said the festival is being thrown largely for Mexican indie fans, who often have to cross the border to see shows — a difficult prospect.
“We have this vision that Mexico has no government and is riddled with crime and has no public health system, and all of these things are either offensive caricature or just out of control sensationalism in the media,” said Patrick. “I’m hoping that a lot of photos get taken, videos get shot, and in doing that we paint the picture of a country that’s not the stereotype. You look at the photos and you’ll see a thousand hip, well-dressed, well-educated brown faces. And that will paint a different, more accurate picture of Mexico.”
One among Mexico’s indie rock community is promoter Pablo Martinez , who threw a similar festival that also poached SXSW talent, Festival NRML, Saturday March 13 in Monterrey. He started the festival to give Mexican indie rock fans the chance to see bands that are often out of reach.
“We grew up seeing MTV and all these American bands, and usually they don’t come play to Monterrey, we have to go see them in San Antonio or Houston or Austin,” said Martinez. “So one of the objectives of the festival was to open this root of touring bands south of the border.”
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SXSW scene report: Yard Dog party
It’s everybody’s favorite old-school SXSW event: Randy opens up his Yard Dog Gallery on S. Congress Ave., bands play in the lot out back and people wander down the alley in search of a cold beer and some free music.
The crowd seemed to be smaller than normal Saturday afternoon, no doubt because of the weather, which didn’t keep one joker (surely a local) from coming out in short shorts and sandals.
“It’s good to be back in Anchorage for North By Northwest,” Coal Porters vocalist-mandolinist told the crowd that was trying to outsmart a chilly wind that went through you no matter where you stood. “I told the band to pack shorts — it’s hot in Texas.”
A genuinely funny (guitarist Neil Robert Herd is actually a comedian of some renown in the U.K.) and irreverent bluegrass band, the Coal Porters got serious long enough to do the weepy “A Soft Place to Fall,” written by Allison Moorer, also known as Shelby Lynne’s little sister. By set’s end the crowd seemed in an agreeable mood, and the $2 pints of Dogfish Head beer no doubt helped.
Franklin said the weather hadn’t caused him any problems except “it’s making me cold. But everything’s on schedule. And we haven’t had bad weather for this in years. But we’ve been doing this 15 years and I don’t ever remember it being this cold.”
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Where to go tonight after last call, y’all
Vice Magazine is taking over the vacant Starr Building at Sixth and Colorado Streets tonight at midnight for a party that should run until 5 a.m. Free cocktails and music from:
Les Savy Fey
Cheeseburger
Happy Birthday
Davilla 666
DJ sets from Mr. Jonathan Toubin
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New schedule for outdoor shows at Auditorium Shores
Following the announcement earlier today that tonight’s free and open-to-the-public shows at Auditorium Shores were going to be shortened to just the daytime hours, SXSW organizers have released a new schedule with modified set times.
Aside from headliners She and Him, most of the performers will be playing 20-minute sets.
Here it is:
- Doors, 5 p.m.
- Kimya Dawson, 6-6:15 p.m.
- Dawes, 6:20-6:40 p.m.
- Deer Tick, 6:50-7:10 p.m.
- Lucero, 7:30-7:50 p.m.
- Justin Townes Earle, 8-8:20 p.m.
- She & Him, 8:40-9:45 p.m.
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SXSW scene report: Rachael Ray party at Stubb’s
Our Addie Broyles has the scoop on the just wrapped Rachael Ray party at Stubb’s. Sounds like the cold weather did not affect the good mood of fans, bands or host.
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SXSW interview: YACHT
Jona Bechtolt and Claire Evans, aka YACHT, make danceable, Brian Eno-inspired music, but that’s only one aspect of their mission, which extends to visual arts and the written word, most recently in the form of pamphlets about the history of the triangle. They will play a total of six shows at SXSW this year, with their last two on Saturday. We caught up with Bechtolt and Evans in the convention center Saturday as they fretted about the fact that their final shows were at outdoors, as temperatures dropped into the 40’s.
How has the week gone so far?
B: It’s been intense and stressful, really great and fruitful, and a dash of fun has been in there.
E: A pretty small dash of fun.
What’s different this year?
B: This year we brought an extended lineup. We’ve expanded to the Yacht and the Straight Gays. We were supposed to have three extra members but one got seriously ill, so we now have two extra members. It’s been kind of fun to take people who never been here before and show them around.
E: It’s been nice to get back in the swing of things. Last year we came but didn’t play any shows.
B: We had literature that we were distributing.
E: It was almost more productive then playing. No interference of music, just pure message.
What was the message?
B: We were talking about triangles. Two years ago when we were living in Marfa we became obsessed with triangles, and did a lot of research about the shape and it’s importance throughout human history. So we wrote a primer pamphlet introducing to people why we feel triangles are important to human kind, and we gave those to people directly.
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SXSW scene report: One girl follows her Muse to fest
The trio from the UK isn’t just the kind of band that can draw people from one end of a park to another, it’s the kind of band that compels fans to travel from one city to another (and likely one country to another), even when the chances of seeing their musical demigods is about as good as Billy Murray not showing up on Red River Street during SXSW.
Before the sun went down on Friday, the line to get into Stubb’s already stretched down the block. It had been highly publicized that only badge holders would be getting into the “surprise” Muse show at 10 p.m. but that didn’t keep hundreds from showing up anyway, hoping a badge would fall into their hands (around their necks?). Once the amphitheater reached capacity, dozens lined the roof of the parking garage across the street. But some decided to listen to the show from 9th street, behind the stage, where the band loads and unloads.
Among the devoted lining the sidewalk was 20 year-old Erika Waller and her group of girlfriends. They had already seen Muse in Ft. Worth on Wednesday and Houston on Thursday, but, with appetites not satiated, they made the drive up I-35 from San Antoino to try and get one more glimpse of their musical heroes.
Waller, who has seen the band perform 9 times since her first Muse experience at ACL Fest in 2006, actually had the great fortune of receiving a harmonica from bass player Christopher Wolstenholme — who, according to Waller works the harp as a lead in to “Knights of Cydonia” — at the show in Houston.
She followed Muse to Austin in hopes of meeting the band. And, while a full-on tour of the bus and photo opp. hadn’t occurred at the time we spoke, she did get Wolstenholme’s attention as he was exiting the bus at 9 p.m.., and, recognizing her from the night before in Houston, he graciously autographed the instrument for her. As we talked, she held it in her hand like it was the holy grail.
“They blend classical music with rock, and every song is different … no two songs are the same,” Waller said.
Her pilgrimage continues this spring, as she follows her Muse to California for the Coachella fest.
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Big Star Alex Chilton tribute lineup released
Announced today at the Big Star panel, for the show that has become a tribute to Alex Chilton, who died Wednesday: Evan Dando, John Doe, Chris Stamey, Watson Twins, Sondre Lerche, and MIke Mills are playing. They reached out to Jeff Tweedy but his schedule wouldn’t allow it.
It’s scheduled to begin at 12:30 a.m. at Antone’s.
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SXSW review: Lucero
“This is the last time we’re playing this (expletive) festival. Of course, I’ve been saying that for eight years in a row.”
Welcome to the warped cantina that is the mind of Lucero’s Ben Nichols. The above wry line came roughly an hour and innumerable whisky and Cokes into his roots rock band’s sprawling, epic set Friday at Red Eyed Fly, and was a microcosm of the acerbic open heartedness that dominates Nichols’ lyrics.
The show, which weighed in at nearly two hours - “That clock on the wall better be right, because we’re going to use every single minute,” Nichols chided the sound tech - was a display of the muscular but nuanced sound of “Summer Song,” the open lament of “Wasted” and the singalong glory of “Sweet Little Thing.”
What really stands out live is that as easy to pick apart as Lucero’s sound is - Tom Waits fronting The E Street Band while trying to cover The Band - the ache and world weary joy Nichols pours into every word holds the entire outfit together. And it doesn’t hurt that he’s got a crack band who can just about read his mind (there’s a tremor-inducing thought) behind him.
By the time “What Are You Willing To Lose?” closed things off at 1:59 a.m., with Nichols’ voice sounding like it was emanating from the bottom of the galaxy’s deepest whisky barrel, there was enough beer on the floor and fists in the air to pretty much guarantee that “the Lucero family picnic,” as the singer dubbed it, will probably make its ninth SXSW appearance next year.
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Auditorium Shores show tonight shortened to just evening hours
(She and Him at Lustre Pearl. Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN) Just in from SXSW headquarters:
Please let people know that the outdoor stage show is still happening, but that we have shortened it to just the evening hours. She & Him, Justin Townes Earle and Lucero are still performing. Hopefully, Kimya Dawson, Dawes and Deer Tick will also be able to perform if their schedules permit. Doors are at 5 p.m.; music begins at 6 p.m. Free and open to the public.
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SXSW interivew: J. Roddy Walston and the Business
J. Roddy Walston and the Business snapshot dreams lost (“Brave Man’s Death”) and reclaimed (“I Don’t Wanna Hear It”) with wolverine fury. The Baltimore-based quartet scored a last-minute slot at Mr. & Mrs. T and Rachael Ray’s Stubb’s party on Saturday.
“It was a surprise to us,” lead singer Walston says. “I think they booked the whole party and (someone at Vagrant Records) sent over our demo. Between their reaction and Rachael Ray’s, things got shifted around and we got added.”
American-Statesman: How did your set go at Red Eyed Fly (Thursday afternoon)?
J. Roddy Walston: It went great. We had the exact opposite SXSW experience a couple years ago. We played a pizza parlor that was turned into a club and no one was there. Everything this year is awesome. We played the same way that we played at the pizza parlor in 2008, but everyone seems to be reacting.
Earlier this week, you told us that you wanted to eat at Torchy’s (Tacos).
I haven’t been yet. I got free jeans, though, which nearly brought me to tears. I needed jeans so bad, like I literally would’ve taken anything with a crotch in it. We’re living on the edge right now (laughs). We’ll try to get (to Torchy’s).
You’ve talked about Paul Westerberg’s influence on you.
I heard him and Big Star at the same moment. Something about those two connected. With Westerberg, we were kind of trying to tap into a wild (streak). We were touring and feeling something branching out, and they’re such a dangerous band. They have an entire record where they’re obviously just blasted. Not that I necessarily want to do that.
Now, (Westerberg’s former band) The Replacements’ song ‘Alex Chilton’…
Oh, right. (Chilton’s death earlier this week) is pretty shocking. I’m really, really bummed out. I’ve been so involved in this experience that I haven’t really gotten to dive into what happened. Do you know?
Looks like it was a heart attack.
Man. Big Star’s “#1 Record(/Radio City)” definitely changed my life. I would’ve loved to have actually seen him play. It sucks. I think every single song on “#1 Record” is mind-blowing. I don’t cry too often, but that record will bring a tear to your eye.
Not many would say the same for (Queen’s) ‘Fat Bottomed Girls,’ but you guys do a great cover.
You know, we’re still a band who people don’t know when we roll into a city. That’s the one (cover) that might pop out because people know it, but we don’t want to be stuck playing it for the rest of our lives. We had to pull the plug on it after a couple tours.
How does living Baltimore influence you as a songwriter?
I grew up in southeast Tennessee. There’s no comparison. (Tennessee) is this weird, perfect world, and then we move to Baltimore. It’s like, “Oh, this is different.” Within a week, our bass player was laying out the contents of his wallet for a dude.
Does ‘Brave Man’s Death’ relate to that?
That’s probably the most direct reaction to living in Baltimore. The whole song stems from the core idea that I don’t want to die in a bed or have a heart attack. I want to go out with a bang.
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SXSW review: World Music Expo showcase at Copa
The WOMEX (World Music Expo) showcase at Copa on Friday had to be one of the most diverse events in SXSW history, in terms of genre, style and place of origin, although quality-wise, it only ranged from very good to extraordinary.
Affable South African flautist Wouter Kellerman opened the evening with an appealing set that combined African, classical, Latin and contemporary jazz elements. Backed by acoustic guitar, bass and drum, he played with symphonic technique and a great deal of feeling. Toward the end of the set, he even announced that he was going to prove the theory that white men can’t dance, and donned a pair of rubber rain boots to get up and perform side-by-side moves with his drummer — who was definitely the better dancer, but Kellerman acquitted himself well, leaping, throwing his arms and slapping his boots with enthusiasm.
Almost a polar opposite was the next artist, Norwegian singer Unni Lovlid, who opened with a traditional song that she said she had heard sung by an old man who lived at the very end of a fjord and ate nothing but bread and water day in and day out. No need for a translation of the lyrics — it was pretty much the loneliest song this side of Ralph Stanley’s “O Death.” After that, Lovlid turned to more experimental compositions, accompanied only by drummer Thomas Stronen, who manipulated electronics and added more expressionistic color than propulsion.
Lovlid’s lustrous mezzo soprano is a fantastic instrument for this kind of abstraction, and some of the atmospheric, non-linear compositions sounded like they were waiting for the right filmmaker to seize upon them. Particularly fascinating were a piece where she harmonized with a loop of her own vocals, and another that she said incorporated a recording of the Northern Lights. Both seemed like something adventurous-minded Elizabeth Fraser fans would love. Unfortunately, the Copa is not exactly a listening room, and loud voices from the bar frequently broke the spell. To her credit, Lovlid never seemed to notice, even when a guy hollered to his friend “You buyin’ shots, dude?!?” loudly enough to be heard in the next venue. I was extra glad to snag a promo copy of her gorgeous album “Rite,” so I could listen to her again at the end of the night without the drunken intrusions.
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SXSW review: Sarah Jarosz at Momo’s
If you’re a teenage girl in most households in America, perhaps you grow up wanting to be Miley Cyrus or Taylor Swift. Or, if your tastes are a little more sophisticated, perhaps Lady Gaga or Beyonce.
If, however, you grow up in the Jarosz household in the small Hill Country town of Wimberley outside Austin, you debut onstage playing the mandolin at age 12 in bluegrass festivals, then move on to guitar and banjo. You write a fistful of songs that are wise beyond your years, sign with Sugar Hill Records, record with the likes of Jerry Douglas, Tim O’Brien and Ben Sollee, and see your first album nominated for a Grammy. All before you get out of high school.
And then, just to put a cherry on the year, you get to play SXSW and see yourself voted Female Vocalist of the Year, Country/Bluegrass Band of the Year and Folk Band of the Year at the annual Austin Music Awards, to be presented Saturday night.
No doubt about it, it’s good to be Sarah Jarosz.
Jarosz played for a packed room of adoring hometown fans, recent converts and acoustic music aficionados who were just getting the word at Momo’s on Friday. Such a crush of expectations might have wilted any other young woman within shouting distance of 20, but she seemed to take it all in stride. Coolly taking the stage by herself, Jarosz moved through a set that included original material from her first (and so far only) album, “Song Up In Her Head” and cannily chosen covers.
Patty Griffin’s wry yet poignant “Long Ride Home” kicked off her show, followed by a new tune, “Gypsy,” and a lesser-known Bob Dylan song, “Ring Them Bells.”
Jarosz’s confident demeanor and penetrating voice cut through the club chatter with ease, but you could still see the young girl within the assured. “How fun is this?!” she exclaimed at one point, sounding incongruously like a young girl who’d just won a shopping trip to the mall. To a grumpy and dyspeptic old music critic (think the old guy in “Up” with a notebook), it was an endearing moment.
After a solo turn mandolin, performing her Grammy-nominated song “Mansinneedof,” Jarosz brought up her backing band, Black Prairie, which included members of the Decembrists. A cover of Shel Silverstein’s “Queen of the Silver Dollar” preceded the grisly “Shankill Butchers,” a Decembrists song that Jarosz covered to chilling effect on her album.
This writer had to depart at that moment, making a note to check out Jarosz again soon, after the tourists had all gone home. He’s a sour old crank, and he doesn’t play well with others.
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SXSW review: Jail Guitar Doors at Ghost Room
For all I know, lo these many hours later, the Jail Guitar Doors are still rocking onstage at the Ghost Room, one musician/activist after another taking the stage in apparently endless succession. At the shank’s end of Friday night, the loose-knit collective of folkies, rockers and rappers showed no sign whatsoever of relenting as last call inexorably approached.
After taking the stage almost an hour late, ringleaders Billy Bragg and ex-MC-5 guitarist Wayne Kramer set up housekeeping on the tiny corner stage and began ushering one guest star after another in from the outdoor beer garden.
It was a case of hey, look, there’s Chris Shiflett of the Foo Fighters! There’s Mike Mills from R.E.M. rocking CSNY’s “Ohio!” There’s Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello shredding guitar with funk-rappers Street Sweeper Social Club! There’s Billy Bragg wryly declaiming the origins of Jail Guitar Doors to Wayne Kramer, standing at his side: “I said I named it after a song by the Clash,” said Bragg. And Wayne said, ‘Yeah, I’m in it.’ I said, what? He said, ‘What’s the first line?’ and I realized it was ‘Let me tell you about Wayne and his deals with cocaine.’ I felt about this big.”
Bragg went on to explain that JDG (which Kramer aptly described as “the loudest charity on earth”) was formed in England as a collective of musicians who put the redemptive power of music into action by making instruments and outreach programs available to jail inmates. An ex-con himself, Kramer became an ally with Bragg and helped get the ball rolling on this side of the pond. Their SXSW gig, they said, marked the American debut of Jail Guitar Doors.
Just that morning, said Bragg (a lifelong political activist for a host of social justice causes), the group had played at the Travis County Jail. “This is the after-party,” he said.
And “party” was the operative word. There was folk, hip-hop, scalding rock ‘n’ roll (the anthemic rendition of “Jail Guitar Doors” itself, for instance), passionate advocacy and heartfelt musical camaraderie. Drop by the Ghost Room today — they might still be having at it.
(More on Jail Guitar Doors here.)
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Thanks for the great summary! I wish I’d been at that panel and hopefully it was taped for posting later. I loved Alex Chilton and his music, and I’m glad he’s getting his accolades. Just wish he had received them while he was still around.
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cheeseburger. just what i need.
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