Weekend Reviews

They were super and furry -- but ended up just scary

By Austin Bonner
February 19, 2004

At your average psychedelic rock show, you should be able to say to your companion "Hey, does the guy onstage remind you of someone from 'Planet of the Apes?' " with a reasonable expectation that said guy onstage will not manage to overhear you. But if Papa M failed to notice such comments from the three dozen or so people who were not more interested in the bar than in his mumbling, it was only because he was too busy staring intently at his own left hand. This does not bode well for your average rock show.

Fortunately, headliners Super Furry Animals came out with guns blazing. The first walls of noise they erected would have left listeners in a trancelike state were it not for the uncomfortable thundering of bass in everyone's chest. Smaller women backed away from the stage. Combined with whimsical pop lyrics reminiscent of Belle and Sebastian and big screen projections of cartoons and film clips, the effect was glorious and overwhelming. For the first hour, this Welsh band seemed like avatars of the new glam rock, the fabulous outrageousness of such classic performers as Ian Hunter and Gary Glitter now simply projected on a screen and doused in pink lights. T Rex for the information age!

And then the band turned into the Dead Kennedys of the information age. The words "all governments are liars and murderers" were repeated over feedback and printed in white block letters on a black screen. The visuals were then intercut with unflattering photos of George W. Bush and, as the pace increased, even less fortunate pictures of Tony Blair. The climax: a dozen choruses of "They don't give a (deleted) about anybody else."

The band left the stage for a few minutes, making room for the group's DJ to showcase his skills on the laptop, and returned in -- no kidding -- giant golden fur suits to shout a few more choruses alongside a fist-pumping Lenin-esque figure projected behind them. But, by that time, what should have been funny felt downright creepy.

Theater

WILLIAMS' TRUTHS TRANSCEND 'TUNA'

Jaston Williams may be well known for his comedic work with Joe Sears in the "Greater Tuna" plays, but during his autobiographical show "I'm Not Lying," he never mentions this part of his life. Tuna fans take no offense; Williams just has other things to talk about.

"I'm Not Lying," which has seen two previous incarnations as a work in progress and a public workshop in June and July 2003, is now in full production at the State Theatre. Comprised of eight monologues, the show proves that fact is sometimes stranger than fiction — and after he describes some of the more outrageous events, Williams repeats the line, "I'm not lying," just to prove the point. The play starts with his first moment of stage fright during a ballet recital at age four (the wails could still be echoing somewhere) and ends with the adult Williams, who recognizes a desire and need to be a father again. In between these bookends, Williams contends with his corker of a mom, who refuses to give up driving; admits to personal failures; and reveals how he ended up on acid in a chicken suit at a Renaissance fair thrown by Dennis Hopper in Taos, N.M. Director Scott Kanoff has kept the staging simple, allowing the stories and Williams' performance to command the space.

Two things stand out. First, although these stories are autobiographical and flavored with West Texas patois, they have more than regional appeal. Some deal with big ticket items such as isolation, addiction and death. Others deal with less monumental but still potent experiences, such as welcome rescues and the intervention of people who bring grace and even a little cussin' into his life. Second, Williams displays a mastery of craft that is the product of more than just years of stage work. He realized after that first dance experience that "flair and raw emotion can't be taught. You've either got it or you don't." Williams has it.

"I'm Not Lying" continues Wednesdays-Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2:30 p.m. and 7 p.m. through Feb. 29 at The State Theatre, 719 Congress. Tickets are $24-$31 with 50% student discount at the door. Info: www.austintheatrealliance.org, startickets.com or 469-SHOW.
--Jamie Smith Cantara

Music

TIA CARRERA TURNS ON A DIME

One of the wonderful things about Austin is that the clear majority of important clubs are within spitting distance of each other. Which means working musicians can play an early set at one Red River venue and then play a late set at another Red River club — and manage to play to two completely different audiences.

That's what Tia Carrera did Friday night. The improvisational psychedelic rock trio — guitarist Jason Morales, bassist Andrew Duplantis and drummer Erik Conn — have recently relaunched their Friday happy hour residency at Room 710. Starting at 9 p.m., they launched into their usual burn, mostly jamming on two or three chords in front of a slightly haggard-looking crowd happy to be out of the freezing weather. The first 37-minute piece felt like warming up, but the second epic held together. They kept hitting melodic passages that you wanted them to pursue and grooves you wanted them to jam on, but Tia preferred shifting their riffs and beats around.

Morales and Duplantis also back up songwriter Richard Buckner, who was playing his last show as an Austinite over at Stubb's. But this wasn't a full band show, so after a strong set of storytelling songcraft by local Mike Nicolai, Buckner was joined (at first) only by Duplantis on Wurlitzer and guitar, who rushed over after the Tia jam was done. Buckner played a laid-back, casual show. As Friday turned into Saturday, the set turned into a hootenanny, with organist Jacob Shulze jumping on stage for one song, and Morales adding acoustic guitar on another. This is what Austin is supposed to feel like, musicians looking like they're goofing off, delivering the goods nonetheless.
-- Joe Gross

Music

MIRÓ SHOWS MASTERY OF STRINGS

The performance Sunday afternoon at Bates Recital Hall by the Miró String Quartet of George Crumb's "Black Angels" was the sort of tour de force that people talk about years afterward. Cellist Joshua Gindele, in his introduction hailed this 1970 piece as one of the most important string quartet compositions of the last century. Scored for an amplified string quartet, with the four players also playing percussion instruments and water-tuned goblets, the set of 13 pieces amounts to a lexicon of advanced string techniques.

The scattered occasions when I have heard Crumb's music have been consistently exciting and rewarding because his effects are not merely weird but beautiful as well. They also communicate genuine ideas. According to Gindele, while "Black Angels" is widely taken to be a commentary on the Vietnam War, Crumb has stated that the work responds more generally to dark moments in his own life and immediate surroundings. Whatever the music is "about," the Quartet performed its task with an intensity and attention to detail that allowed this powerful music to speak for itself.

The same qualities characterized the Quartet's reading of Charles Ives's student composition, String Quartet No. 1. About half of the time the music sounds like Dvorák if Dvorák had grown up in New England, though the harmony gets a little unruly. The carefully voiced counterpoint and vigorous (yet never rough) playing were particular pleasures.

The third of Beethoven's early quartets opened the program. The consistent balancing of the parts to favor the first violin was the only disappointing aspect of an otherwise wonderful performance.
-- David Mead

Theater

HANDLE 'AMERICAN ARCANA' WITH CAUTION

"American Arcana" returns to Austin this month, revised and not so innocent. When Cyndi Williams first wrote and presented the cynical satire with Austin Script Works in 1997, Sept. 11 was just another day in the year.

After re-writes and the addition of a crowd-pleasing puppet caricature of President Bush, "Arcana" mixes absurdity with dark foreboding and tosses in a few hundred digs at Bush's expense. The play is not for the easily offended; between flag burning, stereotypical accents and jabs at everything from the liberal media to religion to talk radio, no one escapes the bitter dialogue.

Under the direction of Sonnet Blanton, "Arcana" rarely loses the audience's attention. There's just too much going on. The intimate setting of the Blue Theater brings the audience uncomfortably close to the actors in their exploration of the emotional depths reached in the average, everyday Armageddon. The talented actors make it difficult to watch without wanting to punch them or comfort them, depending on the moment.

The back wall looks like a Texas antique shop that was hit by a tornado. Two alarm clocks blink on and off, resetting to 12:00 each time the power goes off (which is often). Static-filled TV screens jump to life when the puppet politician speaks. Sounds of gunshots and bombs jolt the audience awake. And a little dog playing a bit part gets lots of love from the audience pre-show.

From the first tarot card reading that begins each scene, "Arcana" gets more and more disturbing. It's not a "feel-good" play, and it's sure to incite some high-spirited conversation on politics, the environment and war in the car ride home. Even in a laid-back city like Austin, "Arcana" should come with a warning label: should be taken with a grain of salt, could be harmful to the religious, conservative, patriotic or pregnant women.

"American Arcana" continues 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays through Feb. 28, with one Sunday performance at 5 p.m. Feb. 22, Blue Theater, 916 Springdale Road, $15-$20, 927-1118.
-- Sarah Adams

Theater

BAROQUE EVENING FINALLY HITS ITS STRIDE

Jenifer Thyssen, soprano, is one of the real talents on Austin's early music scene. Her finely focused voice, full of silver-colored flashes, was tailor-made for the 31st Street Concerts organization's Saturday program of early Italian Baroque music, featuring works by Monteverdi, Cavalli Luigi Rossi and others.

The texture of the music was transparent, Thyssen's voice declaiming freely over a bass line, with lightly arpeggiated harmony from the theorbo and an occasional countermelody from the violin. The Belmont-Cogdell House provides a resonant, though dry, acoustic where every sound is easily heard, which can work for or against performers. Throughout the first half, small slips — moments that weren't quite together, not quite in tune, or chords that didn't sound quite right — kept the performers from finding the flow of the music.

Thyssen was supported skillfully by Laurie Young Stevens, baroque violin; Barrett Sills, baroque cello; and Scott Horton, theorbo. As interludes, Horton and Sills each performed intriguing if lightweight unaccompanied solos. Stevens and Horton reprised Castello's "Sonata prima a la sopra" from her recent solo program, this time with somewhat more conventional ornamentation.

After the intermission, the music-making found focus and confidence. The first selection, "Canzonetta sopra la nanna" by Tarquinio Merula, conjured an image of the Virgin Mother singing a lullaby to her Son, a moving piece with an expressive arc that foresees the events of the Passion and unfolds largely over a two-note ostinato. The occasional pieces in dance style — including Barbara Strozzi's "Amor dormiglione" and Giovanni Sances' "Cantata sopra la ciccona" — provided a delightful contrast to the prevailing free declamation. It's too bad it took so long for things to click.
-- David Mead