The Fading Memory of Friday

I managed to drag myself to the very first panel of the morning, at the insultingly early hour of 11am. The easy 20 minute bike ride helped me wake up.

I'll create a separate post on the Adult Rock Music Meeting, a music evaluation session with a panel of public radio music directors. Truly the usual suspects: Bob Boilen (All Songs Considered), Rita Houston (WFUV), Jim McGuinn (The Current), Bruce Warren (WXPN), Norm Winer (WXRT).

Then Daniel and Louie joined me at Cuba Libre to hear...

Rebecca Loebe – extremely intelligent songwriting with a emphasis on love. Her clear & beautiful voice at first made it hard for me to recognize her cover of Kanye West’s Stronger - she rocked it. One of her newest, High & Lonesome, got stuck in my head the next morning, "You-u be High and I-I'll be Lonesome..."

After Rebecca, I made it over to the "family" friendly bar, The Rusty Spurs...

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals – The Nocturnals provided solid country rock, while Grace channeled Janis Joplin when she screeched and affectionately called the audience, “Motherfuckers”. One More Goodbye Kiss & Apologies were my two favorites.

I met up with Leital Molad from Studio 360 and took her suggestions for early evening bands...

Spring Standards –  Americana group with some lap steel,  a standing singing drummer & keys player, and various stringed instruments that got passed around stage. I enjoy stomping to a band who's good at that heavy downbeat.

Band of Horses – straight ahead rock band with predictably pleasing harmonies. The coolest thing was to see them play at Central Presbyterian. It's a beautiful sanctuary with acoustics that accentuated the group's signature reverb. We couldn't figure out what we had to do to get in the choir loft.


jj – Nor could Leital and I figure out all the buzz about this Swedish duo. Because, seriously girl, why were you so sad and bored for your SXSW showcase? Did performing in a church offend you? Did you have a cold? Whatever it was it made for a bad performance. Slumping over in a chair, singing karaoke style to your video tracks is not cool. And that posture made you flat. It’s strange to me that your album is on Waterloo’s weekly top 50 list.

Court Yard Hounds – 2 of the 3 Dixie Chicks (minus Natalie), nothing new, lots of gear for a simple sound. The magic is gone, sad but true.

Ciro joined me for the end of the night to behold...

Rye Rye – Baltimore rapper, she brought two matching dancers and a dj with her onstage. She managed not to sweat as much as the boys as she danced half and rapped half the show to extremely fast beats.  The audience, including myself didn’t know how to dance to it, as much as we tried to shake it, to the ground, shake it shake it, then bring it back up.

No trip to Austin feels normal without food at Magnolia. Ciro and I finished up the night by stuffing ourselves with queso, pasta, and a hearty pot pie with flaky crust and a playful hint of cinnamon.