This is fine.
Third show of the week was at La Zona Rosa. Had to run solo for this one, made it easy to get through the crowd, my stage space locked down by a Lone Star bribe to a group of people in town from all over Texas to see Nada Surf together; no photo pit, but still a three song limit.
We were treated to Austin’s The Zoltars and San Fran’s Waters as openers before Nada Surf played a twenty-three song set.
More after the jump…
Well, everyone else is doing it, so why don’t we? We’re going to toss out our top five albums of the year, except we’ll be doing it with our four main contributors, so hopefully that’ll mix things up a bit. Obviously, we’re only half-way through the year, so things are subject to change, and by things I mean our minds.
Read more
The wife was feeling nostalgic when she bought tickets to see Howard Jones perform Human’s Lib and Dream Into Action. Think of all the soundtracks, montages, sing-alongs on 80’s night. “Like To Get To Know You Well” makes me want to restore a Camaro with a French girl.
HoJo was one of the guys pushing Synth Pop. Listen back to these early albums and tell me you don’t pick up on Twin Shadow, Chairlift and others currently pulling these new wave tones back up top. And Human’s Lib, despite it’s happy singles, is a pretty dark album.
I figured I might as well take some pics.
One of our favorite little labels, Soliti Music, just grabbed a hold of this band, and I couldn’t be more excited. Delay Trees will release their new album in the Autumn, but for now they’ve given us this beautiful sprawling track of pop gold. It builds slowly through the first minute or so, but as the pace of the song picks up, you find yourself whisked away by the creativity and dynamics of the group. We’ll keep you posted as more details come our way, but for now, allow yourself a little time to get lost with this song.
Download:Delay Trees – Pause [MP3]
Beat Radio is a band that I really got into around this time last year with their surprising pop tune “Golden Age”. They continued my fandom with the release of their EP earlier this year Hard Times Go Pt.1. Well not it’s time for part two of the Hard Times Go series and I’m posting a preview of that effort with this new song “Days Like Diamonds”. It’s a bit more of a downtrodden pop tune than what I’m used to from the band, but I dig the more raw feel it brings. You can stream the entire new EP from Beat Radio over on bandcamp.
[audio:https://austintownhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/beat-radio-days-like-diamonds.mp3]Download: Beat Radio – Days Like Diamonds [MP3]
Having seen Austin band Crooks this past weekend at White Horse made me realize that country is a genre that seems to allude ATH. Granted, it seems like talent in the genre is bleak and it’s even harder to seek out the quality when most labels we associate with don’t touch country. So it’s nice when we’re sent songs like this tune “The Way it Is” from Portland based act Denver (yeah that’s not confusing). Now this band with a city name is actually more of a supergroup featuring members of Blitzen Trapper and Alela Diane’s Wild Divine. What’s created by this hodge podge of Portland musicians is a slow honky tonk sound with alternating vocals not far from aforementioned locals Crooks. A full self-titled LP from the group is due out August 12th in all your favorite formats.
[audio:https://austintownhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Denver-TheWayItIs.mp3]Download: Denver – The Way It Is [MP3]
Admittedly, I’ve been feeling the effects of the heat, holing up in my room jamming to some folk tunes for the summer. But, that’s all about to change with this excellent Milk Music track I just got sent in the mail today. This new jam is just a solid rocker from the Washington rockers, but it comes with the announcement that the group’s long time sold out Beyond Living EP is now up on iTunes, so it’s available to you all. The group’s about to embark on a nice little jaunt, and then we expect them to have more music to bowl us over.
Download:Milk Music – Violence Now [MP3]
A show that I billed as a must see this past Tuesday definitely lived up to its expectations. I met up with our photographer Brian Gray, and we jammed it out.
I’m pretty sure you’re all going to love this track; there’s really nothing as strikingly wonderful as this track from Pure Bathing Culture. It’s such a subtle pop track, with the instrumentation turned down low so the vocals can reach perfection by the time they hit your ears. You can find this track on the group’s debut self-titled EP, which just came out via the good people over at Father Daughter Records. Come on, one listen just isn’t enough, you’re going to have to play this song over and over again. I don’t know about you, but that pretty sums the track up as a certified hit.
In late April I brought you one of the tunes off of Arc in Round‘s self-titled album, and since the record just came out this week, we’re going to toss up another gem for you get behind. This tune is called “One-Sided,” and I love the way the guitar discordantly works in the background, fighting for space with the lofty female vocals (which have a unique echo effect). Once again, the group’s used some great texturing to their work, creating a sound that’s definitely pop-centric, but shows the abilities of band’s that can incorporate layer upon layer to create gems such as this.
Download:Arc in Round – One-Sided [MP3]
You can get the S/T album from La Societe Expeditionnaire.
