Author: brian.gray

The photo taker and manager of the IT Department.

Show Preview: Night Drive Release Party @ Cheer Up TONIGHT!

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Come dance with us.

Night Drive is finally able to unleash their self-titled full length out today. To commemorate, we are gathering at Cheer Up Charlies for a night music and fun. They wanted to invite friends that they love and make some new ones to join them on stage. If you show up, you get good friends Orthy, who have promised a bunch of new music, Keeper, Single Lash and Lambda.

That is a really nicely stacked lineup. Add to it, AmuricaTX will have their photobooth trailer to immortalize things and Captain Morgan is providing the drink specials if you dare.

I’ll be there taking the pics for ATH along with +1 and many friends and familiar faces. We’re thinking a burger and Salt and Time would be fun beforehand. It will be hot. Be ready. Dress sensibly. Comfortable shoes. Nathan loves when I bring up comfortable shoes. Tickets are $5 at the door.

To get psyched, have a listen…

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Austin Record Label Flea Market Recap

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We love you Austin.

Everyone is already looking forward to doing it again. More on that later. I took photos, we did our shimmy thing, records were sold, merch was sold, group shots, industry discussions, ball-busting, cider sampled, dogs joined in, kids were indoctrinated into collecting vinyl.

Modern Outsider, Super Secret Records, Western Vinyl, Holodeck Records, Launch Cycle, Chicken Ranch Records, Keeled Scales, Saint Marie Records, Nine Mile Records and, as Nate said, our own little ATH Records all had the booths up and running. We had the musical stylings of The Sour Bridges and A. Sinclair.

Please enjoy my little photo essay on the Austin Record Label Flea Market. Click through to see what you missed or reminisce…

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Bonobo Sneaks Out An EP

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Bonobo has long been a chillout favorite of mine. Dial M for Monkey, aside form being a great title for a record, is great record. Simon Green has been steadily releasing great material, I actually slept on promoting the last release, though we have reviewed shows, put Bonobo on best-ofs, shot festival sets and interviewed him in the past.

The latest announce is a quintessential Bonobo track called “Samurai” released as part of a three song EP. The EP highlights the song “Bambo Koyo Ganda” in acoustic form. Stream below. Please.

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Show Pics: Tres Oui and Growl @ Hole in the Wall (5/25)

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…with Blushing, too.

I am finally getting around to sharing some pics from our little party the other night at Hole in the Wall. I used to go there quite a bit way back in the day. I went on a few dates with a girl whose family lived there. I dared not go back for a decade after breaking up, just in case.

HitW also made for a great test of some new hardware. I have gone mirrorless with Sony. It is a brave new world.

Click through to see some photos from the night full of Blushing, Tres Oui and Growl with a few thoughts on both music and photography.

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OMD Shows The Kids How To Do It

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Synth pop, new wave, dance pop, whatever you want to call it, has its roots in the late 70’s and early 80’s with groups like Visage, Depeche Mode, Gary Numan and many more. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark was among those early pioneers with tracks like “Electricity”, “Messages” and “Enola Gay” setting a foundation for their pop stardom in a shift to a more mass-market approval and mid-80’s movie soundtrack domination. We recently saw OMD here in Austin and one thing is for sure, they still love those songs and they still love the genre.

The band is currently back to the core lineup and they are making new music. It seems they want to show all the kids how to do things. The first real release from the forthcoming record The Punishment Of Luxury, due 9/1 on White Noise Records, is called “IsoType” and it is wonderful reminder of the roots that is back to being contemporary. Put on your headphones to revel in stereo effects and dream of the heady days of Kraftwerk, Ultravox and The Human League…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCWB7D2T1f0

Hot Luck Fest’s The Hi-Lo @ Fair Market (5/19)

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…and now for something completely different.

The wife and I love to cook. We like to make things that taste good. We like to go places to eat things. I’ve put notes in show reviews about our diners beforehand, whether a pretzel at Easy Tiger, a burger at Salt and Time or a series of small plates at Second. When James Moody and Aaron Franklin announced their collaboration to bring a new feel to the normal food festival, I was pretty interested. That they would tie in some music related events, I though, “cool.” And while the music is my normal, I really wanted to see how they’d break from the norms of a food fest. Enter the Hot Luck Fest.

So, tune this out if you don’t want to see pics of delicious things. Let’s get weird and talk about the delicious.

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Night Drive News

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We don’t shy away from the fact that the ATH loves Night Drive. “Rise And Fall” is on my JamOTY list. The new record is finally final with a June 16th release date. The s/t debut rehashes a few hits we are familiar with while adding new tracks that have been on the periphery of recent live sets. New song below!

Speaking of live sets, the big release party is also officially official. Details available on the bookface, but the short and sweet is 6/16, Cheer Up, Orthy, Keeper, Single Lash and Lambda for $5. In.

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Show Pics: Tycho @ Stubb’s (5/12)

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Last Friday was an insanely busy night in Austin. While Nathan camped out with Team ATH bands over at Hotel Vegas, I was taking in a full set from Tycho at Stubb’s.

It has been a big year for Scott Hansen. He started the Tycho project as an aside to his graphic design (check it out at ISO50.com). The live shows have featured projections of his art as an element of the performance. To the credit of that graphic design, I sometimes “see” the design language when spacing out listening to the records. The latest album, Epoch, was Grammy-nominated for Best Dance/Electronic Album. That had to be a rad feeling, and a bit odd given how much of the record is not electronic or dance. The Austin show was the end of the tour, so we were treated with an extended set of lesser played songs after an intermission following the normal show.

Anyway, you can relive the night with photos of Tycho and openers Khruangbin along with some more words and even get a few bonus shots of our friends Tres Oui at Beerland. Deal?

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Dreamy Perfection From Hazel English

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…and it is a gem. I listened to it twice.

According to the intarwebs, this is a bonus track to a 2xEP purchase featuring previously released materials and some new things. Hazel English straddles a line between too much and not enough in every little bit of the song. You want the song to be longer, the hook to stick around, echoes linger and layers peel back, but without letting go to move on and open space for the synth flourishes and guitar sweeps and all that space between, you wouldn’t be nearly as hooked at one listen. Brilliant stuff.

Order the double EP here and those of you across the pond need to see if she is playing in your town.

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Have A Nice Weekend

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Jay-Z is playing ACL.

LCD Soundsystem has released two songs into the digital wild.

Resume your regularly scheduled programming.

Here is a the latest track from Beacon, realized I hadn’t shared it yet. According to a bookface post, it is a hint of what to expect from the new record pending on Ghostly. When artists are given the ultimate freedom of the digitally (or analog in the case of classic synths) crafted soundscape, I am disappointed how often that soundscape can be squandered or derivative. The creation of the tones and waves, how they transition and fall into the feeling of the track, maybe a half beat early or late, pitch-shifted or hot cut, will often decide whether or not I will spend two seconds or all day listening to a track. The foundation and eventual fall of the primary groove here, the transition between notes and octaves, the way it disapperas as the track progresses and leaves behind the refrain closing the song, but is still present in melody is why I spent more than two seconds listening.

…and what I say here stands for the bangers and the ambients, dance pop and deep house, you gotta do something with it.

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