SXSW: Blog Malfunctions

The Austin Banjo Club

AUSTIN _ Here's the good news: I've been having a great time going out to see bands and spending a lot of time with my kids and grandkids, who live in this town.
Here's the bad news: I've gotten way behind on my blogging about t he festivities surrounding SXSW. My old cronies like Chuck and Alec will scoff at this notion, as they'll remember me in years past staying up to 5 a.m. At the old Excel Inn to blog this silly stuff. I guess I'm just getting feeble in my old age.

Also, during the few scraps of time that I've had to spend on this mess has been frustrating because my iPad blog program (Blogsy) isn't cooperating with placing and arranging photos like I want them.
At one point tonight I nearly started screaming at my screen in the Study Room of Strange Brew coffee house, which would have been extremely rude. (I've never been 86ed from a coffee joint before.

Tomorrow looks like a fun and busy day. Hopefully I'll finally catch The Night Beats Saturday at noon at Whole Foods on South Lamar. And there is more after that. So I'm going to do a blog moratorium for the rest of the trip.

And you can follow me on Twitter and on Instagram

The Wackos of Waco

SXSW Day 2

The Hickoids: America's Sweethearts

AUSTIN, TEXAS _ Hands down my musical highlight Wednesday was The midnight set of The Hickoids over at The White Horse, a nothin' fancy but welcoming joint off East 6th Street that in recent years has become one of my favorite Austin venues in recent years. And, of course, The Hickoids have become one of my chief must-see bands every time I come to Austin. Having a Santa Fe crony, guitarist Tom Trusnovic in the group helps, but I already was a casual Hickhead even before Tommy joined several years ago.

But I was a little apprehensive about seeing them last night because this would be the first show I'd see them since last year's death of original member, guitar slinger, no-shit cosmic cowboy, "The True Heart of Austin Rock 'n' Roll" and Prince of the Plaid Davy Jones.

Publicist extraordinaire Heather West and Hickoid Jeff Smith with Davy's award

Last time I saw Davy, or The Hickoids, was during the 2014 SXSW. I saw them play twice (once in San Marcos and once at the White Horse) and I watched them get formally inducted in the Austin Music Hall of Fame at the Austin Music Awards show. He was in great spirits that week and played like the maniac he was.

Last night before the White Horse show, Davy was honored again at the Austin Music Awards. He got inducted posthumously into the Hall of Fame, this time as a "solo" artist. Head Hickoids Honcho Jeff Smith was there to accept that award. He held it up on stage at the beginning of the band's set to great applause. And then the surviving Hickoids proceeded to live up to his memory.

Smith, Trusnovic, bassist Rice Moorehead and drummer Lance Farley -- along with new guitarist Cody Richardson (who also plays with The Beaumonts) bashed through some of my favorite Hickoid hits including "Git Back on The Truck," "Cool Arrow," "Working Man's Friend" and the fabulously filthy "Stop It, You're Killing Me," which put to shame anything in the Blowfly tribute set, which was on immediately before.

My son, who lives in Austin, went with me to the show, so it was heartwarming to see it through the eyes of a newcomer to the warped world of The Hickoids. (He'd seen the band once before, when they opened for Roky Erikson on New Year's Eve. But I'm so bitter and resentful for missing that show, I don't like to talk about it.)

Actually that Blowfly tribute was pretty disappointing. The main problem was it just went on way too long. I loved Blowfly, who died earlier this year, but a little of him goes a long way ...) But that set was sandwiched between two fantastic sets, The Hickoids and The Beaumonts.

I walked into the White Horse just as The Beaumonts were starting one of my favorite tunes, "Money for Drugs."

Unfortunately, we got there too late to see Churchwood and Stevie Tombstone. In my golden years I guess I'm starting to lose my schedule management abilities for SXSW ...

SXSW Day 1

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A look behind Thee Oh Sees

AUSTIN, TEXAS _ As Roger Miller would say, my ears still ring from last night's show at Hotel Vegas over on East Sixth Street. The stars of Tuesday's show were Thee Oh Sees, which longtime readers of this humble blog should know is one of my favorite living bands.

This is the third time I've seen John Dwyer and his merry band. I first caught them during the 2012 South by Southwest festival in Austin before I even knew who they were, playing on a bill with The Gories and Kid Congo Powers. By the second time I saw them, a couple of years ago in Albuquerque, their album Floating Coffin was one of my favorites of that year. (It's still my favorite Oh Sees record, though they've done a couple of fine ones since.)

Of those three shows I've seen, last night's was definitely the fiercest, most aggressive and most intense. They started off on full blast warp speed and rarely eased up for the hour-plus they played. Dwyer, after putting Thee Oh Sees on a ridiculously short "hiatus" shortly after the last time I saw them, moved from San Francisco to Los Angeles and put together a new version of the group.

The band I saw last night had two drummers (which also was the case when I first saw them four years ago), a bass player and, of course Dwyer on guitar, vocals and occasional keyboards.

Oh si!

This Austin crowd was extremely fired up, immediately forming a frenzied mosh pit, which inspired a seemingly endless stream of stage-divers/crowd surfers. It was as if the early '90s never ended.


And I've got to go on the record here as a hip and swingin' rock 'n' roll grandpappy and say that this crap irritates me. I've avoided the mosh pits since that night a few years ago I nearly lost my upper plate when some dumbass mosher thought it would be cool to slam into my back. One reason I hate it so much is that the quality of my snapshots suffer when I lost my place up front and center.

But all that geezer stuff aside, this show left me grinning. Not only was the show full of fire, the crazed other-worldliness of Dwyer's musical vision -- his distorted falsetto vocals, the crazy sci-fi guitar bleeps and blorches -- cuts to the bone.

It's all on a visceral level. I couldn't actually make out any of the lyrics he was singing and I didn't recognize many of the songs until several minutes in -- and many of them, I didn't recognize at all.
But you could feel the power, that call of the weird that rock 'n' roll fans crave.

If you're in Austin right now, don't kick yourself for missing this show last night. Thee Oh Sees have taken up residency at Hotel Vegas and will be playing tonight and every night through Saturday there. (Not sure of the times though.)

One disappointment: Another favorite underground band I love, The Night Beats, also was on the bill at Hotel Vegas Tuesday. However, they played hours before I arrived, around 5 p.m. (5 p.m.? What is this, the early bird special at Denny's?) So hopefully I'll catch them somewhere later this week.

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, March 13, 2016
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell
Webcasting!
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell(at)ksfr.org

Here's the playlist

OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres

Accentuate the Positve / Things are Getting Better by NRBQ

Little Doll by The Stooges

I Got Eyes for You by The Gories

Ass Welt Boogie by The Bassholes

Bad Love by The Night Beats

Meat Juice Mustache by Made for Chickens by Robots

UFO, Please Take Her Home by The Coachwhips

Wild Man by The Mokkers

Romance by Wild Flag

Crazy for You by Dirtbombs

 

Dead Moon Night by Dead Moon

Voyage of the Trieste by Chocolate Watch Band

Lady Queen Bee by The Grandmothers

Bee Line by The Ugly Beats

Facebook Troll / No Xmas for John Quay by The Fall

Mean Ass Girlfriend by The Barbarellatones

Pre-St. Pat's Celebration (Celt Rock and more!)

Black and Blue by Kilmaine Saints

The Body of an American by The Pogues

Jack Dempsey by Scythian

Some Say The Divil is Dead by The Wolfe Tones

Hey What's Under Your Kilt by Celkilt

Full Moon by The Bloody Irish Boys

What's Left of the Flag by Flogging Molly

Jimmy Collins' Wake by Dropkick Murphys

Hit the Ground by Greenland Whalefishers

Whiskey Devil by The Mahones

Molly Malone by Sinead O'Connor

The Six Rat Rovers by Paddy & The Rats

Forty Deuce by Black 47

Carrickfergus by Van Morrison & The Chieftains

Substitute CLOSING THEME: Lucky Day by Tom Waits

 

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Subscribe to The Big Enchilada Podcast! CLICK HERE

 

SXSW 2016: WATCH THIS BLOG

Love is in the air in Austin next week.
And The Waco Brothers will be there too

I'm headed down to Texas once again for the festivities surrounding South by Southwest. Please bookmark this blog and watch for my posts. Hopefully, if my grandsons allow it, I'll be posting ever day, starting Wednesday morning.

No, I didn't get a badge or wristband. But as any music fiend who has attended this Spring Break for the Music Industry knows, you don't need no stinking badge! There are plenty of unofficial, unsanctioned, unspeakable events to keep you thoroughly entertained.

The last time I was there, in 2014, there was a senseless, tragic crime in the streets of Austin that left four people dead (just a few blocks from where I was at the time.) A maniac named Rashad Owens plowed through Red River Street, which was full of pedestrians, leaving four people dead. this was near the Mohawk, where some musical acts I love, including X, The Black ANgels and Les Claypool were playing.

Last November a jury found Owens guilty of capital murder. Because the state didn't seek the death penalty, he received an automatic life sentence.

If anyone gives a rodent's posterior, you can find my posts from past years, going back to 2004 HERE.  And you can find a whole lot of my SXSW snapshots HERE

The bad news: No Wacky Wednesday or Throwback Thursday next week. But follow the links and catch up on some old ones.

Someone I won't be seeing next week is the late Davy Jones of The Hickoids. Davy died of cancer in November. But I bet his spirit will be there Tuesday night when Hickoids, Beaumonts, Churchwood, Stevie Tombstone and others play The White Horse.

R.I.P. Davy Jones