Episode #5: Halloween Edition

It's a special edition of the Waterloo Sunset podcast--all Halloween music, all the time. Special thanks to Meg from Lost Art of the Mixtape for tracking down some of these songs. Here's this week's spooky setlist:

Jad And David Fair--"Frankenstein"
Link Wray and His Raymen--"The Shadow Knows"
Screamin' Jay Hawkins--"I Put a Spell On You"
The Spooks--"The Spook Walks"
Man Man--"Top Drawer"
Jerry Bryan--"Vampire Daddy"
"Twilight Zone Theme Song"
October Country--"My Girlfriend Is A Witch"
Crazy World of Arthur Brown--"Fire"
Dead Man's Bones--"My Body's A Zombie For You"
Blind Willie Johnson--"Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground"
Basil Rathbone reading "The Raven" + Ennio Morricone's "Death Rattle"
Tom Waits--"The Earth Died Screaming"
Danny Elfman--"This Is Halloween"

Total running time: 38:00

Listen below: either click to stream or right-click (control-click for Mac users) and save to download.

Halloween Podcast

Punk Parties

Two great shows going down this weekend in the ATX, unfortunately both on the same night (Saturday, October 24). Follow That Bird!'s angular post-punk has finally been committed to wax, and those ladies and lads are out to celebrate. They're playing a record release party at the United States Art Authority to commemorate their new 10", and get this--$7 gets you in the door AND a free copy of said 10". Not too shabby.

Meanwhile, Austin's perennially-on-the-cusp White Denim bring their muscular punk-soul-funk to the Mohawk to celebrate the release of their second album, Fits, which dropped on Tuesday. They've been better received in Europe than in their own hometown, which is ridiculous--get out there, Austin, and claim these firebrands as your own.

Both shows start at 9 PM. Do it to it.

Episode 4

Here's Episode 4 of the WS Podcast, now a bi-weekly venture. This week's track list:

Jim Ford--"Harlan County"
Woods--"To Clean (Acoustic)"
Neil Young--"I've Loved Her So Long"
The Very Best (ft. Ezra Koenig)--"Warm Heart of Africa"
Mulatu Astatke--"Yegelle Tezeta"
Amen Dunes--"Castles"
Blitzen Trapper--"Sleepytime In The Western World/Jericho" (Live at ACL '09)
Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood--"Some Velvet Morning"
Grizzly Bear (ft. Victoria Legrand)--"Slow Life"
Sonny & the Sunsets--"Too Young To Burn"

Total running time: 36:23

Episode 4:
Waterloo Sunset Podcast 4

Kurt Vile: Childish Prodigy

I've reviewed my first album over at Prefix Magazine, Kurt Vile's Childish Prodigy. Vile's known for his musical Zelig-ness: lo-fi bedroom psychedelia, full-on classic rock stompers, and even avant-garde electronic soundscapes all figure into his increasing canon. His debut for Matador shows a continued evolution--this time incorporating swampy blues rock into his hypnotic psych-folk. Read the full review here, and check out this potent cut from the album:

Kurt Vile--Overnight Religion

Sonny & the Sunsets

Musical simplicity: harder than it seems, and just as emotionally resonant as the most complex arias. This year has been critically ruled by cerebral art rock--Grizzly Bear, Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors, St. Vincent, etc. Yet SF's Sonny & the Sunsets don't need no fancy laptops, autoharps, or digital effects--they just create beautifully shaggy garage pop that sounds utterly timeless from the moment the needle hits the wax (or the 1's and 0's shoot out of...wait, what's the digital comparative?). The brain (and, more fitting, the heart) behind these charming tunes is one Sonny Smith, who has put out a number of solo albums before teaming up with some Bay Area friends to craft Tomorrow Is Alright, the Sunsets' debut album. Smith has experience writing short stories, and his songs seem to allude to this, each one a fully-formed tale populated with intriguing characters. Tomorrow is set for a November 10 release via Soft Abuse, and it seems it might go fast--their debut single sold out quickly over the summer. Pre-order the album here, and be sure to check out the tunes below.

**Note: you can now download any songs I put on this blog, but only for a limited time. Right-click on the song (control-click for Mac users) and save the file to your computer, or just stream it by clicking the arrow.

Sonny and the Sunsets--Too Young To Burn
Sonny and the Sunsets--Death Cream

Episode 3

ACL has rolled into town, and this week's podcast is a primer of some the acts playing down at Zilker Park. Like always, though, I couldn't help fit in time for some older tunes to offset all the freshness...Here's this week's playlist:

Heartless Bastards--"The Mountain"
St. Vincent--"Marrow"
Link Wray--"Rumble"
Flat Duo Jets--"Never No More"
Rodriguez--"Sugar Man"
Cotton Jones--"Blood Red Sentimental Blues"
Wye Oak--"That I Do"
Dr. Dog--"Adeline"
Blitzen Trapper--"Country Caravan"-->"Badger's Black Brigade"

Right click or Control + click (Mac users) the word to download, or just stream below.

Episode 3
Podcast #3

Total running time: 36:27

***Two special notes***
I'm going to be doing some writing for Prefix Magazine, so I probably won't be able to continue weekly podcasts. Henceforth, they will become bi-weekly, and be on the lookout for some album reviews coming down the pipe.

Furthermore, the downloads/streams of the podcasts will only be up for a few weeks to save filehosting space, so get em while they're hot...

Rome Built In A Day

At Arthouse last weekend, people gathered from all over Texas to take part in L.A.-based artist Liz Glynn's performance piece The 24 Hour Roman Reconstruction Project. It's exactly what it sounds like: from 12:00 Saturday morning to 11:59 Saturday night, hundreds of people set out to recreate Rome, starting with its hamlet beginnings, working through its Republic growing pains, and eventually on through the rise and fall of the Empire itself (at 11:59 the destruction commenced, with people stomping and crushing the day's work with gleeful abandon). The buildings ranged from the classic (the Circus Maximus, the Coliseum, etc.) to the absurd (buildings with "beer-bottle columns and a roof covered in lavender fur"), all representing the creativity--and the range of abilities--of the artists themselves.

The Austin Chronicle has nice write-up here, and you can see more pictures here, courtesy of the Austinist.

Long, Long, Long Was the Summer

I think this video sums up my feelings about Summer '09 in Austin, which still enshrouds us with its humid grasp as I write this on October 1st...

Cotton Jones - The Radio Slugger - Luxury Wafers Sessions from Luxury Wafers on Vimeo.

Cotton Jones will be performing this weekend at the Austin City Limits Music Festival in beautiful Zilker Park this weekend. Check em out, and be on the lookout for Episode 3 of the WS podcast tomorrow, where I'll have some more music from the Jones.

Onward.