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Willie Nelson at 80: Screen-Testing for Gandalf

"The smoke is white … we have a new wizard!" proclaims one of the ad-libs in this Willie Nelson screen test. Peter Jackson has it within his power to grant America's favorite octogenarian his fondest birthday wish: Cast aside that talentless hack Ian McKellen and install Nelson as the wizard Gandalf in The Hobbit 2. Read More | Comment »

1:15PM Tue. Apr. 30, Marjorie Baumgarten

Austin Psych Fest Live (Sunday): Roky Erickson/The Black Angels/The Moving Sidewalks

On the Reverberation mainstage, Austin Psych Fest’s final day drew to a close with a transgenerational trifecta of Texas-bred acts, each of which embodies a different aspect of the music that the event celebrates. Read More | Comment »

2:47PM Mon. Apr. 29, Scott Schinder

Austin Psych Fest Live (Sunday): Goat

When you’re putting on a show with distinctive visual content, you want people to see it. Swedish ensemble Goat has a different idea. Despite taking the stage in wizard’s robes, masks, and led by a pair of booty-shaking singers, they kept lighting to a minimum, forcing the audience to get in close to see what was going on. That was doubtless the point. Read More | Comment »

2:07PM Mon. Apr. 29, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest Live (Sunday): Dead Skeletons

Iceland’s Dead Skeletons evolved out of an art installation. Now, this collaboration between Singapore Sling’s Henrik Bjornsson and Asteroid #4’s Ryan Van Kreidt comes to the people via the full-length Dead Magick, a forthcoming EP titled Buddha-Christ, and a set at Austin Psych Fest in front of a spotlight-enhanced Colorado River. Read More | Comment »

1:37PM Mon. Apr. 29, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest Live (Sunday): No Joy

Time to create an infographic for the number of guitars played at this year’s Austin Psych Fest. It could be broken down into subcategories: Who played their guitars with chimerical delirium? Who played them in that massive, wall-of-sound, shoegaze-thrash way? How many of them felt embarrassed when they heard other bands jack their style? Read More | Comment »

1:17PM Mon. Apr. 29, Luke Winkie

Austin Psych Fest Live (Sunday): White Fence

After heavy humidity on Friday and an abusive monsoon Saturday night, the usual Texas heat yesterday was practically a relief. If two and a half years in Austin has trained me for anything, it’s standing in a field trying to ignore the skin on my neck begging for mercy. Read More | Comment »

11:57AM Mon. Apr. 29, Luke Winkie

Austin Psych Fest Live (Saturday): Spectrum

Sonic Boom – Peter Kember to his mom – hasn’t released a Spectrum LP in several years, but that doesn’t mean the act ain’t a going concern. That said, the UK trio’s Psych Fest set was equally about Spacemen 3, the pioneering Eighties psych-rock troop whose feedback and drone-ridden spirit hangs over this festival like an awning over the back porch. Read More | Comment »

4:20PM Sun. Apr. 28, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest Live (Saturday): Deerhunter

There was a brief moment Saturday night where I thought I might die at a Deerhunter concert. Not for any interpersonal danger, or bad drugs. I’m talking about the freeway turn lane into Carson Creek Ranch as sheets and sheets of rain began to snuff the hope out of anyone. This review would be my obituary. Read More | Comment »

3:33PM Sun. Apr. 28, Luke Winkie

Austin Psych Fest Live (Saturday): Boris/Masaki Batoh’s Brain Pulse Music

Japan hits Psych Fest hard this year, with Acid Mothers Temple on Friday and this double-whammy yesterday. Read More | Comment »

1:17PM Sun. Apr. 28, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest Live (Saturday): Young Magic

There was a moment yesterday, in hustling to a music festival to see Young Magic, that I realized something was wrong. Not that bottom of-the-bill bands haven’t moved me to action on other Saturdays – quite the opposite actually – but driving out of the way to see Young Magic seemed particularly obtuse, like I was parodying myself. Read More | Comment »

11:47AM Sun. Apr. 28, Luke Winkie

Austin Psych Fest Live: Acid Mothers Temple

The insanely prolific Japanese ensemble Acid Mothers Temple built a reputation in underground circles for its improvisational take on both folk-rock and heavy psych. The former, however, was nowhere in evidence during the band’s sonic thunderstorm Friday night. Read More | Comment »

3:03PM Sat. Apr. 27, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest Live: Silver Apples

Electronic rock pioneer Simeon Coxe turns 75 this year, and what better way to celebrate three quarters of a century of existence than by hitting Austin Psych Fest on Friday night under the Silver Apples name with which he’s most associated? Read More | Comment »

2:30PM Sat. Apr. 27, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest Live: Tamaryn

By 8pm, we sat contently, watching a gorgeous sunset cascade through the thickness of the grayscale sky. The angry humidity had lessened. Beauty was all that was left. Read More | Comment »

1:15PM Sat. Apr. 27, Luke Winkie

Austin Psych Fest Live: Bass Drum of Death/Besnard Lakes

Moisture stayed locked in the low-hanging air, rain threatening all afternoon. A little bit sticky, a little bit muggy – atmospheric discomfort pairs nastily with the first few hours of a festival. Walking into day one of Austin Psych Fest on Friday was almost surreal. Was this everybody? Read More | Comment »

9:45AM Sat. Apr. 27, Luke Winkie

There’s a Blue Note in Each Song That I Sing Since You’ve Been Gone

I have no idea if it’s the same for anyone born in Texas after, say, 1990, but there’s generations of us who, no matter our class, creed, color, religious, political, and musical beliefs, or genital arrangement, were stopped dead in our tracks and wept uncontrollably at the news that George Jones, native of Saratoga, died this morning. I know I did. Read More | Comment »

4:07PM Fri. Apr. 26, Tim Stegall

Austin Psych Fest: The Rain Parade

The so-called Paisley Underground was more of a loose affiliation of like-minded friends than an actual movement, but if there was a group that epitomizes its post-punk take on Sixties psychedelia, it was the Rain Parade. The crush to get into Red 7 last night to see the band’s only Psych Fest set demonstrated just that. Read More | Comment »

11:17AM Fri. Apr. 26, Michael Toland

Austin Psych Fest: Metz

Last night at Mohawk for one of two Austin Psych Fest “kick-off parties,” the mid-slot headliners proved one point loud and clear. For all its ferocity, Metz remains pretty unassuming. Read More | Comment »

10:47AM Fri. Apr. 26, Luke Winkie

SXSW Interview: Kid Congo

The former Brian Tristan was born 53 years ago in La Puente, CA. He grew up first a teenage glam denizen of Rodney Bingenheimer’s English Disco, then the president of the Ramones Fan Club, before forming the Gun Club with Jefferey Lee Pierce in 1979. He showcases tonight at Maggie Mae’s Gibson Room, 12:30am. Read More | Comment »

3:01PM Sat. Mar. 16, Tim Stegall

Abracadabra

Steve Miller had to sing for his supper, so to speak, at the 2013 Texas Medal of Arts awards Tuesday night. The Lone Star rocker was one of this year's dozen honorees, but he was also conscripted to play during the two-hour-plus ceremony at the Long Center. That proved lucky for those present, as his three songs were highlights of the program. Read More | Comment »

3:15PM Wed. Mar. 6, Robert Faires

Iggy & the Stooges Return to SXSW

As predicted in "Playback" on Thursday, Iggy & the Stooges confirmed a South by Southwest showcase today when Vans posted its Mohawk bills. Read More | Comment »

11:40AM Mon. Mar. 4, Tim Stegall

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