The last few weeks, this commercial has been bugging the crap out of me. Is it what it appears to be? Is it a coincidence? Is it a bold statement of solidarity? Turns out, it is 100% logo placement. That is an HRC logo. And Towleroad blogged about it.

If you're anywhere near the Austin Convention Center, that whizzing sound you hear probably isn't I-35. It's more likely to be visiting skaters getting ready for Capital Punishment: Battle on the Bank II, this weekend's massive banked track roller derby tournament (tickets available now). When the whistle blows to start the first bout at 2.30pm Saturday, June 20, it will arguably be the culmination of eight years of hard work for April Ritzenthaler. As La Muerta, she was one of the original founders of Austin's own TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls and captain of the Putas Del Fuego until a torn meniscus ended her skating career. Since then, she's held a variety of management positions, including helping organize this event. Amidst the madness of setting up the track and getting everyone where they need to be, she took the time to talk about the road to the tourney. Austin Chronicle: So you guys have a bit of an event this weekend? April Ritzenthaler: Slightly. I think we're going to be invading down town. AC: So this is the second big tourney the banked track leagues have organized: What's the background on that?

For the past few years, people have been telling me about their amazing experiences at Bonnaroo. I was thoroughly convinced after a security guard at last year's ACL Fest went on and on about how it's the festival he looks forward to most every year. The lineup added fuel to the fire. After a 15-hour overnight drive, I arrived in Manchester, Tenn., in the pouring rain. Within the first 10 minutes, I ran into three friends from Austin. After getting the campsite set up as much as one can in stormy weather, it was time to check out the grounds. The first thing that struck me as different than all the other festivals is the amount of stuff you can do without catching a single act. There was the Silent Disco – a tent where everyone was handed headphones playing the same music and told to jam out in their own way. There was a ferris wheel, peepshow, music trivia in the FuseTV house, and booths galore. I had to save my energy though, because the music went until 4am. Highlights: Extremely friendly staff Clean Port-A-Potties Arepas The air-conditioned comedy tent Watching a press panel (headed by Andy Langer) where Janeane Garofalo and Ani DiFranco got into it over Obama Seeing Nine Inch Nails perform for over three hours in what turned out to be their last U.S. show ever The Yeah Yeah Yeahs Shooting Crystal Castles (dark stage, single strobe light) Watching Public Enemy play "It Takes a Nation of Millions" Standing 10 feet from an extremely energetic Drew Barrymore Sleeping in the tent in pouring rain during Paul Oakenfold's set

The big roller derby weekend just got a little bigger. Aside from the long-awaited banked track tournament (come back later this afternoon for an interview about the event with TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls' April Ritzenthaler, aka La Muerta), there's some flat track action tonight, courtesy of the magic of the interwebs. The Texas Rollergirls' travel team the Texecutioners is up in Woodbridge, Conn., tonight to take on the nation's top team, the Gotham Girls Allstars. For those of you that can't afford an overnight flight to New England, there's a watch party with a live stream at Scholz Garten, 1607 San Jacinto. The party starts at 5.30pm and runs until final whistle, plus there's the bonus of happy hour drink prices.

When Steve Earle was only 16 years old, he had already dropped out of high school in San Antonio and begun playing in coffeehouses and any bars he could sneak into. In Austin and Houston, the folk scene of the early Seventies was thriving, and Earle went looking for his place within it, tracing the winding and wrecked path of his idol, Townes Van Zandt. Van Zandt's inspiration consumed the younger songwriter’s music and life, and helped propel him to national acclaim with the release of his first album, 1986’s Guitar Town. Alcohol and heroin had taken everything away from Van Zandt by his arrest in 1993. More than a decade after his death, the spirit still lingers indelibly upon Earle. Last year, holed up in his tiny New York City apartment, Earle began recording the long-planned tribute to his late friend and mentor. Between songs, the tape kept running as Earle would talk about Van Zandt, telling stories that have slipped from mere memory into legend, quietly baring the intimacy between Earle and Van Zandt that rings throughout his new album, Townes (New West). Speaking from his home just outside of Woodstock, NY., which he shares with his wife Allison Moorer, Earle reflected back on his past with Townes and finally making the tribute album to him. Earle plays a special solo acoustic show tonight at the Paramount. Joe Pug opens. 8pm.

Longtime local Curt Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets always calls it liked he sees it. “I like this record as much as anything we’ve ever done, but every punch bowl has to have a turd in it if you ask me,” he says of the trio’s latest, Sewn Together. “It’s my party and [track nine] ‘S.K.A.’ is the turd in the punch. It still works.” Sewn Together marks the first time for the elder Kirkwood to self-produce since 1989’s Monsters, and some of the material, most notably the closing cut, “Love Mountain,” predates even the band’s 1982 eponymous debut. Kirkwood sounds off below on the making on the making of the album, which the Puppets rehash in its entirety on Saturday at the Parish with Retribution Gospel Choir, topped, as Kirkwood notes, “with a bunch of old crap.” Off the Record: Everyone’s first reaction to Sewn Together seems to be that it’s a classic Meat Puppets record. Was that yours as well? Curt Kirkwood: Not really. I just wanted to record straight to tape. We’ve been out now doing shows for ten months, and it felt like we were a good live band, so I wanted to grab that. The best way I know is in the studio with 24 tracks. It’s pretty easy for me to get satisfied that way. I always have a collection of songs. There’s some older ones and some newer ones. That may help a little bit. I wrote “Love Mountain” in 1981. That’s one of the oldest songs I have around. I don’t know why it never got recorded. Cris once said, "What the fuck is this? I don’t live on a Love Mountain." That’s why [drummer] Ted [Marcus] and I went behind his back and recorded it in Ted’s bedroom.

There could be some grim surprises for some legislators come Father's Day: That's the deadline for Gov. Rick Perry to put a big, thick line through the legislation he doesn't like. That said, it could come even sooner: Last session, he ruined the weekend for community colleges by slashing their funding on the Friday. So far, two bills seem to be drawing the biggest veto controversy, with forces marshaling on both sides to encourage/discourage Perry's hand on the legislation. First up is House Bill 4294, which gives school districts the option to buy electronic versions of learning materials, instead of hard copy text books. In passage, it had pretty broad support. Only the Textbook Coordinators' Association of Texas opposed it, on the basis that the state still doesn't have a coherent and unified approach to integrating technology into the classroom. But now conservatives on the State Board of Education like Terri Leo are complaining that it undermines their power over textbook selection. However, bill supporters argue this won't change those powers one jot. What it does is give school districts a little more pull in their complicated and long-running dance with textbook publishers over some more cut-throat practices. So with the Texas Association of Business calling for Perry to sign, this is now fiscal conservatives versus the religious right. Possibly more controversial for Perry may be Senate Bill 1440.

Travis Co. District Judge Mike Lynch said Thursday afternoon that he would decide by Monday (June 23) whether circumstances warrant a reduction in bond that would allow defendant Robert Springsteen to be released from jail pending his retrial in the infamous yogurt shop murder case. The current legal dispute is, essentially, a battle of DNA experts, although in the Thursday hearing they were represented only by the opposing attorneys. The latest chapter of the seemingly endless saga began back in March 2008, when new DNA testing by Fairfax Lab (Virginia) working for the state revealed an unknown male DNA profile on vaginal swabs taken from the youngest victim, 13-year-old Amy Ayers, murdered with three other young women in a North Austin yogurt shop in December of 1991. The DNA profile from Ayers’ body does not match Springsteen nor co-defendant Michael Scott, nor two other men – Maurice Pierce, who prosecutors previously dubbed the “mastermind” behind the grisly murder before dismissing all charges against him in 2003, and Forrest Welborn who prosecutors said acted as a lookout, but against whom two grand juries failed to return an indictment. Nor, it turns out, does the profile match any of more than 100 people that the state has tested it against. To date, the donor of that DNA remains unidentified.