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Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Time capsule songs spooled onto cassette by Caroline Sallee caught the collective consciousness beginning in 2014 and now find re-release on local heralder Western Vinyl. 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can’t Be Wrong recounts the local’s West Coast adventures in hues of loneliness, with lo-fi encapsulations titled as inside jokes (“Funeral Potatoes”) and rooted in reminiscences. At…

by Rachel Rascoe

Headlines

City Council meets today (Aug. 17) with a full agenda, including public budget and property tax hearings, revisiting the Plaza Saltillo TOD ordinance, more discussion of the Austin Energy long-term plan … and plenty more. “A Council’s Work Is Never Done,” Aug. 18. A three-judge federal panel ruled unconstitutional Texas Congressional Districts 27 and 35,…

by Chronicle Staff

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

By design, Jeff “Horti” Hortillosa’s Corpus Callosum doesn’t rest within one genre. Foretold by the title of his solo disc, the Whiskey Shivers guitarist invites listeners into his brain, and bluegrass ain’t on it. Instead, there’s a mélange of lush, beachy guitar licks (“Falling Down”), a cabaret ditty led by jazz clarinet (“You Can’t Make…

by Abby Johnston

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Ray Wylie Hubbard rides shotgun to the apocalypse, like Major Kong straddling the bomb to destruction in Dr. Strangelove. On his 17th long-player, Wimberley’s gypsy troubadour continues his new-century resurgence, born in the blues of the Eternal & Lowdown (2001), slithering through the Snake Farm (2006), and caught between A: Enlightenment B: Endarkenment (Hint: There…

by Doug Freeman

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

What initially began as weekly stress release sessions for Kristin Davidson and Carolyn Phillips has now Hardened and Tempered into The Trailer Sessions, country and folk that storytells the plight of humans. Produced by the legendary Lloyd Maines and featuring the talents of Richard Bowden, Bukka Allen, and Terri Hendrix, 11 neatly wrapped songs driven…

by Lauren Modery

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Last-standing BoDean Kurt Neumann is in a reflective mood, both toward his longtime Dripping Springs residence and Wisconsin upbringing. Neumann retains moments of roots-rock freshness on the driving “I Get Low” and dreamy “Here Somehow,” but Thirteen still sounds dated, particularly on the misplaced pop swirl of “Evrybdy Wants.” Penned for Ashton Kutcher’s odd Netflix…

by Doug Freeman

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Their brand of acoustic folk-pop nestling comfortably between the sensitive earthiness of the Avett Brothers and the baroque tendencies of Andrew Bird, Sons of Santos’ enchanting circle of strings, keys, and percussion wafts soft as a feather bed on the Austin quartet’s debut full-length. The bass clef steals the show with Nick Soberon’s agile cello…

by Kevin Curtin

Soccer Watch

With a 2-0 exhibition win over Incarnate Word under their belt, the UT Longhorns open their regular season this Fri., Aug. 18, hosting Rice at 7pm at Mike A. Myers Stadium (Manor & Red River), and Western Kentucky at 2pm on Sun., Aug. 20. A Back to School Weekend special offers $1 tickets for students,…

by Nick Barbaro

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

The death of his father and birth of a son contextualizes Josh Abbott’s triumphant fifth LP. Powered by a well-oiled septet, its opening title track signals palpable evolution beyond the Red Dirt circuit, the frontman’s easy drawl and Austin Davis’ banjo providing fascinating interplay with Rob Mathes’ string quartet arrangements. “Heartbeatin'” melds that same banjo…

by Doug Freeman

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Contemporaries of every hallowed name in Austin’s Seventies/Eighties blues boom, Kathy & the Kilowatts understand the form’s vocabulary as well as any surviving practitioners. “Call Me Mrs. Blues” and “Read ‘Em & Weep” shuffle akin to Lightnin’ Hopkins, while the titular opener rocks like the Fabulous Thunderbirds in their hit-making ATX heyday. Then the horn-drenched…

by Tim Stegall

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Brandon Luedtke’s debut hinges on the local’s uniquely twinged warble and fingerpicked melodies. There’s a touch of Tom Brosseau’s bent, nasal folk (“The Cuckoo Bird”) and Woody Guthrie at his most playful (“New World”). Toe-tapping opener “Can’t Get Away (From the Way of the World)” and the gospel-blues harmonies of closer “Soon One Morning” bookend…

by Doug Freeman

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Matt Sever approaches songcraft with the life-or-death attention to detail required in the former day job that spawned his performing moniker. His 10th album recaps the six 7-inch singles he recorded with guest artists alongside a second disc of his current trio’s renditions of the same songs. “Mountains,” particularly the single version, is the big…

by Greg Beets

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Mark McKinney gained Lone Star traction on 2013’s Standing My Ground, but his fifth album doesn’t push the local songwriter much further. Road-worn opener “90 Miles” rides the best moment, and leaves the rest to roll downhill. McKinney falls too easily into triteness both lyrically and musically, sometimes clashing cliches, as on “Rainy Day Money”…

by Doug Freeman

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Though not as prominent as International Artists brethren like the 13th Floor Elevators and Bubble Puppy, the Golden Dawn whittled a niche all their own in emergent Texas psychedelia. Listening to 1968’s Power Plant in retrospect, you can easily trace South Austin-bred bandleader George Kinney’s forward path. Aside from lysergic San Franciscan revelations steeped in…

by Greg Beets

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Johnny Dango, Doug Strahan, and Todd Thompson make a dangerous combo. The collective’s second long-player shoots dark and gritty at the outset with wicked ballad “Todos Juntos” and roaring blues “Driving Rain.” Swerving Southern rock choogle with hints of Old 97s and Drive-By Truckers, Thompson’s piano rolls atop Dango and Strahan’s guitars, working rockers like…

by Doug Freeman

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Between Adam Wright’s deep blather-n-blort and Dashiell Sublett’s jigsaw locomotion sparks certain death. The rhythm section’s Southern lag lends first decimation “Impending Tomb” a woozy subterfuge stampeded by a NWOBHM inevitability that bears replay and insures Burial Wraith’s future. “Inverted Casket” pummels and double-times, cymbal shrapnel flying, while its EP bookend “Kneel to the Witches…

by Raoul Hernandez

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Sixties disillusion and the Seventies paranoia of Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon lurches straight into nuclear winter on Doom Side of the Moon. As executed by three-quarters of local warp riders the Sword and the key to Brown Sabbath, Alex Marrero, all the touchstones remain: an uncanny Gilmour croon aerating “Breathe,” the…

by Raoul Hernandez

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Almost a decade vested in ATX, Colombian fivepiece Headcrusher finally follows up 2012 debut Let the Blood Run and subsequent EP Black Burning Skies by erecting a solid wall of death. Where its meat-hook predecessors basically spread a single song over a dozen combined tracks, that raw sustenance hardens into uniformity on Death Comes With…

by Raoul Hernandez

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

San Antonio trumpeter/educator Adrian Ruiz wastes no time barreling out of the chute on “Elvinism,” lead-off track from this debut release. Director of Jazz Studies at UTSA, Ruiz assembled a stellar lineup of Austin musicians who meld into a tight, wailing unit that navigates the shoals of more contemplative material with compositions contributed by all…

by Jay Trachtenberg

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Not quite as compelling as Adrian Ruiz’s bow, but satisfying in its own right is the debut from Austin trombonist Altin Sencalar. A straight-ahead affair of primarily originals, the comfortable sound centers around the leader and his rhythm section with a saxophone or trumpet included on some tracks. Pianist Ross Margitza proves a splendid foil…

by Jay Trachtenberg

Mr. Smarty Pants Knows

A 2007 dispute between attorney Gregory Shamoun and oilman John Cantrell, both of Midlothian, led Shamoun to bring his donkey named Buddy to the courtroom. Cantrell complained of the donkey’s noise and manure. The case was settled when Shamoun agreed to buy some of Can­trell’s land – and thus, Cantrell’s objections to the ass were…

by Mr. Smarty Pants

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

If you’re a fan of raucous Chicago blues à la Chess Records with a bit of the swampy Excello sound thrown in, the Peacemak­ers are for you. Mixing spot-on originals “Cool Driver” and “Your Goose Is Cooked” with choice covers of Howlin’ Wolf, Eddy Clear­wat­er, and Slim Harpo, these guys get down and dirty. An…

by Jay Trachtenberg

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

When Minnesota-to-Austin-and back (and forth) transplant Mike Nicolai released his third album Rooster Nudes in 2003, the Chronicle savaged it. A decade-and-a-half later, now remastered on vinyl, it deserves reappraisal. Part of a wave of solo auteurs more influenced by Paul Westerberg and Jonathan Richman than Bob Dylan or Joni Mitchell, Nicolai marries bar band…

by Michael Toland

Celebrity Judges at the Hot Sauce Festival

Brandon Watson (Head Judge): Brandon Watson is the food editor of The Austin Chronicle. Rob Lippincott Rob Lippincott and his wife, Cathy, own Güero’s Taco Bar – now in its 31st year of being run and operated by the Lippincott family. Jake Maddux Jake Maddux, founder of the upcoming East Austin all-wood focused restaurant and…

by Chronicle Staff

Summer Jams Clearance Sale, Part 2

Loving reappraisal for Nakia’s 2009 debut Water to Wine rides atop the same soulful ballads that carried him into the semifinals of NBC’s The Voice. Behind the local vocal powerhouse, “Pharmacy” welcomes fans and newcomers alike with a heavy love punch whose beat keeps asking you to catch up, but a lyric accentuated by Nakia’s…

by Isabella Castro-Cota

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