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The Dan Patrick Files

Who is Dan Patrick? He’s the former Danny Goeb, a Baltimore-born sportscaster (not to be confused with the much nicer Dan Patrick formerly of ESPN) who reinvented himself as the burning radical of Texas’ religious right. Patrick has made a career out of getting little done, but doing it loudly, and getting promoted because of…

by Chronicle Staff

Texas Platters

Jack Ingram sat poised to make the leap into mainstream success after capturing the prestigious Academy of Country Music Award for “Best New Male Vocalist” in 2008, followed up the next year by Big Dreams & High Hopes. Then momentum waned. What’s remarkable about Midnight Motel, the Houston native’s eighth studio LP and first in…

by Doug Freeman

Texas Platters

Continuing a sound established on 2014 debut Olivia, Jeremy O’Bannon’s contemporary folk falls squarely on the shoulders of James Taylor. The Austin-born Houstonian affects the Martha’s Vineyard great’s nasally sing-song cadence and bright instrumental accoutrements (“Come Back to Stay”), leaning heavily on fluid guitar picking and O’Bannon’s assured delivery (“What Lies Beneath”). “Tuesday Afternoon” adds…

by Abby Johnston

Gay Place

DJ GirlFriend continues to make space for queers and also raise funds for some hard-workin’ orgs

by Sarah Marloff

Texas Platters

Picking up where his 2014 debut Flagship – named after the now-defunct Galveston hotel – left off, Justin Stewart heads north up I-45. Second LP City Fox begins with “Houston,” a country-touched ode to his native city led by acoustic guitar and revelatory piano flourishes. After that, however, the album actually dwells in the far…

by Abby Johnston

Texas Platters

Greatness lies within the grasp of Austin outfit Magna Carda. 2014’s Like It Is covered the Rootsian, full live band aspect of hip-hop, production by Dougie Do leaning toward sounds that wouldn’t be completely unfamiliar to the jazzy, soulful legacy of the Native Tongues/Soulquarians collectives (Common, Talib Kweli, Mos Def, and Q-Tip). That provided a…

by Kahron Spearman

Soccer Watch

Portugal eked out a very late goal, against the run of play, to beat France 1-0 in the Euro 2016 final, and win the first major title in their illustrious history, but it was a disappointing final to a disappointing tournament, in which negative play generally won the day, and goals were few and far…

by Nick Barbaro

Texas Platters

To paraphrase: Rock isn’t dead, it just smells funny. Frank Zappa spoke of jazz at the time, but its blues offshoot cousin today lacks any sort of bleeding edge, which then lends the format a peculiar odor. My Jerusalem, the Austin quartet led by the nearly always brooding Jeff Klein, isn’t reinventing the genre, but…

by Jim Caligiuri

Headlines

The city’s Planning and Zoning Department announced this week that CodeNEXT project manager Jim Robertson is leaving his post to become chief urban designer for the city of Boulder, Colo. Robertson leaves the department next week, and Austin in mid-August. Capital Metro ticket vending machines at its nine MetroRail stations will no longer accept credit…

by Chronicle Staff

Texas Platters

Honky’s as stable as the rodeo. Led by the twin cowboy hats of bassist JD Pinkus (Butthole Surfers) and Bobby Ed Landgraf (Down, Skrew), Austin’s beardtastic power trio rarely expands beyond its own self-imposed boundaries, but the band just as rarely falters in its hip-shaking hellbilly rawk. Corduroy, the band’s seventh album, introduces a few…

by Michael Toland

Quote of the Week

“We ask the police to do too much, and we ask too little of ourselves.” – President Barack Obama, speaking Tuesday at the memorial services for five murdered Dallas police officers

by Chronicle Staff

Texas Platters

Some of the best and the busiest musicians in Austin populate 10-piece ensemble Hard Proof, comprised of band members from Black Joe Lewis, the Calm Blue Sea, Ocote Soul Sounds, the Echocentrics, and more. As the former Hard Proof Afrobeat, they still take their cues from the funk excursions out of sub-Saharan Africa. Where Fela…

by Jim Caligiuri

APD Begins Mandatory Overtime

The Austin Police Department instituted mandatory overtime staffing on Tuesday, continuing through the next two weeks, at which point the department will “reassess to see if there is a continued need.” Police Chief Art Acevedo wrote in a memo to Austin Police Association president Ken Casaday that the decision to shift into “this emergency posture”…

by Chase Hoffberger

Mr. Smarty Pants Knows

For many Brazilian teens, a visit to Orlando, Fla., is a rite of passage. At age 6, Sophia Loren’s chin was cut by shrapnel during a bombing in World War II. While Thomas Jefferson was U.S. vice president and president, he was also president of the American Philosophical Society, the nation’s oldest scientific society, which…

by Mr. Smarty Pants

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