Cover Story
Happy Feet!
‘You listening to the ooold school – KUTX, nine-eight-nine!’
Better Lorde Than Britney Spears
‘Royals’ hitmaker unleashes ‘Team’ video
Film Flam
Pacino sightings, plus SXSW keynote drama
Dan Keller Freed
After 21 years, reunited with Fran outside county jail
(Dangerous) Toys for Christmas!
Jason McMaster checks his annual (set)list
The AggreGAYtor: December 5
What happened today in gay? Here’s your QILTBAG recap of queer news.
Former Becker Winemaker Russell Smith’s Wines Now In Austin
Quality Spanish wines priced to party
Swearingen to CCA: Please Test the Evidence
State says testing won’t prove innocence
Bad Law, Bad Lawyer: Davis Wings Abbott
Dem sinks in barb over Republican’s defense of slashing school finance
Visions of Edible Masterpieces Dance in Our Heads
Pastry chefs, culinary students create gingerbread art
Yes Yes: Sundance Announces 2014 Class
Austinites a-plenty in Competition and NEXT slates
The AggreGAYtor: December 4
What happened today in gay? Here’s your QILTBAG recap of queer news.
Railroaded
Wayne Christian spreads gun control lie
Film Flam
On marshmallows, V.C.’s in Vegas, and a Weird sad signoff
Austin Psych Fest Announces Lineup
APF 7 goes global
Austin Aquarium Manager Sent to Federal Shark Tank
Covino gets a year behind bars
Thirsty Nickel’s Justin Adame Wins Bartender Appreciation Day Party
Local bartender wins a party and you’re invited
¡Gaytino! A Universal Experience
Dan Guerrero’s one-man show comes to Austin for one night only
Ladies Night Out at the Volstead
KOOP fundraiser promises plenty of girlie action
East Side King Celebrates 1st Anniversary at Hole in the Wall Dec. 4th
Souvenir t-shirts, food & drink specials while supplies last
Motown vs. Stax
Local covers showdown Friday at the Cactus Cafe
Austin-Area Confections Make National Top 25 List
Round Rock Donuts come in at #2, Gourdough’s at #12
The AggreGAYtor: December 3
What happened today in gay? Here’s your QILTBAG recap of queer news.
‘The Death Penalty Is About Us’
‘Dead Man Walking’ scribe Sister Helen Prejean speaks in town tonight
Staple! Lives!
Indie media expo adds three big names to guest list
‘Nothing Is Done Alone’ Extended Interview
The TxCC and their role in Bastrop’s recovery after the fires
T.R. Fehrenbach Dead at 88
Historian celebrated for ‘Lone Star: A History of Texas and the Texans’
The AggreGAYtor: December 2
What happened today in gay? Here’s your QILTBAG recap of queer news.
Your Mouth Wants a Biscuit Like This Biscuit
Because, we suggest, the toppings are downright Pre-Raphaelite.
Cue the Underdog QB Fantasy
Texas State finds reality in season-ending loss
Aggies End Regular Season on a Losing Streak
Mizzou captures SEC East with Saturday’s win
Bang Your Head With ‘Necronomica’
Heartfelt black metal comedy gets Vimeo Staff Pick seal of approval
Austin Bakes Steps Up to the Stove Again
Volunteer bake sales to raise money for flood victims
De-Stigmatizing HIV
Austin’s third World AIDS Day event works to educated and combat stigma
The Wyldz
French rock & roll trio settles in locally
Longhorns Gobble Up Texas Tech
UT keeps Big 12 title hopes alive after impressive win over Red Raiders
Farmers’ Market Report: Nov. 30-Dec. 1, 2013
Greens and winter squash, frozen custard, finishing salt, and basil
Robert Rodriguez: Future Sins, Fiery Projects
Update from Wizard World on ‘Fire and Ice’, ‘Sin City 2’ and more
‘How Wild the Sea’
Pulitzer Prize winner Kevin Puts brings waves into the concert hall with new symphonic work
Texas Platters
Emily Wolfe Mechanical Hands Emily Wolfe’s first installment of a two-EP debut introduces the 23-year-old Austin singer/guitarist/fireball with musical muscle and uninhibited joie de vivre. Despite the upbeat tempo of the opening title track, it layers on the melody in trained prudence. By the chorus, however, the song’s full-on decadence, with the whimsy of a…
‘Nothing Is Done Alone’
American YouthWorks’ Texas Conservation Corps helps bring Bastrop back to life
State Health Care Numbers Plunge Again
Clients served drops 77%
Alan Pogue
Exhibition tracks this photographer’s 46 years of witnessing for justice and how he’s still at it
Texas Platters
Jitterbug Vipers Phoebe’s Dream “When you’re high, there’s nothing else to do but watch your very next breath make its way through the sky,” melts Sarah Sharp in a tranquil vocal haze on “When You’re High,” lulling an ephemerality that seeps through the entirety of Phoebe’s Dream. Featuring nine new originals from the local quartet,…
Playback: T for Texas, T for Starlings, TN
Double dulcimer reunion and other musical Thanksgiving
Texas Preps for Last Inmate to Die in 2013
State will end the year with 16 inmates put to death
Pump It Up!
Flex Space coordinator Rebecca Marino takes over parent space Pump Project post-EAST
Texas Platters
Ponty Bone Dinner With Ponty (Rabbit Hole Records) As the first-call accordion king of Austin, with a lengthy résumé boasting more than a few stellar appearances (the Clash, Joe Ely Band, Tom Petty, Flaco Jiménez, Linda Ronstadt) and a string of solo recordings, Ponty Bone’s eclectic sound remains as big as Texas itself. Maybe it’s…
Gay Place: Thank You
Thanks, gays
Fran Keller Released
After 21 years in prison, former day care owner Fran Keller was set to be released on a personal recognizance bond at press time Tuesday. Keller and her husband, Danny Keller, were convicted in 1992 of multiple counts of child sexual abuse at their Oak Hill day care center. He, too, is expected to be…
Put the T and V in Thanksgiving
Holiday specials to ease you through the food coma and into the weekend
Texas Platters
Shearwater Fellow Travelers (Sub Pop) “Sixty million years ago, this was the bottom of the ocean,” writes Jonathan Meiburg of the lonely stretch of I-10 through West Texas. “Tonight, though, it’s just the highway to El Paso.” The liner notes for Shearwater’s new covers LP, songs cribbed from tourmates ranging from St. Vincent (“Cheerleader”) and…
Day Trips
A winter wonderland of lights and fun
The Luv Doc: Turkey Day Decorating Tips
Once again it’s time to ramp up the holiday schmaltz, if only to remind ourselves that we live in a country where we can afford holiday schmaltz. In famine-ravaged places where a feast consists of a desiccated bug husk marinated in malaria sweat, it’s probably hard to even comprehend the type of ostentatious holiday excess…
Holiday Classics Hit the Paramount
‘Love Actually,’ ‘White Christmas,’ and more warm fuzzies for December
Texas Platters
Kimmie Rhodes Covers (Sunbird) For her first studio effort after the death of life partner/producer Joe Gracey, Kimmie Rhodes offers songs written by a broad range of legendary songwriters and the results are decidedly mixed. Covers finds Rhodes in her sweet spot, singing timeless melodies “What a Wonderful World” and “Yesterday,” but her voice remains…
Soccer Watch
The St. Edward’s women bowed out of the NCAA Div. II playoffs in the national quarterfinals on Sunday, with their first loss of the year, 2-0 at Western Washington. Up in Div. I, the Atlantic Coast Conference flexed its muscles, sending six teams into the final eight. On the men’s side, the six-team Pac-12 has…
Frozen
This animated film mines Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tales for material, discards the most brutish bits, and applies a heavy Disney top gloss.
Mr. Smarty Pants Knows
Peanuts are not nuts; they’re legumes. The first Star Trek episode aired closer in time to the ratification of the 19th Amendment – giving women in the United States the right to vote – than to today. The average NFL player lasts for just three years of service, according to NFL union head DeMaurice Smith.…
Texas Platters
Charlie Robison High Life (Jetwell) Four years have passed since Charlie Robison’s post-divorce album Beautiful Day. While the songs on High Life were all written by others, the Bandera native claims he’s written enough of his own new compositions to fill two albums. Nevertheless, High Life shows sides of Robison’s persona that have been elusive.…
Hornography
Even though 7th-ranked Oklahoma State crushed the Longhorns and No. 9 Baylor in consecutive weeks, Texas still has an outside shot to win the Big 12 if they win the next two games and the Cowboys fall at home to Oklahoma on Dec. 7. The biggest “if” of the two is whether the Longhorns have…
Oldboy
Spike Lee maintains the shuddery, visceral punch of the South Korean original, but something gets lost in translation.
Oops!
In “Point Austin: Reflections on Assassination,” the following sentence should have read: None of this was apparent to me in 1963, when I was a bright-eyed, buzz-cut freshman at Bishop Noll high school in Hammond, Ind., sitting in an afternoon Latin class – yes, it was that long ago – and the news came that…
Point Austin: Help the Hungry
Give thanks, give money, raise your voice
The Book Thief
This print bestseller about a girl’s coming of age amid the horrors of Nazi Germany is swaddled in maudlin melodrama in this film adaptation.
Texas Platters
All ATX Vol. 1 (Odyssey Productions) Broadcasts Vol. 21 (KGSR 93.3FM Radio Austin) Two Austin charities tap the sound of our town. Health Alliance for Austin Musicians (HAAM) services the body, while SIMS, named for local hard rock suicide Sims Ellison, maintains the mind. Both nonprofits soundtrack ATX in the name of all those same…
Food Events
Fall Creek Artisan Fair & Post-Thanksgiving Feast Cozy up to a roaring fire in the tasting room with a glass of mulled wine, enjoy a Mexican buffet from Tamale King to the tunes of Christmas music, and shop with area artisan vendors. Wine shoppers get a one-day 10% discount on wine and FCV gift items…
Quote of the Week
“Mama’s not happy.” – Sen. Leticia Van de Putte on why she is entering the Texas lieutenant governor race
Black Nativity
Kasi Lemmons’ adaptation of this Langston Hughes work is a muddled church-time reverie.
Texas Platters
Berkshire Hounds Are Not Amused Whereas 2012’s Greatest Hits drove bastardized rock through rust-worn speakers, this second album from local derelicts Berkshire Hounds sequences more like Sublime’s Robbin’ the Hood, with quick skits, hip-hop, and a little Tom Waits weaving between the city’s gutsiest young songwriting (“Yellow Red, and Then Blue”). Credit pack leaders Jim…
Civics 101
Saturday 30 CITIES FOR LIFE VIGIL Join communities worldwide in saying no to the death penalty. 7pm. Austin City Hall, 301 W. Second. br6647@gmail.com. Monday 02 LIVEABLE CITY HOLIDAY BASH Kick off the season with Austin’s partying policy wonks: complimentary artisanal pizzas, cash bar, and silent auction to get a jump on your gift shopping.…
Philomena
Judi Dench and Steve Coogan star in this drama about the search for a woman’s son who was taken from her when he was a toddler.
Exhibitionism
Helen Merino is open and radiant as Emily Dickinson in this one-woman show about the reclusive poet
Texas Platters
Ichi Ni San Shi Slow Truth (Super Secret) Between tenure in bands as stylistically varied as Stretford and Attack Formation, Austin vocalist/trumpeter Bill Jeffrey continues defying convention. Ichi Ni San Shi’s debut long-player thus arrives as his chocolate-and-peanut-butter moment – an unlikely but revealing soundclash of disparate genres. On first reading, New Zealand’s indie-pop renaissance…
OPM Report: Probable Cause for Concern
Latest report on police complaints reflects a troubling increase
Homefront
This Jason Statham actioner is mostly predictable, but throws a few curveballs and ends up being surprisingly entertaining.
East to Eden
Sonya Coté’s farm-to-table Arcadia, Eden East
Texas Platters
This Will Destroy You Live in Reykjavik, Iceland (Magic Bullet) Proffering wordless communication in a manner that’s more orchestral than classic rock, San Marcos’ This Will Destroy You eschews solos and bears down on intense waves of sound on this old-fashioned double-live LP. “Communal Blood” and “Glass Realms” could be erupting from a symphony instead…
Then There’s This: The Road of Many Sagas
As SH 45 revs up (again), group sues for commissioner’s emails
Nebraska
Woody is a man of few words who might not be all there, but Bruce Dern is all there and that’s more than good enough for us.
Exhibitionism
The current touring version of this Kander & Ebb musical doesn’t deliver much in the way of spectacle
Texas Platters
The Wyldz Human Rise “There’s no time to jam with the stars – we shall fight!” declares the Wyldz in “No Time.” “And when we fight with drums and guitars – we’re all right!” Both this non-winking manifesto and the Bill & Ted band name might lead you to believe the trio covers itself in…
Council: Eat Your Vegetables!
Both sides of urban farm debate declare victory
Bullett Raja
Bollywood crime thriller.
A Conversation With Chef Sonya Coté
Eden East chef on inspiration and inclement weather
Texas Platters
Gary Graves Till the End of Time With his rich, trembling, Nina Simone-like voice hovering like a hummingbird over vibrant, finger-action acoustic guitar, local open-mic workhorse Gary Graves strikes a secret chord, and oneness flows. “What would you do if I told you I love you?” he inquires with stinging delivery on soulful opener “If…
Food-O-File
Remembering Southern food historian John Egerton, and Austin’s century-old history of Eastside farming
Candidate-o-File: Local Races
Only a handful of contested seats in Travis County
Irandam Ulagam
Romantic drama from India.
Exhibitionism
Verdi wrote an opera lover’s dream, and Austin Lyric Opera realized it with an all-star cast
Texas Platters
Birdlegg (Dialtone Records) Somewhere in the soup of Sixth Street’s blues bars lives Birdlegg, a 66-year-old harmonica player so bad you wouldn’t leave your lady with him for a lickety-split second. The Pennsylvania native’s third album, and first since 1998, doubles as his first on local blues imprint Dialtone Records, which proves a perfect fit.…
The Farm Team
Edible Austin Eat Drink Local Week
Headlines
› No City Council meeting this week – Happy Thanksgiving! – and no regular session until Dec. 12 (work session Dec. 10), while everybody celebrates and considers what was postponed from last Thursday, when a couple of big issues dominated the day. › Specifically, it was officially dinnertime at Council last week, with spirited discussion…
Rising Stars of Chocolate Bars
Meet Austin’s newest chocolate artisans, Crave Artisan Chocolate and the Chocolate Makers Studio
Texas Platters
Starlings, TN All the Good Times (Chicken Ranch) Starlings, TN’s double-dulcimer finger dance becomes a big sound on the alt string band’s seventh LP. Credit the addition of drums plus psych-worthy reverb levels applied to Steve Stubblefield’s country croak and Tim Bryan’s bowed dulcimer. Thank chemistry as well. The Starlings’ punk rock pedigree coughs up…
Lost Pines Found
How a handful of neighbors helped rebuild Bastrop County – one home at a time
It’s Official: Van de Putte Running for Lt. Gov.
In a historic first, two women will top the Democratic ballot
Letters at 3AM: Wake of the Red Witch
Everything that begins also ends
Texas Platters
Pinetop Perkins How Long? (RockBeat) September 10 and 11, 2010: Jack-of-all-trades Austin guitarist Jake Langley took blues piano legend Joseph William Perkins of Belzoni, Miss., into Yellow Dog Studios. Austin had long been home for Perkins, aka Pinetop, best known for a Fifties take on Pinetop Smith’s 1928 “Pinetop’s Boogie Woogie” for Sun Records. Perkins…
Trickle Down: Parsing Federal Relief
Despite best intentions, coordination in crisis does not always produce the best recovery
The Hightower Report
Lawmakers who force the poor to take drug tests should be drug tested
