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War Stories

From Austin to the Upper Peninsula to Afghanistan and back: Heather Courtney’s long journey to arrive at Where Soldiers Come From

by Cindy Widner

Texas Platters

Melissa Bryan Return of the Woman For Melissa Bryan, the struggle to perform and record is compounded by severe arthritis, yet neither condition daunts the muscular power-pop on Return of the Woman. The veteran local throws open the gates with the rowdy, schoolyard opening of “‘Til Night” and rockers including “Last Saturday Night,” but she’s…

by Margaret Moser

Texas Platters

Sarah Pierce Bring It On (Little Bear) Over the course of eight albums, Sarah Pierce’s songwriting sensibilities and subject matter have varied little. With Bring It On she persists in singing affairs of the heart in a simple, country-fed manner at times cringe inducing. Pierce’s clear, pretty vocals recall Tish Hinojosa and Laurie Lewis, two…

by Jim Caligiuri

Austin x Design

It was only a matter of time before the city’s design professionals decided to jump on the festival bandwagon – or to design, construct, and furnish a bandwagon of their own. The local chapter of the American Institute of Architects spearheaded the move to coordinate a month’s worth of activities under the banner Austin x…

by Robert Faires

Mr. Smarty Pants Knows

According to researcher Gregor Rolshausen, the use of bird feeders has led to a new species of European blackcaps. In their beach party movie heyday, Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello reigned supreme. Avalon’s character in the movies was usually named “Frankie.” Funicello usually played characters named “Didi” or “Dolores.” South African anthropologist Francis Thackeray believes…

by Mr. Smarty Pants

Oops!

In “Point Austin” last week, Michael King mistakenly reported that a charter amendment petition requires “5% of the previous record vote” to be placed on that ballot. In fact, the petition standard is 5% of registered voters, and the passage has been corrected online to read: “Worse, the substance of the charter has been steadily…

by Chronicle Staff

Headlines

� City Council meets today (Thursday, Oct. 6), against the backdrop of the “Occupy Austin” protest under way at City Hall. Inside chambers, expect wrangling over how to proceed with the Downtown Austin Plan, plus items creating a Parking Benefits District Program for neighborhoods, an advisory committee for a 2012 bond election, and more. See…

by Chronicle Staff

The Dead

The sun-drenched locales of Ghana and Burkina Faso provide the backdrops for this original zombie apocalypse.

by Marc Savlov

The Hedgehog

Eleven-year-old Paloma moves from girlish self-destruction to engagement with the world without ever leaving the confines of her French apartment building.

by Marc Savlov

Machine Gun Preacher

Gerard Butler and Michael Shannon star in this drama about a reformed bruiser and drug addict who now rescues children from the conflict in Sudan.

by Marc Savlov

Margaret

A tangled post-production history kept this Kenneth Lonergan film from completion for six years, and its story about teenage trauma suffers as a result. But, oh, what a cast.

by Marjorie Baumgarten

Restless

Gus Van Sant hits a rare discordant note with this story about two death-obsessed teens that is twee and precious instead of genuine and candid.

by Marjorie Baumgarten

Texas Platters

Balmorhea Live at Sint-Elisabethkerk (Western Vinyl) Recorded late last year at the Saint Elisabeth Church in Belgium, a massive stone cathedral from 1873, Balmorhea’s first live album begins with a call to service, the opening swell of “Settler” off the expansive neoclassicism to 2009’s All Is Wild, All Is Silent. The nine-minute gold rush that…

by Austin Powell

Texas Platters

Kashmere Reunion Stage Band Uncle Billy’s Brew & Que on Lake Travis, Sept. 30 Approached onstage at La Zona Rosa during the Chronicle’s 2010 South by Southwest Film party, a Kashmere Stage Band member confirmed that it was the Houston funk orchestra’s first performance in Austin. The former high school band’s reunion two years earlier…

by Raoul Hernandez

Texas Platters

Quiet Company We Are All Where We Belong The spiritual melancholy that pervades Quiet Company’s third recording comes quite by design. Mixed by Brit-turned-Austinite Tim Palmer, best known for mixing U2 and Pearl Jam, the five-man local band led by the aptly named Taylor Muse (Eisley) crafts rich arrangements of compelling quality and wildly varying…

by Margaret Moser

Texas Platters

Leslie Sisson Harmony For more than a decade, Leslie Sisson has graced myriad projects with her subdued vocals and guitar work, from defunct locals Black Lipstick to her most recent work with Matt Pond PA and Andrew Kenny’s Wooden Birds. Harmony finally brings Sisson to the fore with a debut that calls upon many of…

by Doug Freeman

Luv Doc Recommends: Central Texas Paranormal Conference

New bumper sticker: Keep Austin Paranormal. That’s pretty close to weird, isn’t it? OK, so maybe not in a dreads-and-tie-dye kind of way or a bike-with-a-really-high-seat kind of way or a whole-body-tattoo-with-whisker-implants kind of way, but you have to admit, ghosts are pretty freaking weird – nearly as weird as people who believe in them.…

by The Luv Doc

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