TCB

The Sound and the Fury

Not to quote Bob Dylan's "Mississippi" or anything, but "things should start to get interesting right about now." The City Council meeting this afternoon (Thursday) will likely see the new sound ordinance adopted, marking a major milestone in how Austin's live music providers interact with their neighbors. Not faring so well is Austin's newest club, Easy Rhino's. Owner Dave Pantano allows that the situation at the former Mango's is "getting a little better," but that's only because it couldn't get much worse. To appease his campus-area neighbors, he planned on ending shows by midnight as per the noise ordinance, only to find that his collegiate patrons weren't exactly in a rush to see rootsy fare like Beaver Nelson and Shelley King. "They don't even get ready [to go out] until 10pm," he laments. Pantano has already had to move music inside, to an area he admits is better suited for use as a restaurant, after someone called in two noise complaints to the police. "We want to be part of the community," he vows, chalking up his club's chilly reception to the previous tenants: "I know we're paying for the sins of Mango's." TheSouth Austin Jug Band went over smoothly this past weekend, says Pantano, but "I hope to book a band with a drummer this Saturday." He also hopes to get some use out of the cozy outdoor theatre he built on the club's patio. For now, Pantano plans to keep doing music inside as best he can manage, meeting with the neighborhood association, and hoping people come out earlier once the weather warms up for good. Meanwhile, when "TCB" said recently that Flamingo Cantina owner Angela Gillen was "mostly content" with the new noise ordinance, it turns out that by "mostly" we meant "not so much." In addition to her reservations over the new, as-yet-unannounced "standard operating procedures" employed by the APD to enforce the ordinance, Gillen also finds it patently unfair to subject clubs with outdoor music to shorter hours and to require non-Downtown establishments to apply for variances to secure the necessary permits. Basically, she e-mails, "I have a problem with regulating live music, and that's what is proposed." The ordinance is scheduled for discussion around 3pm at council chambers in the LCRA building, 3701 Lake Austin Blvd. Also today, the council could effectively kill the Austin Music Network if it doesn't approve a last-minute amendment authorizing the remainder of AMN's 2002-03 operating budget. Talk about pulling the rug out...

A Solid Foundation

Imagine someone gives your band $15,000 and a team of top-shelf industry professionals to help you use it. That's not the next Fox reality show, it's the goal of the Austin Music Foundation's Incubator program. The foundation will award three grants for said amount, one each in rock/pop, urban/hip-hop, and country/singer-songwriter. The program is open to any local musician or band not under major label contract, and it's geared toward those acts with an album's worth of new material ready to go. A full list of rules and requirements, plus application, are available at www.austinmusicfoundation.org, but to qualify you have to put down the bong and get to the post office -- applications, including a press kit, recording, photo, and $30 processing fee, are due this Friday. Because musicians aren't always punctual, AMF representatives will be on hand Friday at Opal Divine's Freehouse, accepting applications until the stroke of midnight. The advisory board, including Fastball's Tony Scalzo, hip-hop utility man Tee Double, attorney Chris Castle, and manager George Couri, hosted a well-attended, detail-heavy Q&A session at Momos Monday night, to which Kerry Mosser of recently retooled Human said he thought the program "seems very honest and fair." Mosser wasn't sure if his eardrum-abusing metalleers would apply, but they are already booked to play the afterparty for the Incubator finalists' showcase March 1 at the Red Eyed Fly. See, this does sound like the next reality show. Hope they don't kill the Music Network just yet...

Bella Donnas

Cockless rockers the Donnas are on top of the world right now, with their riff-tastic Atlantic debut Spend the Night yielding significant airplay on MTV, MTV2, radio, and a searing recent appearance on Saturday Night Live. Singer Brett Anderson, aka Donna A., called from the band's former hometown of Palo Alto, Calif., where the Donnas were about to kick off a tour with OK Go and Longwave that stops at Emo's tonight.

TCB: What's your favorite Ramones song?

DA: Probably "Rockaway Beach."

TCB: What have you been listening to lately?

DA: Appetite for Destruction. That's a big band favorite.

TCB: How important is the cowbell to the Donnas' sound?

DA: It really fills in a lot of gaps. We just love it. We've always loved it.

TCB: What do you think about Avril Lavigne?

DA: I don't think she really does anything, but she's sending a message that girls should do things. That's a baby step in the right direction.

TCB: I read on your last tour that you watched Nightmare on Elm Street movies every night.

DA: We still watch Nightmare on Elm Street. We actually just got the box set on DVD, which is so exciting to us.

TCB: What's your favorite movie in the series?

DA: I think two is really good. It's got some crazy homoerotic undertones that are very exciting.

TCB: Since you write a lot of songs about partying, what's your favorite cure for a hangover?

DA: I think vanilla milkshakes work really well, and a Coke with a lot of ice is really good, too. Also, swearing off alcohol seems to work really well.

Four Play

Four local gigs worth your time and money this weekend:

Cruiserweight: The pop-punk contenders' first Austin date of the year. (Friday, Red Eyed Fly)

Moonlight Towers: Expansive, exquisite Built to Spill-esque rock from some talented newcomers. (Friday, Mercury)

Squat Thrust, Excess Lettuce, Free Range Bastards, Hobble: Four of Austin's least sobriety-friendly bands pool their resources; designate a driver in memory of Handsome Joel. (Friday, Room 710)

Booze Weasels: South Austin standbys reunite for Stonesy tomfoolery and lengthy guitar solos. (Saturday, Continental Club)

Joel Svatek 1969-2003

Sealy native Joel Svatek, better known in the local music scene as "Handsome Joel," was involved in a serious car accident early Monday morning and was taken off life support later that day. Svatek, on his way home from work, was stopped at a light on the frontage road at I-35 and Riverside, when, according to the Austin American-Statesman, he was struck by a drunken driver. Svatek had been Emo's stage manager for the past two years, before that working at the Red Eyed Fly and Flamingo Cantina. "The bands loved him," Emo's owner Frank Hendrix said. "He was really good at what he did. It's gonna be hard to fill that spot." Beloved up and down Red River, Svatek will be remembered at several benefits to help his family defray medical expenses: Feb. 15 at Emo's, Feb. 20 at Beerland, and dates at Elysium and Room 710 to be announced. Funeral services are 2pm Friday at Austin-Peel & Son Funeral Home, 607 E. Anderson Ln. (I-35 & 183), and a viewing is scheduled there tonight (Thursday), 6-8pm.

Scene Stealers: Slum City

Austin punk rockers Slum City are psyched about the release of their maiden CD, Hot Beef Rejection, this weekend, but singer/bassist Candi Licious really wants to move down under. She's been studying up on the Saints, Radio Birdman, and a whole list of other Aussie groups.

"She's got these escapist fantasies about moving to Australia," swears singer/ guitarist Suzy Slum.

"This guy Will said that when he went down there in the Navy, people were trying to pawn their daughters off on him," chimes in drummer Chuck City. "So yeah, I'll go."

"It would be easy for us to move to Australia, because we could just say 'Slum City from Austin,'" insists Candi. "We're three-fourths Texan, so we have really stupid accents anyway."

Candi and Suzy have known each other since taking a shamanism class at UT ("It was about how to spot a shaman," notes the bassist), but Slum City didn't come together until late summer 1998, when the pair decided their contributions weren't appreciated by their then-current bands.

"We were both playing in bands that were all boys except for us," notes Suzy. "I would offer my songs, and that's as far as it went."

The two ladies recruited Chuck, 24, through a mutual friend; guitarist Yancey Pants, 25, who boasts, "I'm the one playing Lil' Kim in the van," came aboard about a year later. They've hung together through a couple "leaves of absence" and a chronic tardiness problem.

"We were always, always, always, always late," says Candi of early Slum City shows. "Sometimes the other bands would get really mad."

Hot Beef Rejection is a brash, no-bullshit 22 minutes of femme fury that balances Suzy's personal experiences with Candi's societal observations; "If You Put It in My Face" was inspired by an especially enlightening Jerry Springer episode. Other times, the subject matter is more risqué than even daytime television.

"My parents have been dying to hear the CD, and I'm just like, 'No,'" Suzy says. "I'm supposed to be a virgin in their eyes, and I think this would probably destroy that."

Slum City's CD release is Friday, Jan. 31, at Beerland with Manikin, the Materialistics, and Chop Saki.