TCB

Wild in the Streets

Austin musician Freddie "Steady" Krc has Duran Duran and A Flock of Seagulls to thank for getting him back in touch with his roots. On a six-month busman's holiday in England back in 1986, a homesick Krc recorded an album of songs influenced by the music he heard growing up in La Porte, a small French-settled town between Pasadena and Galveston Bay. "A lot of Thibideauxs, a lot of Heberts," he remembers. The result, Wild Country, is solid Gulf Coast country, with a heavy bayou influence and a fair amount of blues and R&B. "I was a rock & roll kid, but if you grew up in Texas, it's all there," says Krc, who at the time was frustrated because "the only ones getting signed were those synthesizer bands." After breaking into the local scene with Raul's-era power-poppers the Explosives and spending several years in Jerry Jeff Walker's band, Krc just re-released Wild Country on his own SteadyBoy Records with four bonus tracks, and will mark the occasion with a 7pm show Saturday at the Saxon Pub. But that's hardly all he's been up to: A new Explosives LP is in the can, and Krc maintains his dual membership in barroom groovers the Shakin' Apostles and Freddie Steady's Midnight Howl. "I feel like that guy on The Ed Sullivan Show that would spin the plates," he admits. "But I like what I do, so it's not a chore."