South By Southwest Day Two: Wussy, Boys In A Band, Carbon/Silicon, The Wombats And 18 Other Bands
Friday March 14, 2008 @ 04:00 PM
By: ChartAttack.com Staff

Born Ruffians

ChartAttack News Editor Steve McLean is in the midst of his annual pilgrimage to the South By Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas. Here's his report, written while not wearing pants, from day two:

I went to the New West Records party to check the schedule for later in the afternoon and stayed for a couple of songs by Tim Easton. I respect him as a singer/songwriter, but never got into him much. The food lineup was long and they were replacing the kegs, so that aided my decision to scoot down to Volume for Destroyer. I like the new Trouble In Dreams album and Dan Bejar wasn't with The New Pornographers when I saw them in Toronto last week, so this was a good opportunity. The band took a while to set up so I bided my time with free apple martinis poured through an ice sculpture. Bejar has a distinctive voice and writes quirky pop tunes and the set was fine, but I discovered I prefer recorded Destroyer over live Destroyer.

I made my way to the Dirty Dog Bar for Born Ruffians, since I've never seen them in Toronto. There was a free buffet of barbecued pork and beef (which I doused in habanero sauce), beans, coleslaw, pickles and onions. I was too busy eating to take many notes, so let's just say I enjoyed the food and the band in equally large quantities.

I see Billy Bragg as often as I can and since I'm interviewing him next week, I took the opportunity to go see his short set of material from his new Mr. Love & Justice album at the convention centre. "Sing Their Souls Back Home" was low-key, but as well-written as you'd expect. He gave a stirring speech about how singer/songwriters can't change the world (using James Blunt as a prime example) and said it was his job to promote activism by others. "I have faith in your ability to overcome cynicism and go out and make a difference in the world," he said before playing "I Keep Faith." The set ended with an untitled song that Bragg unofficially calls "Old Clash Fan Fight Song." He got applause for the line "George Bush will soon be gone," and this great song deserves to be recorded before the Texan president is finally finished his term.

ATG Concerts' Craig Laskey and Waco Brother Tracy Dear joined me for Bragg, and we all made our way up to Club DeVille for the New West party to see the Old 97's and toss back some free pale ales. We were standing at the back by the kegs and there were a lot of people — including us— talking, so it was hard to hear, but I'm a big fan, so I still enjoyed it and look forward to their new Blame It On Gravity album. There was more chatting and drinking during The Drams set and, while they're not as good as frontman Brent Best's previous band Slobberbone, they're improving.

I took "the world's greatest living Englishman" to the Mint/Six Shooter hootenanny at Headhunter's. We each bought a round of beers and Six Shooter founder Shauna De Cartier kept bringing around tequila, and told us to keep the commemorative Six Shooter shot glasses. Yvette Ray gave me a The Pack A.D. foam beer holder as I watched the Vancouver female garage-blues duo. It was raw and gritty, just like a show at Headhunter's should be. I've always found Luke Doucet to be consistently good, and his set of material from his campus radio chart-topping Blood's Too Rich album was no exception. I was hanging with The Sadies' wives while watching Neville Quinlan (NQ Arbuckle if you choose to use his stage name) join party hostess Carolyn Mark for a great duet on "Fireworks." They teamed up for more music, people bought me more beer and I left on a high note. Unfortunately, I discovered a hole in my army pants pocket as four shot glasses I had planned to bring back as souvenirs for co-workers fell out and smashed on the sidewalk. A few more were salvaged.

Despite RSVPing for the Fader Fort shows, I still had to wait in line for the Lou Reed tribute featuring What Laura Says, Thinks And Feels, Paper Route, Oh No! Oh My!, Ezra Furman, Joseph Arthur, Dr. Dog, Mark Kozelek, Yo La Tengo, My Morning Jacket, Moby, Thurston Moore & The New Wave Bandits and a rumoured appearance by the man who the show was in honour of. While talking to a couple of young local women in line was enjoyable, I gave up after an hour when the show was almost over anyway and went and got a better-than-average Austin pizza slice before heading to Emo's at 7:40 p.m. This left an uncomfortable 20-minute window with nothing to see before Jens Lekman came on for a solo performance. The club filled quickly when he came on stage and opened with "We're All Going To Die." While I admire Lekman's amusing songs, I think you'd have to be a total fan to fully appreciate a performance like this.

I went up the street to Spiro's for Houston's The Western Civilization. The band have a diverse indie rock/electro-acoustic pop sound that utilizes male-female vocals, but the recorded material I've heard wasn't matched live so I went to Latitude 30 to catch the last, very intense song by a young English indie rock band called The Voom Blooms.

A lovely young lady was handing out samples of an alcoholic energy drink called Sparks that I drank along with my Blue Moon upon my return to Emo's Annex for Seattle's The Boss Martians. They did a song called "Mars Is For Martians" that they wrote with Iggy Pop, which will come out on an album later this spring. Their '60s garage rock sound sometimes bordered too close to meat and potatoes rock, which caused an earlier than expected departure.

Cincinnati's Ass Ponys were always a favourite of my mine, and I really enjoyed the set by main man Chuck Cleaver's more recent band, Wussy, when I saw them here two years ago, so a return date at Bourbon Rocks was in order. Cleaver — much hairier, but still with his distinctive, slightly high-pitched voice — has a female foil in guitarist Lisa Walker to share vocals with. The songs weren't as off-the-wall as The Ass Ponys, but they were still great and the set was one of the night's highlights.

A friend told me to go out back to the Bourbon Rocks patio to see a Mexican band called Hong Kong Blood Opera he thought I'd like. They were all clad in red pants and red muscle shirts and struck me as a more percussive Hives. They were OK as a novelty, but couldn't keep me interested enough to stick around, so I made the walk to The Rio to see Boston's Wild Light, who recently opened for Arcade Fire and LCD Soundsystem. They mixed keyboards, electric and acoustic guitars and each song seemed to build momentum as it went along. All the tunes had hooks and the writing was strong, especially on "New Year's Eve."

I returned to the Dirty Dog Bar for an Austin rock 'n' roll quartet called The Steps. They certainly weren't offensive, but not as inspiring as I had hoped after listening to some songs online.

I dropped into Spiro's Amphitheater for Cranford, N.J.'s Socratic, and the first thing I heard was the singer saying that their next album is going to be produced by former Blink-182 bassist Mark Hoppus. That's one strike against them. Their youthful pop-punk didn't do it for me, so I made a pretty quick exit.

Last year I saw Teitur, a singer/songwriter who's the biggest music star of the 48,500 people who live in the Faroe Islands. He was so dull. Tonight, I saw Boys In A Band. They were anything but dull and they're too good to be kept on the Faroe Islands. The world should be their stage. The '60s-influenced garage rock band had a ton of energy and reminded me a bit of a trashier Fratellis. Before their last song, the singer/guitarist instructed the crowd members to move to the front of the stage so he could hug them. He hugged me and so did the keyboard player, who looked like a hairy wizard.

I still had a big smile on my face when I crossed the street to see Murfreesboro, Tennessee's Glossary. They get labeled an alt.country band, but they rock much harder than most bands in the genre — and more so than when I saw them here in 2004. While I wasn't losing it like some of my American friends, who were in heaven at the foot of the stage, the guitars and male-female vocals worked really well together. A pal demanded I write great things about Glossary, and it was hard not to. He then convinced me to cross the street to see Pink Nasty, who I like but I'm not crazy about. She was fine, but I had bigger things in mind.

I saw another friend near the front of the line at Friends, and I squeezed in beside him to go in to see Carbon/Silicon, the new project from The Clash's Mick Jones and Generation X/Sigue Sigue Sputnik's Tony James. They started 30 minutes late (they are British, after all), but luckily there was beer close at hand — and the wait was worth it. They opened with "The Magic Suitcase" and the rest of their material from their soon-to-be released The Last Post debut was just as magic, including "War On Culture" (which reminded me a bit of The Clash's "Career Opportunities"), "The News" and "Why Do Men Fight?" If you liked Big Audio Dynamite, you should enjoy Carbon/Silicon. They won't have the impact The Clash had on my life, but they were still very impressive. I look forward to a longer set in Toronto.

I was warned by a Mancunian not to see The Wombats, but he hates all things Liverpudlian, so screw him. The very young trio (accompanied by a stuffed wombat in front of the drum kit) were obviously having fun, and it was reflected by everyone beside me at the front of the stage who were dancing and making me concerned that the floor of Maggie Mae's rooftop patio might collapse. The noisy yet melodic indie rock provided nothing but good times, and singer/guitarist Matthew Murphy oozed charisma. He told us they had played paintball earlier in the day, and all the band members lifted their shirts to proudly show the resulting welts. The Wombats write songs beyond their years and are one of those British bands worthy of the hype they receive at home. The woman beside me grabbed my pen and notepad and wrote "Fuckin' Awesome." I couldn't agree more.

Saint Arnold Amber Ale and pork were on the menu when I returned to our suite. Bed came around 4:30 a.m.

—Steve McLean