Austin is the Live Music Capital of the World.
Every single night of the week, all over town, Austin reverberates with the sweet sounds of local music. To highlight some of the great local acts you should support, we frequently share a list of five bands you need to hear. Welcome to Volume 35! To check out Volume 34, featuring Poly Action, Sun June, Linen Closet, and more, click here.
Contributed by Ryan Ricks
Photo Credit: Camp Life Facebook
The sheer likability of Camp Life stems from their loud, fast earnestness. If the powerhouses of the emo canon—Rites of Spring, Cap'n Jazz, The Promise Ring—further established the genre as one that employed aggression as a tool of catharsis, then Camp Life is Austin's latest torchbearer in emo's mission. Indeed, Camp Life lets it all out in typical emo fashion, crafting explosive punk rock that never totally explodes. This dash of restraint characterizes Camp Life as an emo band in the classic sense—they're not freewheeling punks nor chicken indie kids but something in between. Additionally, it breathes life into frontman Nick Lauve's lyrics. "You say we never talk at all/ and somehow that's my fault/ hey man we all die alone" Lauve howls like a young Barry Johnson over a tightly wound barrage of buzzing guitars and thunderous percussion. Here, Camp Life demonstrates their knack for making dull platitudes like "we all die alone" sound thrilling and fresh. With their exciting take on traditional emo, Camp Life manages to be one of the most promising bands in town.
"Camp Life writes relentlessly catchy tunes that are over in a flash." - The Advocate
Photo Credit: Belcurve Facebook
Sarah Castro, longtime frontwoman of Belcurve, has a thing for locating excitement within the mundane. Castro's songs brim with observational wit and concrete imagery, capturing the details of everyday life with poetic significance. In this way, Belcurve is a very literary band. "We walked down the stairwell to the train," Castro hums on new single "Strangers," rendering the banalities of a daily commute mysterious and dramatic in the same way Tom Waits or Leonard Cohen can make the action of eating a sandwich interesting. However, the allure of "Strangers" and Belcurve at large stems not only from Castro's lyrical conceits but also from the band's polished instrumentation. Punchy guitars, steadfast bass lines, and intricate drum patterns merge to create peppy indie rock redolent of PJ Harvey and Jenny Lewis. Much like Harvey and Lewis, Castro's voice is delicate and pointed at once, occupying that sweet space between antidote and venom that can be so difficult to perfect. But, of course, Castro nails it. Belcurve offers some of the best indie rock in Austin.
Where: Thursday, September 6th @ Hotel Vegas
Photo Credit: alptrack facebook
Experimental dance producer Alptrack operates through the veil of obscurity. Social media, particularly Alptrack's Facebook page, offers little biographical detail and only two photos, both of which only further complicate things. Google searches also prove fruitless, mostly yielding frustrating autocorrections and foreign links. This mystery, coupled with Alptrack's post-industrial dance pop, recalls the early days of PC Music when the identities and motivations of A.G. Cook and gang still remained unknown. Alptrack, much like Cook, relies heavily on contradiction, often blending avant-garde cacophony with Top 40 bubblegum. Their remix of Rihanna's "Work"—one of the best on the market—perfects this irony, seamlessly interweaving maxxxed out sub bass and clangorous percussion with Rihanna's indelible hook. The result is a club-certified banger for art school kids, pop music cooked in the kiln. Acid2, Alptrack's newest offering, is a fizzy collection of avant-garde dance-pop that carries the torch of forebears like PC Music and Norway's Rytmeklubbin.
Photo Credit: Matt The electrician
Matt Sever a.k.a. Matt the Electrician has been an Austin favorite since 1996 when he kickstarted an open mic night at the now-defunct Flipnotics Coffeespace. There, among other notable Austin songwriters like Southpaw Jones, Sever began honing his craft, penning catchy folk songs that managed to strike both hearts and funny bones. One Right Thing, Sever's 2006 triumph, oscillated between softhearted warmth and wry humor with Sever fulfilling the role of guitar-strapped picaro a la John Prine or Michael Nesmith. From there, Sever further solidified his legacy in the annals of Austin folk music, releasing more than ten memorable albums like 2009's Animal Boy and, most recently, 2017's The Doubles. His music has appeared throughout advertising and television from LL Bean commercials to the Army Wives soundtrack. Sever's relationship with commerce, a touchy subject for many musicians, has always been refreshingly lax and down-to-earth. He possesses an everyman's cool toward subject after subject. Folks, it's indisputable: Sever reigns king of Austin's folk scene.
"Matt Sever approaches songcraft with the life-or-death attention to detail required in the former day job that spawned his performing moniker." - The Austin Chronicle
Where: Tuesday, September 11th @ Mean Eyed Cat
Photo Credit: The Oysters Facebook
The Oysters make punchy rock n' roll that could be adored by beer-swilling party animals and bespectacled critics alike. The band's newest single, "I Don't Want Anyone to Be Around Me" finds frontman Billy Bivalve talk-singing over a hurricane of nervy guitars and frenetic drumming. It's a slice of life right out of late-1970's New York when punks began eschewing nose rings and mohawks in favor of thick rim glasses and tucked-in oxford shirts. Bivalve's corrosive talk-snarl will, of course, garner comparisons to Andrew Savage of Parquet Courts and perhaps for good reason. Like Parquet Courts, The Oysters have a penchant for crafting slick rock tunes for people who know who, like, Wire and Chuck Klosterman are. All of this theorizing aside, The Oysters still make indelible rock n' roll that never bores or exhausts.
"Glazed in lo-fi, it’s a bit like the love child between Guided By Voices and your favorite early 00’s pop-punk band. If you’ve got the lemons, they’ve got the cocktail sauce." - KUTX
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