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 38! To check out Volume 37, featuring Chalkboards, Blanket Forts, Risky Motion, and more, click here.
Contributed by Ryan Ricks
Photo Credit:Search Party FaceBook
Surf pop is perpetuated by our insatiable appetite for nostalgia. A quick google image search of the term yields a handful of vintage photos featuring sun-washed beaches, classic cars, and 1960's fashion. Perhaps this fascination with the past stems from the fact that surf music has its roots planted firmly in our parents' record collection (The Ventures, The Beach Boys) or perhaps the crystalline guitars, ride cymbals, and reverb-soaked production just embody the #feelings of reckless summers and fleeting youth. Search Party, a local four-piece, make endearing surf pop that wears its badge of nostalgia with honor. Sioux Sessions Demos, the band's most substantial release thus far, is an EP of loose SoCal pop brimming with gooey guitar licks, gentle vocals, and curved rhythms. It's a simple record designed for easy listening, a testament to the old school belief that a band needs only some amps, guitars, and a mic to produce great music. Though these songs sound unfinished and, at times, ramshackle—they are, after all, demos—Search Party's plug-in-and-play style adds a sense of spontaneity to the mix which, in turn, strengthens the youthful energy so integral to surf pop. This is the stuff we tried to play in our parents' garages over high school summers but never mastered. With their relaxed surf pop, Search Party is sure to become a go-to in Austin's local scene.
Photo Credit: Kidlat Facebook
Longtime stalwarts of We're Trying Records—an Austin/Omaha-based label that's become something of a mainstay in the local DIY community—Kidlat makes charming indie pop that shimmers with traces of emo and punk rock. Originally formed in 2015 under the name Kidlat Punch, the four-piece has recorded a slew of EPs and played countless co-op parties and punk houses over the last three years which, in effect, has morphed Kidlat into one of the most distinguished bands within the scene. In mid-December, Kidlat's dedication culminated in Gettin' Pretty, their most complete and polished collection of songs since 2015's . . . if only we could hear them. Gettin' Pretty maintains Kidlat's trademark bummer pop but sounds more sophisticated and fresher than anything before. The guitars sound chunkier, the hooks are bigger, the drums feel more robust. Much of this vigor can be attributed to bassist and singer Olivia DeBeck who provides lead vocals for two songs and background melodies for many others. DeBeck's voice—a cracking warble stuck somewhere between pretty and punk—complements frontman Alex Villarreal's boyish hum, and the interplay between the two propels much of the drama at the heart of Gettin' Pretty. While Kidlat is nearing age four (that's like 150 in emo years), Gettin' Pretty feels like the beginning of something great.
"The rowdy Austin, Texas quartet – according to their own bio – makes sloppy, poppy, punk rock." - Playlist Play
Photo Credit: Ama Facebook
No strangers to the local scene, Ama have been generating buzz since the arrival of their debut EP, Losing Less, in 2017. The record, an endearing collection of indie-rock head-bobbers, established Ama as a a lovable group of newcomers who could melt your face with a fiery rocker and then break your heart with an earnest slowburner. Trilogy, the band's 2018 follow-up to Losing Less, further develops Ama's amiable brand of indie-rock, featuring warm tones, sweet vocal melodies, and just enough distortion to keep things heavy. Singer and guitarist Blair Robbins seems to have come into her own on these tracks, her vocal delivery more composed, her songwriting more audacious than ever before. "I wanna be a part of everything/ but I'm too damn fragile to start," she sings over a tangled guitar arpeggio and a bumbling bass line, sounding wounded and eager at once. Some will be tempted to draw comparisons to Liz Phair given Ama's 90's alt-rock energy but, while both artists may share similarities in sound, Robbins is a far less candid songwriter—at least on the surface. There's no "Fuck and Run" on Trilogy though the sentiment may be. Instead, Robbins is indirect; she never fully addresses the proverbial elephant in the room, a move which forces listeners to dig deeper into her lyrics. Ama is one of the best bands in town, and their catchy indie-rock deserves nationwide recognition. Let's cross our fingers for a full-length soon.
When: Thursday, January 17th @ Beerland
Photo Credit: Rattlesnake Milk Bandcamp
Though currently located in Austin, Rattlesnake Milk originally formed in Lubbock, and their simmering cowpunk embodies the boozy spirit and barrelhouse swagger of their West Texas hometown. Snake Rattle and Roll, the band's 2013 full-length, is a fiery collection of vintage rock n' roll tunes doused with gasoline and lit with a torch. Frontman Lou Lewis yips and yelps over a bedrock of ghost town country punk, spinning tales of lonesome rides, whisky nights, and barroom brawls like Buddy Holly reborn as a desperado. There's a lofi quality to these songs—Lewis, for example, runs his voice through a filter that makes him sound as if he is singing into a 1960's intercom—that lends Rattlesnake Milk a southern noir feel; any song from Snake Rattle and Roll would fit nicely on a soundtrack for a Jarmusch or Lynch film, and it's easy to imagine the band as extras in Down by Law or Lost Highway. On Rattlesnake Milk's official website there is a nighttime photo of three howling coyotes that serves nicely as the band's calling card. Much like the image, Rattlesnake Milk is a little menacing, vaguely cinematic, and inexplicably memorable.
Photo Credit:Twin Styx bandcamp
Not much is known about Twin Styx. Other than Delete This—the band's first and only EP—they seemingly have no Internet presence or rollout scheme. While this lack of PR could be attributed to the fact that Twin Styx seems fairly new (Delete This is little more than a week old), it also generates intrigue. "Just who are these guys?" one must wonder after hearing Delete This, a collection of moody synthpop tunes coated in lofi grit that leaves us with more questions than answers. On "Entropy," the EP's bouncy opener, frontman Matt Erlandson talk-raps poetic, covering a wide range of topics, including monotony, time, and aging. "I hope that your girlfriend calls," he slurs shortly after worrying about dying. This marriage between hubris and anxiety, coupled with Erlandson's barroom drawl, recalls the solo projects of Julian Casablancas, a dude local blogs will undoubtedly reference in write-ups featuring Twin Styx. Like Casablancas, Erlandson has a knack for taking the potentially douchey and turning it into gold. Not many can pull off lines like, "Damn, city girl I love you/ yeah, same as all the rest because I love them too" but Erlandson, so slick and intrepid, makes it work. If Delete This is an indication of what's to come, then Twin Styx should have no problem climbing the ranks in Austin's music scene.
DISCOVER MORE AWESOME AUSTIN BANDS
