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Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

If you know about Third Root, or the Austin Boogie Crew, you know DJ Chicken George (Jeff Henry). He’s originally from Houston. Austin is damn lucky to have him.

His innovative style, technique and unpredictable grooves have granted him sessions across the U.S. and around the world. But he’s much more than a club DJ. This is an individual thinker often regarded as the very embodiment of hip-hop, a fearless artist, a master collaborator with impeccable tastes.

Last year, Henry was diagnosed with a rare form of skin cancer, cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL). He’s received some treatments that are helping, but he’s also dealing with the resulting fatigue and low energy that’s putting a halt to his DJ gigs. However, friends and supporters have come together to help him out. In addition Austin Boogie Crew partner Danny Spence starting a GoFundMe campaign, several others have organized various events like A Benefit For DJ Chicken George, happening tonight at Empire Garage. It’s a family affair with Riders Against the Storm, Blackillac, Third Root featuring the scholar emcee himself Bavu Blakes, a DJ set by Adrian Quesada, Vocab and Da Shade, and the phenomenal Gracie Chavez and her Bombón crew. Doors at 8 p.m.

Nothing but love here. Mad respect, DJ Chicken George. And here’s to the future.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

One of the busiest music artists in the scene is bringing it home for a badass release party. Mobley has played numerous shows across the country to wildly receptive audiences in support of Cry Havoc!, described by the Austin-based songwriter as “a sci-fi concept record” following the harrowing journey of a renegade in an “alternate past Eighties NYC,” as cinematic and epic in theme as it is in its digi-pop soundscapes.

If you know, you know. Mobley delivers a sensational live performance you won’t want to miss. See him at his ATX album release show tonight, Saturday Nov. 5, at 3Ten at ACL Live, sharing the bill with San Gabriel and Caelin. Doors open at 7 p.m. Get there early; space is limited.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

By definition, borders are meant to contain and define certain areas. But Dos Santos reveals what borders actually embody. They encapsulate the struggles, the triumphs, the endless ironies, the millions of stories of individuals and families coming to terms with their everyday realities. In the throes of the pandemic, within the turmoil and heartache of social and cultural shifts in the U.S., the Chicago-based band wrote and recorded City of Mirrors, their sonic exploration of Latinx identity, an honest and poetic expression of the Latinx experience.

“This album grapples with and transgresses these binaries because we have/and continue to cross borders,” Dos Santos explains. “Yet, for us, the border is no metaphor—too much real staring back at us… And borders were at the center of these struggles. Borders—of nation, of belonging—are the struggle.”

Dos Santos’ City of Mirrors tour brings them to the ATX for a show tomorrow night, Thursday August 11, at The Far Out Lounge and Stage, 8504 S. Congress Ave. They share the bill with Denver-based Latin psych outfit Los Alcos. Doors open at 6 p.m.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

Another line-up to check out at the Far Out Lounge and Stage. Check it:

• Get your smooth pop/freak folk on. And while you’re at it, check out COVERED, an awesome collection of covers quite lovingly recorded and produced by Austin-based pop trio Daphne Tunes.
• You should totally be hooked on Santa Rosa by now, Addictive dream-pop/rock from songwriter Aaron Miller’s solo project Josie Lockhart (“If There’s A Heaven” is featured on today’s AMM).

  

• Listen closely. This may be “desert twang sonic smoothness from the third dimension” crossing your sound waves. Enter Lost Palace.

See them all tonight, Wednesday March 23, at Far Out Lounge, 8504 S. Congress Ave. Doors at 6 p.m., and the music starts at 7 p.m.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

It’s WINNING times three tomorrow night, Friday Feb. 11 at The Ballroom,2906 Fruth St. For Spite delivers an all-ATX , all-badass line-up:

• Put aside any definitions or expectations reserved for hip-hop. David Shabani is here to blow it up and reshape it for the collective fearlessness. “Doin’ Better,” today’s featured AMM track, is from Shabani’s Smooth Sounds of the Summer.
• Nineties funk-rock and contemporary hip-hop meet at the crossroads. The Dragon Berries are there when those worlds collide and collaborate. As KUTX’s Jack Anderson observes, “…the mashup genre of rap-rock can be a treacherous territory to navigate. That said, [this] Austin four-piece seems to have hit a stride in the hip-hop-meets-alt-rock field…”
• Genre-bending, crushing, mutilating and annihilating is the fuel that ignites Austin trio Blynd Birds. Get a hold of the LP Find Your Conscience, Baby and feel your jaw drop in awe over the list of producers on that white-hot striking iron – from Adrian Quesada to Jim Eno to Mobley, and many more. Cuts through the bone and the B.S.

Doors at The Ballroom open at 8 p.m. Get there early to catch all three.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

We’re steppin’ up to represent with Love Austin Music Month, a friendly reminder to show love for your favorite Austin music artists. Today’s Austin Music Minute presents a new favorite making their debut on Keeled Scales, Good Looks. Led by vocalist Tyler Jordan (Tyler Jordan and the Negative Space) and longtime collaborator Jake Ames, the band worked on their new LP Bummer Year with producer Dan Duszynski (Loma, Cross Record), set for release April 8.

Featured on today’s AMM is album opener “Almost Automatic,” officially out with a single release show tomorrow night, Friday Jan. 21, at Hotel Vegas. The line-up includes Pelvis Wrestley and The Juniper Berries. Check the venue for COVID safety protocol, and remember to bring your mask.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

Surely you’ve seen the sweet and unassuming Blue Cow. It’s a magical image, unmistakable. The Blue Cow can be spotted on artwork and murals all around Austin, a gentle cerulean creature most likely caught in mid-float as he continues his adventures in the city and across the land…

If you know the Blue Cow series creator, Ethan Azarian, all of that makes perfect sense. Singer, songwriter, painter, and icon. Azarian is a wizard of visual whimsy, a lo-fi poet who observes the quirks of our bewildering planet and its deranged inhabitants with genuine wonder. He is fearless in his vulnerability. The warmth is real.

It also makes total sense that Azarian grew up in a musical and artistic family. Born in Cabot, Vermont, and influenced by his parents’ friends performing in cafes around Boston in the early ’60s (count Judy Collins and Taj Mahal amongst those friends, by the way…), Azarian took punk rock to heart in his ‘20s and was playing in his own bands before making the trek to Austin in the late ‘80s. This paved the way for the much-loved Austin treasure The Orange Mothers, formed with friend and longtime collaborator Jeff Johnston.

Azarian has been performing with Johnston ever since, from cozy residencies at Hole In the Wall to house shows, and the Longplay East, as well as contributing to Azarian’s solo works. Speaking of which, it’s time to rally around Azarian’s newest release, On the Fringe, an incredible set of recordings produced by Will Courtney, showing the artist at his beautifully offbeat best, winding with wordplay, marveling at all that unfolds in the journey.

To celebrate the new music, Azarian is having a release show this Saturday, October 23, at Wyldwood Shows, 4204 Wyldwood Rd. Opening the show is special guest Little Mazarn, featuring Lindsey Verrill and Jeff Johnston. It’s a socially-distanced event, for your safety.

Ethan Azarian kindly asks that you write to inhousegallery@hotmail.com for ticket reservations, or find him on Venmo.

-Special thanks to designer and songwriter June Higgins for inspiration on today’s AMM.

Austin Music Minute

By: Laurie Gallardo

To clarify, Buffalo Nichols is the solo moniker of songwriter Carl Nichols, one half of renown folk duo Nickel & Rose. (Today’s featured AMM track is a live pop-up session, busker style, of Nichols performing “Life Goes On.”) No matter what genre Nichols has ever played, he always finds his heart returning to the acoustic blues he grew up with – the genuine, the real deal.

Nichols crosses racial and generational divides playing the music he loves. His heartfelt tribute to the great blues artists before him is writing and singing about his own life experiences – growing up in poverty, experiencing racism – the very stories he would hear in the early blues records he fell in love with.

This is one hell of an opener. Do not miss Buffalo Nichols, on the bill with recent KUTX Artist of the Month Sun June, happening Saturday May 8, at 3Ten ACL Live, 310 Willie Nelson Blvd. Doors open at 8 p.m., and the music starts at 9.