We’ll have the latest on relief and recovery efforts in Houston days after deadly storms hit the region and left hundreds of thousands without power.
A new plan for mental health care in Texas and what some Texans say needs to be a shift in priorities.
The Texas delegation to Congress is set to up the stakes in a water fight with Mexico.
A small green beetle, the ash borer, has steadily decimated forests across the U.S. for more than two decades – and it’s recently spread to five new counties in Texas.
This week in Texas music history: recounting the spring of 1963, when Texas’ own Roy Orbison hit the road with the Beatles.
Plus, the antiquated music machines still playing back part of Texas history.
The Beatles
Texas Extra: Adventures and misadventures of a cinematic life
Carolyn Pfeiffer literally wrote a book, “Chasing the Panther,” about her life and, as she puts it, her “adventures and misadventures” in the worlds of cinema and music and so much more. This extended version of her story includes her time in 1950s New York City, a wild hair story involving Fellini’s “8 1/2” and an unforgettable recollection about a train scene in “Doctor Zhivago.”
Texas Standard: December 30, 2021
2021 may soon be in the rear view, but the sounds of Texas will linger for a long time. The year that was in Texas music on a special edition of the Texas Standard. Willie remains the king, and Beyoncé the queen… But the sound of Texas is more diverse than ever before with rule breakers, hitmakers, award winners and newly installed hall of famers. From ground breaking sounds in hip hop to the impact of covid on our listening and concert going habits, the return of western swing, and a new spotlight on the Texan who saved the Fab Four. 2021 was quite a year for Texas Music. So turn it up for this special edition of the Texas standard:
Mixtape
This Typewriter Rodeo poem harkens back to a time when putting together a collection of songs took a lot of work — and was really something special.
This Song: SOAK // Burgess Meredith
Bridie Monds-Watson, aka SOAK, first heard Pink Floyd when she was in the womb (her parents soothed her with the whale songs of their epic “Echoes”) but only after rummaging through her family’s records did she rediscover the bands LP “Meddle.” Hear her tell how the track “Fearless” helped influence her songwriting and allowed her to envision how expansive recording and production could be.
Then songwriting duo Josh King and Jesse Hester from the Austin band Burgess Meredith explore the depth and breadth of their Beatlemania. Josh describes the magic of the very first pre-Beatles recording that John, Paul, and George made as the Quarrymen. Then Jesse talks about how “Yesterday’s” timeless, sweet sadness has helped him understand the purpose of songwriting.
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Listen to Burgess Meredith’s Studio 1A performance
Listen to Songs from Episode 48 of This Song
This Song: Bob Boilen // Mobley
Bob Boilen, host of NPR’s All Songs Considered wrote a new book called “Your Song Changed My Life,” where he interviewed people about songs that changed their lives. What can we say? Great minds think alike!
Listen as he talks about his own life-changing song — the Beatles “A Day in the Life,” which totally opened his mind up to the expansive capabilities of music and art and informed the kind of musician he would become.
Then Austin artist Mobley explores how Kanye West’s “808’s and Heartbreak” showed him how important emotion and vulnerability in music could be and informed the material for his new EP “Some Other Country” which explores his experience of being a black man in America through songs that sound, at first listen, like songs about someone in a bad relationship.
Check out Bob Boilen’s “Your Song Changed My Life”
Check out Bob Boilen’s website where all his music lives
Watch the only existing video of 80’s era Tiny Desk Unit
Watch Mobley’s video for “Solo”
Watch Mobley’s video for “Swoon”
Check out Mobley’s new EP “Some Other Country”
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Listen to the songs featured in this week’s episode.
This Song: Mark Mothersbaugh // Sabrina Ellis and Andrew Cashen
It’s an extra special, extra long, SXSW extravanganza episode of This Song! First Mark Mothersbaugh describes in vivid detail what is was like to see the Beatles for the first time on Ed Sullivan, and how he became the 5th Beatle, at least in his mind. Then Sabrina Ellis and Andrew Cashen from A Giant Dog and Sweet Spirit talk about the the riffs and raw power of Iggy Pop, the songwriting of Regina Spektor how they came to write songs together.
Check out the Mark Mothersbaugh’s Myopia at the Contemporary Austin
Watch Sweet Spirit perform “Baby When I Close My Eyes” live from KUTX on VuHaus
Watch the video for A Giant Dog’s “Sex and Drugs”
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