Wakey!Wakey!

This is just one post in my wrap up of the year 2010. If you would like to read the rest, click here to the main post.

There were a lot of great shows in 2010 that I was fortunate enough to see for free. I love my job. I didn't review a lot of shows as I would have liked but here are some that stuck out in my mind.

White Rabbits
I <3 the White Rabbits. When they rolled into town, I was on it. I even paid $15 to see them. I wrote in my ACL post "for those that know what a cheapskate I am know what a big deal that is." And man, they didn't disappoint. I prepared myself for the show by listening to their two albums ad nauseam at work. I also showed up before the show started, waited in line, and stood right in front of the stage just for this band. Again, none of these characteristics are me. Even though I'm press, there are just some bands that bring out my inner fangirl. This is one of them.

Unfortunately, I got some annoying news right before they took the stage but I was distracted by the percussion awesomeness not to care.

Thrice, Kevin Devine, Bad Veins, The Dig
Summer shows in Texas are fucking brutal and this was no exception. I was sweating so much that I could feel it dripping down my back. Yuck. Poor Chantel, who took the photos, was stuck in the front with a crowd of people around her for the entire show.

It was a random line up but it worked. I watched Thrice from the side of the venue away from the crowd and it was surreal to see this sea of sweaty dude bros pumping their fists in unison and yelling out the lyrics. Those moments make shows unforgettable.

Carney and Athlete
Another summer show but this was inside Stubb's. Think that made a difference from the Texas heat? Hell no. Again, I was sweating and with the combination of the sultry tunes from Carney and the charisma from Athlete's frontman Joel Pott, good god. Babies were probably made that night.

New Politics
I stumbled onto this band during SXSW right before Fall Out Boy's Patrick Stump was set to play. I arrived early so I could ensure that I would be able to get a good spot for viewing. Nothing is more annoying that trying to see a band from behind a person taller than you or drunk high-pitched hyenas. That's a story for another day.

When I walked in the Dirty Dog bar, New Politics was on stage. The music was fun. Honestly, there wasn't anything too special. Got some pop punk elements to it and catchy "yeah yeah" to sing along to. But the minute the lead singer started break dancing, I was sold. More bands need to incorporate break dancing in their sets. Just saying.

Fun Fun Fun Fest
This is what I tweeted about this festival on the old Twitter:
.@funfunfunfest is the one festival to bring out every journalist's inner fanboy/girl. I've never seen so many of them geek out in my life.
Decscendents, Bad Religion, The Bronx... I was such a fangirl that weekend and so was everyone else. It was awesome.

This had to have been my favorite tweet of mine:
As I look at the red-colored press from Gwar's spray, I'm glad Karissa was in the pit & not me. The things we do for you. Haha. So True.

The Secret Handshake
I felt bad for The Secret Handshake when I found out they had to cancel their tour because of low ticket sales. That's disappointing. It disappoints me that if a band hasn't had their ass kissed by Pitchfork or whatever music blog hipsters consider tastemakers that month, no one gives a shit. Whatever happened to liking music just because it's good fun music?

Anyway, off my soapbox... SPEAK opened for this band for my November show and I was really impressed by them. The Secret Handshake is fun, bottom line. Don't believe me? Here's a video.

Down with Webster, Friday Night Boys, The Bigger Lights, and Cute is What We Aimed For

I won free tickets for this show from Do512.com. Yay. I was a fan of Cute is What We Aimed for and I'll admit it was because I thought the name was witty. I don't know if you could call me a fan though because I didn't listen to them on a regular basis. I had the album but I honestly think I heard it once. Again, that name is adorable.

Anyway, the show was interesting. I loved the first band Down with Webster. The second two bands, not so much. The lead singer of Cute is What We Aimed For though... Wow, what a charmer. I was trying my hardest not to swoon, but I just couldn't resist.

Good in the Sack

I had a flashback at the show from the days I spent in the Backroom, reeking of cigarette smoke (smoking was allowed in venues then), and hanging out with all my friends from the Austin Punk Rock website. Seeing everyone in the crowd again singing along to Good in the Sack's silly little lyrics about wishing to know how to fight and having friends with benefits made me feel like that 23-year-old newbie "blogger" all over again.

The Steps, Love at 20, Bright Light Social Hour
This show was great. Three local bands all bringing some different to the line up. Hearing The Steps' guitarist Sam Thompson perform those guitar riffs impressed me. And he's like 19. Wow. These youngins' are coming out of the wombs with talent these days.

Love at 20 always brings a good show which comes as no surprised with all that determination Mike Groener has in that mind of his.

And Bright Light Social Hour was the reason that brought me to that show. It was their last show before they camped in a studio to record their debut full-length. I wanted to see what the big deal was.

Ever see a Cheech and Chong movie? Those '70s and '80s cult films where those two idiots would get high and hilarity would ensue? If life was a Cheech and Chong movie, the Bright Light Social Hour would be that band playing on stage in the bar setting up the scene. I thought for sure that those two clowns would stumble into Emo's at any minute to entertain me. That funky bass, Jack's moustache, and catchy lyrics... woo, that's a show.

Wakey!Wakey!

Unfortunetely, this show wasn't my favorite in the least, but that wasn't Wakey!Wakey!'s fault. It was completely the crowd. The show was inside the Mohawk so it was crowded. That's not a bad thing. Standing in front of a drunk couple who insisted on whistling and yelling as loud as they could because they just looooove Wakey!Wakey! was. I was so annoyed by the end of the night that I wanted to walk out and leave. It was only a keyboard, a violin and vocals so it was very chill show. I understand you're so moved by the music that you feel the need to express yourself, but geez people, yelling? That's unnecessary. Especially inside the venue. Ugh. But the show was memorable.

Glassjaw

Glassjaw was epic. But I'm sure you've realized by now that "epic" is such a regular fixture in my vocabulary. I say episodes of Glee were epic. I say eating a sandwich is epic. But Glassjaw actually lived up to definition "of heroic or impressive proportions."

I wrote a brief review about the show that never got published. Mainly because it was a hot mess, but here are some highlights:

Its been around seven years since Glassjaw performed in Texas, let alone in Austin. With this date not only being the last show they're playing for awhile, it was also the only U.S. date they had booked this year. So it was no surprise that this show sold out immediately when the tickets became available in late December.

Arriving at Emo's at 8:30 p.m., there was a line wrapped around the corner but it moved rather quickly. Glassjaw was the only band on the bill so the crowd had about an hour to get as close to the front as possible or hang out in the venue until the guys took the stage.

The show itself was an hour and 30 minutes of some favorite songs including “Tip Your Bartender,” “Siberian Kiss” and “Ape Dos Mil” as well as some newer tracks from the upcoming album (release date hasn't been officially announced yet.). Vocalist Daryl Palumbo was drowned out by the tightly packed fans who sang along to his every word. Even with one guitar player missing from the original line up, the band still sounded just as fierce and aggressive as the Glassjaw fans love.

After the last song “Babe,” the band said their thank yous and walked off stage. Unfortunately, the small hope in the air was quickly deflated when the band didn't come back for an encore. However, the overall consensus from the fans that night was that this Glassjaw performance was exactly what they have been missing.

This is just one post in my wrap up of the year 2010. If you would like to read the rest, click here to the main post.

Since journalism became my day job, I did my fair share of interviews. While this is my favorite part of the job, transcribing, which is how you get those words into text, is probably my least favorite part of the job. It's too time consuming and requires a lot of individual attention my short attention span can't handle.

One day, someone will invent that helpful software that transcribes word for word for me so I don't have to spend another minute in that grueling process, but in the meantime that's what interns are for. ;)

Here are some of my more memorable interviews from 2010.

Wakey!Wakey!
Ian always assigns me the indie pop bands for Red River Noise and this one was no exception. Michael Grubbs, the man behind Wakey!Wakey!, won me over with not only a great album filled with adorable crush-inducing lyrics, but also with our interview. He was very approachable and easy to talk to.

The album he had just released "Almost Everything I Wish I'd Said The Last Time I Saw You" is filled with so many great lyrics that make the girls swoon. Taylor Muse has some competition. My favorite? "Sometimes I wonder how you stay so sad when you're so beautiful." Aww. Doesn't that just make you think he belongs on a CW TV show? Oh wait, he was.

Zoe Cordes Selbin
I've known of Zoe for a very long time. A high school teenager deeply involved in the business aspect of the Austin music scene? It's only natural that every journalist and blogger in this town wants to write her story.

I was trying to find a band to cover for my next College Sound feature for Accent Newspaper and while I was hanging out before the music started at Fun Fun Fun Fest, I noticed Zoe running around with her festival credentials hanging around her neck and a walkie-talkie in one hand. Then it dawned on me. Why don't I feature her? I knew she went to ACC because I had seen her around campus. It was a perfect fit.

We did our interview on the outside patio of the Rio Grande Campus where we talked on and off the record for almost an hour about the Austin music scene and let me tell you something, this girl knows her stuff. I'm extremely jealous that this girl has it more together than I ever did at her age and she's gonna put us all to shame as she gets older.

Smile Smile
Man, when this band was on the list of bands to interview for Red River Noise, I jumped on it. I was pretty familiar with the background of Smile Smile and had so many questions about how this couple, who used to be engaged, still managed to write and perform music together. It wasn't even a "happy" break-up (do they even have those?).

So my first interview of SXSW was with Smile Smile and it really set the bar high for the rest of the week. Because I was so knowledgeable with the history (turns out I know the third party personally that came between the then-engaged couple), I felt like I was the counselor of this therapy session with the band. I was really surprised with how open they were about the whole situation. None of my questions were out of bounds and there wasn't as much awkwardness you would expect.

I really do think this was one of my best interviews of 2010.

Rocky Votolato
This was assigned to me by Spinner for the SXSW interviews. We conducted this interview on the phone while Votolato was on his way to a show. Since he and his wife were driving through empty fields in some podunk town, the signal kept cutting off. Luckily, we all had good senses of humor about it so the moment one of us would call each other back, we would just laugh and keep going.

What made this interview memorable though was that one time Votolato called me back, he asked me how old I was. If you've met me, you would understand why this question always comes up. I look and sound a lot younger than I really am.

When I told him my age, he of course laughed and said, "Wow, you sound a lot younger. Do you get that a lot?" Oh yeah.

Roky Erickson
I was intimidated to interview Roky for a SXSW interview for Spinner. It's Roky Erickson for crying out loud. It was another phone interview and joining us was Will Sheff from Okkervil who ended up serving as a catalyst which put us both at ease.

The Dig

The guys from The Dig cracked me up throughout the entire interview. I think my favorite part has to be:

So for those who haven't heard of The Dig, what would you tell someone who's like...

Emile: Who hasn't heard of The Dig? Do those people exist?

David: Well by that, you mean everyone?

Emile: Yeah, every single person.

Ross Dubois

When I interviewed Ross Dubois, he had recently decided to become a solo artist so his story was pretty new. I didn't know what to expect. I had never met him before. I didn't know anything about him. There wasn't much to research, but this was easily one of the most informative interviews I've ever done in 2010.

Dubois had a lot of say about his musical background and his solo music without repeating himself or going on never-ending tangents. I felt like I was having a conversation with him instead of just going with a question and then an answer. The article came quickly together after that.

Here are some memorable interviews that were never published but happened during 2010. Don't worry, they'll see the light of day eventually and when they do, I'll explain why they are awesome in my eyes. Just by reading the names though, you'll probably guess why.

New Politics
Tyler Hilton
Prayer for Animals
Ghostland Observatory
Eisley

Imagine this scenario: A guy walks into his usual hangout one night and notices a cute girl he's never seen there before. What better way to get her attention than by performing one of his swoon-inducing piano ballads?

That's exactly what frontman Michael Grubbs of Wakey!Wakey! did when he walked into Bar 4 in Brooklyn, New York, and saw a girl who grabbed his attention. He asked his friend who was running the open mic night to put him on the list. After impressing the girl with his song, he found out she was a writer for the CW TV show, One Tree Hill. The writer then recommended Grubbs to One Tree Hill creator Mark Schwahn.

Schwahn became so impressed with Grubbs that not only did he use Wakey!Wakey!'s song "War Sweater" during the season six finale, but he also wrote the loosely-based reoccurring character "Grubbs" for season seven. Since then, season seven's last episode aired in May and Wakey!Wakey! released their latest album Almost Everything I Wish I'd Said The Last Time I Saw You... in February.

Grubbs sat down with Red River Noise before his show at Mohawk to discuss how One Tree Hill helped his music career and also shared the unexpected music genre Grubbs has a sweet spot for.

Click here to read the rest at Red River Noise.