d Nuts || February 4, 2010

A teaser video just went live at the Baptist Generals' official web site, announcing little more than "soon" about the band's long-awaited sophomore album. As expected, it's an odd, haunting video. I'll post more info if I can dig any up. For now, this is the most concrete step the band has taken in the past decade to announce any new material (lest you forget the 4,000 times Dd has posted Baptist Generals "news"), so we'll keep our fingers crossed and harass Chris Flemmons when we attend this year's NX35 Conferette.

D Nuts || July 28, 2009

Dallas experimental act Tree Wave is giving away four songs for free as a "virtual 10 inch" at their site right now. No explanation, no fanfare, no liner notes. I'd say "no promotion," either, but band mastermind Paul Slocum posted an assuming alert about the release on MySpace yesterday--and, of course, nobody noticed. I can't believe he didn't TwitBookBit it! I mean, it's 20xx!

The 12-minute collection of 4 songs will sound familiar to Tree Wave fans; Slocum is still bleeding old game consoles and computers dry to make lush, plodding waves of noise, made fuzzier by guitar pedals. But these are not as poppy as 2004's Cabana+ EP; from the sound of it, Slocum has entered a new realm of comfort, as these noise blasts are shapely, yet formless, and a lot more provocative as a result.

Judge for yourself.

D Nuts || July 21, 2009

Seems like as good a day as any to update Dd, since this year's Dallas Observer Music Awards take place tonight. Since Dd wasn't nominated for our hard work this past year--GEEZ--I will celebrate in Seattle by seeing DOMA nominees The Theater Fire and Robert Gomez in concert tonight. West Coast tour, whoop!

The DOMAs have a good-looking list of nominees, a fact that will sadly be eroded when everyone's least-fave acts win out over the voting melee (the Nader effect is brutal at any local media award show). But that good list doesn't make up for the latest screed by Observer music ed Pete Freedman, lambasting We Shot JR while trying to defend the award show's "house party" theme.

[Before I begin, I want to heartily thank Pete for getting the ball rolling on the DC9 video series. It's the modern equivalent to the Observer's old Scene Heard compilations, and even if it follows on the heels of video features by Quick, its consistency and quality is the kind of thing a major organization can do to outdo the blogging competition. I have bad things to say about Pete's writing, but not about his video series.]

[Okay. Back to it.]

There's a he-said-he-said between the two sides, but it's not worth analyzing; Pete's article does nothing to address some obvious issues and direct quotes laid apparent by We Shot JR. Not that I get wound up with either side on the basic theme of house parties--they're a subset of concerts that come standard in any town where a bunch of kids are starting bands and getting their musical feet wet. They're nothing new; at my time at the Observer, an editor greenlit a story on house parties, and the writer couldn't come up with anything compelling. Been there, done that. Deleted.

My bigger issue here is that Pete defends his appropriation of a DIY ethos by name-dropping bands, not by talking about his experiences at DIY events.

"[Fergus & Geronimo] are getting love from beyond North Texas' boundaries, getting name-dropped adoringly."

This sentence, out of context, comes off as particularly empty, and perhaps in context, it's not so bad. But it should be isolated to highlight the detachment that Freedman has trafficked in for months since arriving in Dallas. I already wrote about this in the linked We Shot JR post:

Just because Pete fronts a corporate entity--sponsored by liquor, smokes, official venues and so on--doesn't mean covering "fringe" scenes (tejano, hip-hop, DJ/mix, DIY) should be neutered or scared away by the "sponsored by" tag. So why are they? Pete had a real shot with suburb-rock, a long-overdue niche article angle that [former editor] Jonanna Widner lazily ignored before him. But his June feature on the trend came off like something in a business magazine, because it's obvious he dislikes the music in question and wouldn't put his cajones on the table to be an honest writer about it. Guess what? Zac Crain hated Pantera and wrote about them during his tenure--with teeth, conviction and respect all at once. Is the corporate culture of VVM so brutal these days that Pete is stuck in a box, awaiting the day he can finally loose his frenzied feelings? Or is Pete unwilling to get himself caught up in uncomfortable spaces, other than the controlled anxiety of reloading a WeShotJR comments thread again and again between blog posts at work? The typical complaint is that a mainstream outlet covers "the same five bands" over and over, but a far worse fate is to force people to read about all 5,000 of them with no personal conviction attached. -SM

And in this latest column, this detachment is blatant in his descriptions of the Dallas punk scene:

[Dallas punk bands] are being forced to fake their way to a scene through infrequent gigs at July Alley, Reno's Chop Shop Saloon and, when it'll have them, The Lounge on Elm Street.

And that's all he has to offer. Therefore, Pete, I don't believe you. Put us in that scene. Take us to a shitty night at Reno's and put your balls on the table to out yourself as either a fan or a disdainful outsider.

I don't count on that happening, based on how unwilling Pete was to respond to his licks from We Shot JR. The soulless everyman who posts vapid scene commentary--and the same guy who reposts shitty bands' links with smarmy, personality-less commentary on DC9 on a daily basis--is, at this point, throwing up band names on a corkboard in the college cafeteria. Of course he seems like a champion of the scene! Lists are awesome!

But you can do better, man. Unless the boss isn't letting you. -SM

Dd at NX35 || March 6, 2009

Not sure when NX35.com will be throwing this blurb up on their site, so to the eight of you who still reload my page, here's the scoop.

The Internet Thinks Your Scene Sucks
Friday, March 13, at the Denton Civic Center (estimated start time: 4 p.m.)

With new media comes fewer barriers to entry--and that simple fact changes everything. That simple fact also happens to be olllld news, but hyper-local, artistic interests are still struggling to make sense of it. How is a geographically limited music and arts scene supposed to thrive amidst the growing glut of global content aggregation? And what does this have to do with newspapers and magazines dying left and right? Former Dallas Observer music editor Sam Machkovech has thoughts on the important relationship between local media and local artists, and how to make the most of that relationship to survive the Internet's heartless, ever-expanding belly. With him will be current Quick music editor Hunter Hauk to (hopefully) disagree with everything Sam says.

See y'all in a week.

D Nuts || December 11, 2008

Was just back through town last week to visit family and such. A few thoughts.

ITEM: Dallas' public smoking ban apparently passed through city council yesterday. Its April '09 launch couldn't be stopped by panicky resistance from people with money: bar owners, restaurant owners, people who can afford to smoke.

I call BS on the "15 foot rule"; if you want an indoor smoking ban, pick a realistic distance from front doors and patio entryways. (Really, you expect people to walk further than Julius Jones could run in a typical Cowboys rushing play?) Otherwise, it'll be interesting to see if Dallas' music-friendly spots stick to the ban. I certainly hope so, because after only two nights around Dallas, I found myself hawking up black gunk.

As I've always said, secondhand smoke is the crap even smokers don't want. They exhale it for some reason, I assume. But it'd cost too much to get landlords to get any airflow through the ramshackle holes that most bands perform in. And let's not forget, the only major cities with good music scenes and no smoking bans are Dallas and... what, Birmingham? I don't even know.

Enjoy reducing your chances of random, inexplicable cancers when you turn 43, folks. The music isn't going to die.

ITEM: Though you'd think so walking through The Door and The Prophet Bar. I caught a few bands at the latter last week--showed up just in time to miss the dandy Denton duo RTB2, thanks to a show that started on real time, not Dallas time. The fuck, Russell Hobbs?

In case you missed it, the Gypsy Tea Room's two sides are open again. The big room is the new home of The Door, and it's kinda eerie in there if you knew the GTR ballroom well. The bar in the middle has been gutted, presumably to station a cream soda tap for the kids, and a second stage has been hoisted up so acoustic teenagers can croon between headlining screamo bands (still ca-raaazy after the move all the way down Elm St). The Prophet Bar, meanwhile, is the old small room mostly intact, save the old posters and Blind Lemon Jefferson photo behind the stage. And the sound guy. The Theater Fire and Dove Hunter sounded like half of what they are, because that's all we got in the audience--kiss any sense of range or vocal levels goodbye while Danny Douchebag's working the knobs.

Seems like the space is lining up big-name shows, but what's the point? That DART light rail line, still under construction, will open in a few years with round-the-clock stops around the ghost town that Deep Ellum has become. No biggie for me; the place was best when it was a warehouse district, anyway, right? I stopped at Campagna's art gallery while down there, which had a badass freak-jazz explosion happening at the time. No yuppies or cruisers in sight. Just the people willing to chop through the thicket and find a gem in the deepest of Elms.

ITEM: You know who's pretty promising? Daniel Folmer. I'm late to the game, assuredly, but the kid's still 23, so I say there's no rush. The Carrolton native is pulling off a beautiful sort of country-tinged codeine overdose that passed out between The Promise Ring and early Bright Eyes. I'm sure he'd kill me for putting him halfway twixt those, but even if it's not quite accurate, it's a compliment. His songwriting is attractively earnest pre-emo, and his ear for rigid, memorable songs is strangely unique around town these days. Folmer's gig at the Cavern on Monday night started off boring, but he grew a pair by set's end and began earning the heartbreak his lyrics strive toward.

ITEM: Baptist Generals' new record could be done soon? So sayeth Chris Flemmons, who I ran into in my three hours in Denton last week. (Didn't you hear? He's the town cryer; greets all dishonorably discharged music writers when they approach the Denton Square. That'd be cool, actually.)

Says he scrapped previous recordings of the band to work 'em all out again, but this time--THIS TIME, indeed--the band's on the home stretch. Five years have gone into this record, a piddling number in the face of Axl Rose's November 2008 rain, but it's been an eternity for the Sub Pop dudes down the block from my current home base. He expects any finished product to be held for a Fall '09 release. Until he sends me the full album, I will not believe him. I hope this threat is bait enough.

But I have a bit more faith in the claim, because Flemmons also snuck me a copy of the new Bosque Brown record--whose completion, he says, has been the spark behind gaining traction on the BG disc. He says BB lead singer Mara Lee Miller agreed to have Flemmons on board as producer for the band's second full-length because "I told her that they wrote great, beautiful songs, but they were fucking boring." The band was fine with the assessment, apparently, and took the opportunity to try new things on Baby, which should see release this coming March...ish. Didn't get a confirmed date. But I can confirm that the disc is a treat, a fine mix of the band's traditional approach, some sparking experiments, and a three-part series of miniature, a capella songs that continue to fill my ears when I'm outside and everything else is silent. Dear Lord, friends.

Flemmons also went on about NX35, the "conferette" that will be held in Denton the weekend before SXSW this year. I'll wait until that fest nears to hype it, but suffice it to say, Flemmons has friends near and far that should turn pre-SouthBy into a veritable coup for the northern half of music-loving Texas.

ITEM: Speaking of hopeless faith in local music, I hear people still read this site. To the few of you, know that I miss writing about Texas music, but it's a bastard to do this so far away. I hope you understand that I prefer silence from my distant post over tired retreads of the same seven bands... if barely. Thanks for reading.

D Nuts || September 29, 2008

Funny the things that slip by when you're outta town for so long--like, uh, a new band spawning from the mouth of Baboon. Turns out The Boom Boom Box has been percolating since at least the beginning of this summer, spearheaded by Baboon's original founders Mike Rudnicki and Andrew Huffstetler. Dd's Jasun Lee reports that other band members include guitarist Ean Parsons (Pinkston) and drummer Clay Stinnett (Ghostcar)--I guess it's 1998 all over again? Their site reports an EP release around the same time as their live debut: October 18th at Lola's in Fort Worth.

It's hard to gauge whether this band is continuing the Baboon legacy of old or striking out on a new path--but it's not hard to appreciate the band's debut song, posted this morning. Certainly more of an opening salvo than a hit single, "Henry the Skunk" drags Huffstetler out of his usual role as an anthemic chorus screamer; the only chorus is a a repeating guitar blast, fueled by Stinnett's ridiculous drumming and a dark hat-tip to Joy Division. Cool.

Wuz this mean for Baboon, though? No shows are listed at their site, and the band's been generally quiet since releasing their self-titled stunner in 2006. Baboon fans, don't expect to unsheath your whistles any time soon.

Toadies Deliver || May 9, 2008

News has been trickling out of the Toadies camp ever since they self-leaked footage of a new album being recorded a few months ago. The news has ramped up recently as well--they're performing at an upcoming Stars playoff game, they're starting their own music fest at Possum Kingdom Lake, they're announcing more tour dates... the next step seems obvious.

Wedged into today's Dd spam folder, right between "Keira Knightley Stunning photo!!!" and "Now You Can Enhance Your Sex Life at the Lowest Prices," was an anonymous tip with just the word "Toadies" in the title.

The new Toadies album will be officially announced to the public on Monday, May 12, 2008.

The new album will be called No Deliverance and will be released on August 19, 2008.

There will be a new website for the album, www.nodeliverance.com. It will be up and running on Monday.

Site's not up yet, but an Internet whois on nodeliverance.com shows that Kirtland Records, the band's label, has snatched the name up, so this seems to check out. Additionally, the anonymous e-mail had this to say:

The Toadies are playing Lollapalooza this summer. The show will be officially announce [sic] on Monday, May 12, 2008.

Details to come.

So there you have it--1994 is back at Lollapalooza (NIN, Rage Against the Machine, Radiohead). The e-mail also included a statement about how the Toadies street team is supposed to keep these bits of news private, but, well, the street team isn't that hard to sign up for. None of this is entirely shocking; the Toadies, in only a few "comeback" concerts, have already outpaced the Burden Brothers in terms of crazed fans and interest, and the band's previous hang-ups about record labels have to seem irrelevant and petty this many years later. If they're happy getting the band back together, good for them, and good for DFW music--you can't tell me that renewed interest in the area's biggest mid-'90s mainstream rock success is a bad thing. It's not the local music breakout dream for some, but the Toadies are a big-deal gateway drug. Bring it on.

The only question that remains: Who's the new bassist? The team had a notice on their MySpace page asking if people wanted to be the guy/gal "playing those catchy bass lines," but that blog post has since vanished. We know Lisa Umbarger's never playing in a band with Todd Vaden Lewis, but is Baboon's Mark Hughes not returning? I guess we'll find out at Game Three of the Stars/Red Wings series.

d Nuts || April 2, 2008

Another casualty of not being anywhere near town--I totally miss the boat on stories like this. The Pitchfork story, strangely, doesn't make any mention that ear woundee Josh Baish runs Rubber Gloves in Denton ... uh, yeah, it does. Though I totally glossed over the blurry photo. More information, of course, can be found at Denton Rock City.

While I'm here, I might as well send an apology to those who happen to reload this page on a daily/weekly basis, expecting more commentary or reviews or what-have-you about North Texas music. It has to be obvious by now that the semi-consistent posts of old are done. The area's music coverage is something that cannot be phoned in from this many miles away, and I figured the site would fade once I left and finished out the fresh coverage I still had handy around the time of my move. But I get why people still come to Dd--Dallas music coverage is rough. We Shot JR, the ultimate in local blogs, often steers too hard in the underground direction, which would be fine if the other side of coverage wasn't depressingly brief (Quick) or depressingly uninformed (Observer). Instead, local music and arts coverage ambles on with the kind of vacuous, beer-shilling swill that leaves people indifferent and uninspired--and we wonder why Dallas' arts-friendly districts get plowed over by an uncaring city's development and gentrification!

It drives me so nuts, I get tempted to start blogging about North Texas music again....... but, again, can't fly into town that often. I'm not killing the site, but understand that this slowdown will be the norm for the foreseeable future. Thanks for reading Dd, y'all, both then and now. -SM