Tuesday - March 16, 2010

Today, like so many Tuesdays before this one, marked the official transition day from SXSW Interactive to SXSW Music. Registration opened for Music attendees and the events surrounding the official festival really started to ramp up.

I've been in town for a couple of days and have had the opportunity to do some fun stuff while waiting for the sanctioned events to start. I have had some great food, as always, and have even found some new places to haunt when I make my return to the wonderful city of Austin.

Early in the week I made the trek down South Congress to have brunch at one of my favorite – and everyone else's favorite – little joints, Magnolia Cafe. This place is always a hubbub of activity, especially as the transient population of the city grows for the festival. The food was fantastic and the staff as adept and welcoming as always, even in these busy times.

The greatest place I found this year thus far is a record store called Friends Of Sound Records. I'm not talking CD shop here folks... I'm talking real, honest-to-God, vinyl records, and nothing but. I had a couple hours to burn and I sure enjoyed digging through stacks of records as I haven't done in years... far too many years. I came across some vinyl that was just too awesome to pass up. The shop, located at 1704 South Congress and accessed via its entrance in the alley behind the building, is stacked wall-to-wall with 12” records with a couple of large bins of 7” records as well. There's everything one would expect from a quality old school record shop, including rock, jazz, and just the right amount of country music. Awesome place to spend some time and money, with a friendly, but not overly so, and knowledgeable staff.

This year as I was trekking my way back up South Congress I ran across a little shop right at the corner of Riverside called Quincy's Guitars. I took a quick minute to peak inside, and found a very friendly and welcoming environment filled with some of the finest acoustic guitars I'd seen in quite some time. Here's a quiet little shop behind locked door where one can sit and strum Austin's own Collings guitars right next to vintage Martin and Gibson flat tops. One of the proprietors says that they are happy catering to the upper-end guitar aficionado, and plan to continue to do just that. Prices on new instruments start around $3500.00 and go on up from there. While visiting the shop I fell in love with a 1967 Martin tenor guitar, but there were plenty of beautiful instruments to satisfy the most discriminating of tastes.

As the evening unwound and dinner with some great friends at the fantastic Hyde Park Bar & Grill (always a wonderful dining experience, with great food and a really friendly and professional staff) ended, I made my way down to 6th Street to see what was happening. In true SXSW fashion, I felt it necessary to start my musical journey off with a little trip down to see Michael Booher, and whatever his latest band is, play. Since the untimely demise of the unheralded indie stalwarts Zykos a few years ago, it seems Mr. Booher has been busy with a couple of projects and tonight I got to wrap my ears around Booher And The Turkeyz. A collection of local musicians from other bands, including his own Ovenbirds, The Turkeyz lay down some noisy, straightforward rock and roll music with a high degree of melody. A couple songs are holdovers from the previously mentioned Zykos, but the new direction the Turkeyz take them is at once groovy and brash, filled with just enough extra edge to make the songs sound fresh and relevant. The band was in high gear for this evening's performance, even with no monitor mix in sight, and sounded fantastic.

Following the Turkeyz was another local Austin band I've not heard for a couple of years called Frank Smith. I've tried to follow their exploits as I've known some of the members that have come and gone through the band's line-up over the past four or so years. Tonight the band was pretty straightforward, adding only pedal steel to the basic three-instrument rock-and-roll core. The newer Frank Smith songs are really well put together, and soar with an alt. country sound that invokes a darker, richer America. Songs steeped in densely wild guitars and thundering drums carry the day, creating a steadfast and bold platform for songs with a spirit of yearning and timelessness. If you have any interest in alt. country at all, I highly recommend you take the time to attend a Frank Smith performance, it is well worth the time.

-David DeVoe

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