Among the many excellent projects to emerge from the loose collection of artists that made up the Tonewheel Collective the past couple of years, Brazos is among the best. Behind principle songwriter Martin Crane, the group, which includes Nathan Stein and Paul Price of the Early Tapes and new drummer Josh Block of White Denim, produces high energy harmonies that dip across indie folk, more psychedelic breakdowns, and shades of mellow, classic soul. The group will be releasing their first official EP, A City Just As Tall, on Autobus Records in October, the follow up to the gloriously lo-fi romp of Feeding Frenzy. You can catch the group this Saturday, September 1 at our Austin Sound Fest along with 12 more of Austin’s best young bands!
Profile : Brazos
Year Formed:
partially in 2006, mostly in 2007
Members/Instruments played:
Martin Crane - Vocals, Guitar Nathan Stein - Guitar, Vocals Paul Price - Bass, Vocals Josh Block - Drums, Vocals
Former Bands/Side Projects:
Ink (R.I.P.), The Early Tapes, Tacks the Boy Disaster, White Denim, {{{Sunset}}}
Albums:
In mid October, we’re releasing an EP called A City Just As Tall. We’re going to bundle that with Feeding Frenzy, a sloppy EP we’ve been selling CDR style at shows and older recordings, one of which is down below. All this is out on Autobus.
Influences:
Internal Wrangler, A Ghost is Born, Sung Tongs, Greetings from Ashbury Park, One Foot in the Grave, Neu!, Eddie Bo, Fela…
Strangest comment or comparison ever made about your music:
A friend of ours, dressed as a goth, told us that our music sounded like underachievement.
Favorite local bands:
White Denim, The Early Tapes, Tacks the Boy Disaster, {{{Sunset}}}, Peel, Sparrowhouse, Pedro y El Lobo, Wax Museum, Cry Blood, Finally Punk, our friends. Mark David Ashworth, but he moved away.
Favorite local venue:
Mohawk
Upcoming shows scheduled:
Austin Sound Fest, an ACL Afterparty at Deville with some good bands, Emo’s with the Watson Twins on the 20th.
Shows over the next month that you’re excited to see:
A lot of the ACL lineup, The Dirty Projectors because so many people told us about their live show at this past SXSW.
Some of your favorite albums from the past year:
The Panda Bear/Animal Collective stuff. A friend of ours showed us the Ethiopiques series, too.
Ideal band (past or present) to open for on a national tour:
Bruce Springsteen when he was playing small clubs before he got famous.
Austin Sound questions:
Last Spring you and other members of the Wheel Collective started up Autobus Records. What has the experience of starting the label been like and what are its plans in the near future?
Autobus pushed all of us involved to make more than we normally would and on a larger scale, too. It’s also given us a slightly bigger platform to push that stuff out. In Brazos’ case, Autobus gave us advice about how we should go about recording, releasing, packaging etc. our EP. Tommy, Autobus’ handy man, did a lot of the groundwork to get our stuff replicated and distributed. From a band perspective, it’s like making records DIY style with an older brother or sister giving you advice all the time and showing you how it all works. That’s very helpful when you are green like us. And we’re all friends, too, so it’s fun to hang out.
We’ve just released Mark David Ashworth’s first album, Viceroy. The Brazos EP comes out October 16. The new Sparrowhouse EP comes out after that, my guess is. We’d like to continue putting out our own records, eventually branching out to other people we like who want to do it themselves with a little help.
We don’t know if Brazos is named more for the country or the river, what would be your top five “river songs.”
Someone else named Brazos so we don’t know either. River songs…
“Cry Me a River” Julie London
“Ain’t No More Cane on the Brazos” Traditional (the one Alan Lomax recorded as well as The Band version)
“I Might Be Wrong” Radiohead (it’s got the sentiment of a river song)
“Take Me to the River”
and Alan Jackson’s sweet life vest in the video for “Chattahoochee”… he looks so… happy.
Song Introduction:
This song (“Hands Up Little Gun”) doesn’t get going until about 2 minutes in, so if you want to give it a 20 second listen, fast forward it to the two minute, twenty second mark and then give it your 20 seconds. This was with our friend Cully on the drums.
Sound Off:
“Just like every Friday night, he brought his usual three-bean salad to the village supper. At night he reviewed materials, checking, double checking, and triple checking his supplies for durability. On his final eve in the village, the village from which he was raised from a pup, the coyote dozed off wondering, as he often did since his first meeting with the three mysterious Indian golden boys, if there would be answers in the valleys.” - Jim Ponds
Mp3 from:
Hands Up Little Gun
Websites:
www.brazosbrazos.com
Myspace
