Austin Sound

Brian Eno is believed to have once said that “”Only five thousand people ever bought a Velvet Underground album, but every single one of them started a band.” The same sentiment might one day apply for Austin’s The Weird Weeds as well — except that they make their listeners want to make loose concept albums based around harmonious open-field vocals, and indie-prog instrumentals.

Upon a first listen, Help Me Name Melody, the fourth LP from the Weird Weeds and second for local imprint Autobus, continues on in the same way their previous albums played (2008’s I Miss This, and 2006’s Weird Feelings) — polite jam rock that resonates somewhere near the warm fuzzy center Olivia Tremor Control managed to find among the hearts of critics. The Weird Weeds are undecided.

The physical release of Sunset’s new album, Loveshines But The Moon Is Shining Too, comes out tomorrow as 2LP opus, and Bill Baird and company have offered up the lead track for download to celebrate. This follows on the heels of the previous two tracks released back in July, but seeing as how this will be Sunset’s 5th album in three years, which more than most bands put out in their entire career, the band seems to have plenty of tunes to share. The music in Bill Baird’s head must out, one way or another. The good news is that Sunset keeps getting better and better. The band just returned from a little west coast jaunt, but doesn’t currently have any homecoming dates line up that we can find. Download “Heavy Light” below, and order the album from the fine folks at Autobus Records here.

Sunset is gearing for the release of their next album, called Loveshines But The Moon Is Shining Too. Set for digital release on September 7 and as a 2LP/CD on October 12th via Autobus Records, the bits that we’ve been hearing are pretty fantastic. Case in point is the beautiful “Late Night Dawning”, which features vocal contributions from Crystal Fulbright and Red Hunter. “Excuse me while I go insane, or whatever they call it now.” We call it being Bill Baird! Zing! Also contributed for your consideration is “Loveshines II”, with mp3 below and the video available here. This was released as 7-inch last year (TWSS). Baird and Co. are currently out on the road, having mis-adventures and raiding open mics alongside sister project Sleep Good. Tracklist and cover art Loveshines But The Moon Is Shining Too is available here, should you be so inclined to take a gander.

What began as the dreamy pop project of Will Patterson (also of Sunset), has developed into a full band over the past couple of years. If you enjoy Bill Baird’s brand of pop, then chances are you’ll dig Sleep Good as well, grammar aside. After self releasing a series of lo-fi albums, Sleep Good’s fourth offering, Skyclimber, gets a proper release via local collective Autobus Records, out digitally on the 15th of this month, and in physical form come late August. In fact, we recommend going ahead and trying out the digital in preparation for summer, as these tunes seem ready-made for lazy days. Case in point, “Schlitterbahn,” which you can download below. The band now boasts a full quintet, and no word on when they’ll have an official local release show yet, as they will be heading up the east coast with Sunset next month. But you can check out some older videos on their myspace page. And in other Autobus news, the Weird Weeds have finished they’re fourth album, called Help Me Name Melody which due out in September. They’re apparently so excited, they can’t keep their clothes on.

2008 was a marathon year for Bill Baird and Sunset: Pink Clouds, Bright Blue Dream, and The Glowing City. These three full-length albums, each distinct iterations of Sunset’s characteristic sound, accounted for hours upon hours of music that no doubt took many more hours still to write and record. After a year of formalizing his band and establishing his new east side studio, Baby Blue, 2010 brings yet another new release in the Sunset catalog, Gold Dissolves To Gray. Tempting as it is to throw it up on the shelf with the earlier releases, much of the album serves as a re-imagining of Sunset’s sound as stripped down, comical at times, and all-together a more coherent album.

They say Mark David Ashworth left Austin a while ago for San Francisco, but we know that he really ended up tweaked out on some mysterious island. “The record is spinning again. We’re just not on the song we wanna be on!” Luckily Ashworth occasionally flashes back to Austin and still keeps his foot in the local scene with his connection to Autobus Records. We do wish he’d come back, though, especially after getting a taste of his sophomore album, Bright is the Ring of Words, which Autobus will release on February 23. Like his debut, Viceroy, the new album sounds gorgeously intimate, but bolstered by much grander arrangements. This is apparently the product the product of recording both in his small Mission District apartment and in the orchestra room of some middle school? It’s all so confusing! The song available for download below, “Sometimes it Turns Dry and the Leaves Fall Before They Are Beautiful,” is actually a William Carlos Williams poem that Ashworth set to music, so there’s that. The songwriter will reportedly be back in Austin for SXSW, but the album will have to suffice till then.

To look at Phosphorescent Blues as a mere expansion of the themes that made Brazos’ debut EP, A City Just As Tall, so successful might be the best critical approach, but it would hardly do justice to the completeness and solidarity that characterize the success of the new release as a true album. Suffice it to say then, if you liked A City Just As Tall, fear not - you’ll love Phosphorescent Blues. But give the album a chance to work new and different angles, like soft piano interludes and expanded attention to textures, and you’ll find the interplay of themes and textures, both lyrically and musically, are a stunning accomplishment unto their own.

There seems to be a general contention these days between the single and EP. We love that the single is making a comeback, especially in 7″ form as we get from Sunset and the Black below, but we have to continue to take issue with the idea of a three song EP. We’ll let our hangups over the issue of EP vs single slide with Leatherbag and Corto Maltese, though, as both are excellent and welcome offerings that compact their distinctive sounds into great releases. Leatherbag’s Everything I Once Knew encapsulates the range of styles that he has progressed through over the years, while the Corto Maltese’ Answer, Answer proves appropriately more polished than their much acclaimed demo while still retaining their unbridled edge. Okkervil River offers up a new song, “Millionaire,” on their single to The Stand Ins’s, “Pop Lie,” along with an alternate take on the song, and the recent 7″ vinyl releases from Sunset (Loveshines II) and the Black (Little Hits) are must have local singles.

The Glowing City, the new album from Bill Baird’s Sunset, is an ambitious sprawling tribute to psychedelic, prog, folk, and post-rock. Attributed to seven musicians plus another eighteen (twenty-one or more if you count Townes the Dog, the guy who recorded street traffic, and whomever played in the Tejano band on the radio next door to the studio), The Glowing City is filled with lush instrumentation and voices that appear from unlit corners. There’s a sense that maybe complete chaos is right around the bend when all these folks are allowed to get together.

At eighteen tracks and almost 80 minutes long, The Glowing City is a difficult album to digest in one or two listens. Like the best parts of Pink Floyd’s Atom Heart Mother and/or Obscured By Clouds with a dash of Sgt Pepper, Bowie, and Love, this album yields new gifts every listen as the nuances and influences are picked up and peeled away.

Martin Crane and Erik Wofford are Austin’s production dream team. These two masters at Cacophony Recorders could make even a high school ska band sound good. But for as much talent as there is behind the knobs and switches on this recording, there’s just as much talent on the business side of the microphones, compliments of Praveen Ayyagari, with some help from Crane and a few others, including members of White Denim and Tacks, The Boy Disaster. After listening to album after album of new music, it’s nice to sit back, relax and tap my foot along to Canopy’s first offering, a short, 5-song, laid-back (in a good way) EP called Canopy/Anopy.

The EP opens with clicks, hi-hat, toms, and Ayyagari’s airy vocals of “Neon Line,” sounding like the softer shades of Animal Collective or Grizzly Bear before melting into a chorus that layers on the reverb (which seems to have a “sublime” function). Ayyagari sings, “Life’s much harder when it hits you both ways,” trailing off into Crane’s equally compelling guitar. Ayyagri’s vocals trill in the higher register with a smooth if staccatoed lilt, following like a poppier version of Crane’s band Brazos.