18th annual Swollen Circus @ Continental Club, Austin, TX, 11-March 2014

with Amy Cook, William Harries Graham and his Dad, Tim Easton, Wild Seeds, Dog Trumpet, Walter Salas-Humara, The Fauntleroys, WIFEE and the HUZz BAND, Dusty Stray, Purgatory Hill, Ephrata

Next I went on a little detour, away from the crowds on Sixth Street and from official SXSW showcases. Having attended most Swollen Circus parties since they started in 1996, it was a great opportunity to reconnect with old friends both on-stage and off, and to catch a 3-song glimpse of artists which I may or may not see again over the course of the next few days.

Amy Cook @ Continental Club

"Local folk muse Amy Cook turns winter alabaster into Summer Skin, also the name of her LP from 2012. In her decade-long career in Austin, Cook's caught the eye of everyone from longtime resident Ben Kweller to Robert Plant. Her live show is typically stripped and simple, with little more needed than Cook and her guitar." – Abby Johnston, Austin Chronicle
Amy Cook made her second appearance at the Swollen Circus and opened the night shortly after I arrived at the Continental Club, a perfect venue for the event. On this occasion David Pulkingham (Alejandro Escovedo, Patty Griffin) joined her on guitar.

William Harries Graham & Jon Dee Graham @ Continental Club

Back home in Toronto the offspring of well-known musicians are a common sight around the clubs, with Dustin Bentall, Devin Cuddy, Sam Cash and others all having released albums at this point. A similar trend seems to be emerging in Austin, and having seen Jon Dee Graham on so many occasions before I was intrigued to see and hear him with his son William. They performed two songs by William and one of Jon Dee’s. Joey Shuffield had raced over from the The Main II where he had played with Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis just an hour before, and sat in on drums. After the short set I'm fairly certain we will hear more from William or one of his bands, The Painted Redstarts or the The Living Room Project.

Tim Easton @ Continental Club

"American songwriter Tim Easton's most recent album, his ninth, entitled NOT COOL, was placed in the Top 50 Albums of 2013 by American Songwriter Magazine. It evokes the spirit of Sun Studios and early Rock & Roll and Country." - SXSW Band Info
The first time I saw Tim Easton was at SXSW 1999, and I have seen him probably a dozen times since then. He is a regular at SXSW, and he always seem to play a party where I happen to be. I wouldn't call myself a fan, but I have yet to see him play a bad show and things weren't any different at the Swollen Circus.

Wild Seeds @ Continental Club

"Inspired by '80s post-punk greats like the Fleshtones, Dream Syndicate, and Gun Club, Texas music writer Michael Hall formed the rootsy pop Wild Seeds in 1984, on the cusp of Austin's much ballyhooed 'New Sincerity' period." - Peter Aaron, allmusic.com
Never had a chance to see the band live before, so I was really looking forward to the set. Pure Fun - they got the crowd moving with a set that included a Gene Clark and a Lou Reed cover. Added to the list of bands to see again this week.

Dog Trumpet @ Continental Club

"Brothers Peter O'Doherty and Reg Mombassa formed Dog Trumpet in 1990 after a successful run with Eighties Australian hitmakers Mental as Anything. Far-ranging pop smarts and a slightly askew worldview makes for near-instant engagement on 2013's double LP Medicated Spirits." - Greg Beets, Austin Chronicle
Never heard of the band before and had mistakenly confused them with a crappy Austin punk band that played the Swollen Circus many years ago. This was a pleasant surprise.

Walter Salas-Humara @ Continental Club

Walter played several showcases throughout the week, billed under his own name and with The Silos. The band was slightly different for every show. Tonight it was Walter's brother Ignacio on drums, Rich Brotherton and Randy Franklin on guitar, Steve McAllister on bass and Michael Hall on keyboards. Setlist of all new songs from the upcoming Walter Salas-Humara album Curve And Shake: "Counting On You", "The Craziest Feeling" and "Satellite".

The Fauntleroys @ Continental Club

Apparently this was the first live performance by this "supergroup", with Alejandro Escovedo on bass, Ivan Julian and Nicholas Tremulis on guitars and Linda Pitmon on drums. “Loud and loose” is probably an adequate description of their set.

WIFEE and The HUZz BAND featuring Ruby James @ Continental Club

"We are a 9-10 piece, original music heavy band with horns and a Dj in our entirety pulling from influences of old soul, motown,  50's-60's rock and roll, rhythm and blues and some funk." - Band website
Hope I got the spelling right for the name of this band? What is it with bands from Wisconsin and odd spelling of band names (see below)? Anyway, it got really crowded on stage, with the band providing a welcome change of pace/style after the full-throttle performance by The Fauntleroys.

Dusty Stray @ Continental Club

"Hailing from Amsterdam, DUSTY STRAY features the alt-folk repertoire of Texan expat Jonathan Brown which delves into universal themes of unrequited love, heartbreak, loneliness and death but (almost) always with a small dose of hope and redemption. The melodic, lightly psychedelic acoustic-based songs are accompanied by a number of unusual instruments and toys." - SXSW Band Info
There is usually one band at the Swollen Circus that doesn't do much for me – this year it was Dusty Stray. Maybe it was the technical difficulties they had, maybe it was that they were following a highly entertaining act, but their set was uninspired and had a good portion of the crowd heading for the bar or the exits.

Purgatory Hill @ Continental Club

"Wisconsin's Pat MacDonald is best known for his old band Timbuk 3's offbeat 1986 hit song "The Future's So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades," and in his latest project, Purgatory Hill, he cranks Timbuk's bluesy leanings hard in the direction of the sizzling, gutbucket North Mississippi sound defined by R.L. Burnside and the Fat Possum stable. [... The] duo lays down some seriously swampy and electrifying riffs, armed with nuts-and-bolts instrumentation perfect for its stripped-down, amped-up approach to alt-blues—a tambourine, a stompbox, and a hand-built Lowebow guitar made out of a cigar box and two wooden rods." - A.V. Club
Cigar Box, two rods and more awkward spelling ("PurgAtory Hill")? I was ready to write them off as another novelty act, but their set included a nice cover of "I Wanna be Your Dog" and was highly entertaining and proved me wrong.

Ephrata @ Continental Club

"Hi! We're Ephrata and [...] we're spacey and dreamy and sometimes we kind of sound like somebody put Slowdive and Cocteau Twins in the Brundle teleporter with Abba and Sing Along With Mitch." - Band bio
I had not heard of Ephrata, and probably wouldn’t have stayed if I had a chance to listen to their music before the show. But their performance was actually a lot more entertaining than their recorded output and a good way to end the Swollen Circus and the first day of SXSW 2014.