Our beloved, Jacob Cole, is on tour for two weeks playing guitar with Dante Elephante. While he’s away, he’s keeping us updated with this tour diary, so we can live vicariously through him. Here’s his second entry.
killer road ‘stache
Austin, TX Saturday 3/17 3:12am
This past Friday we didn’t have a show. Which was a nice break cause we were still pretty tired from the drive out. We were lucky enough to land a rad spot to crash while in Austin. A gentleman hit up Ruben via Instagram and offered up his house as a home base. Lucky break. We took a chance and ended up making good friends with everyone there, very generous hosts. Nice to not have to worry about a roof for a few days. Enjoyed some good music, made new friends, and enjoyed a solid sampling of life in Austin.
Heard new music from Marlon Williams via a quick stop at Waterloo Records. Very Elvis inspired voice and delivery. Reminded me of a talented local boy back home, Jon Palamo. Also, heard a special jam by Human League called “Human”. Amazing feel that Rafael and Ruben turned us onto.
15mins from our home base to the show at 47thriiifts. It was like an art collective/co-op/vintage clothing space inside a very cool converted house on East Cesar Chavez. It was a little ways away from where most of the official SXSW action was happening, but lots of good people, and GREAT CLOTHES. Found two sick t-shirts.
About 50 people at the show, because they were a little funny about letting people in. I heard they had been shut down the day before, and I suppose that fear limited this show. However, the owners were super sweet people. Very hot weather, so it was nice that the music was outside.
It was another no sound check kind of gig, just a quick line check. This seems to be the norm. Sound guy was sweet, but kept mis-reading everything we were directing him to do while playing. Guitars were too loud in the mix and the vocal was too quiet. Everyone in the crowd said it was chill, and considering how thrown together it seemed to be, it was a positive show.
Of note: I noticed that at most of the showcases we saw and heard, the sound was generally not that stellar. Very sub-woof heavy, and more blown out then you would think. Found it very fascinating given the caliber of some of the acts playing. Now don’t get me wrong there were a lot of venues who’s sound guy was spot on it just seemed that the consistency was a little off.
Worth mentioning our Friday lunch because of how good it was. Amazing cocktails, truffle fries. Very good sandwich and ‘impossible burgers’ at Hopdaddy where “hopiness is a warm bun”. Unfortunately, I couldn’t chow down on the impossible due to the potent soy content (soy intolerances ain’t no joke). Before the gig we went to Polvos Mexican Cuisine, not far from the venue, since we were rushing around, and hadn’t had much sleep. Very good Huevous Rancheros. Home made tortillas to die for.
Brother Sports played a few acts after our set. This was our hosts band, I liked them for a few reasons: 1. They covered some Velvet Underground 2. One of their guitar players had a little Mic Singh swagger going on, very similar personality 3. The singer was our host and knew a lot about great music and you could tell he trying to do something honest and original with his delivery, good use of vocal effects as well. They should be releasing some new music very soon.
Had a lot of fun hanging with some friends we made the night before, drinking this vodka mix that was being poured out of a giant light bulb. It started raining a bit, but everyone in Austin is used to the weather being super unusual so nobody seemed to mind. Again the sound guy was funny, didn’t seem to understand that asking for no guitar in the monitor actually meant no guitar in the monitor. He kept turning it up every time I asked him to turn it down, kind of hilarious, actually. Especially in retrospect. They don’t make sound engineers like they used to.
Now ten and half hours to New Mexico while jamming to Bruce Springsteen, Willie Nelson and David Bowie…