Hot August nights

Wow - summer is finally here. And it came crashing in. As I've mentioned earlier in this blog we had a rainy season that lasted up until about one week ago. Now we are back to normal. It's about 10pm here in Austin now on August 6th and the temperature is in the 80s. Of course tomorrow in the daytime it will be in the 90s, that's in the shade, and it will feel like 100. I love the heat though, probably one of the main reasons I live here versus somewhere up North. Pretty much everywhere in the continental 48 gets a bunch of hot days except for Maine, but here in Austin it stays hot through September and at times through October, if we're lucky. But right now in August in Austin we are enjoying the heat, especially at night. Enough about the weather.

Sunday was my birthday so on Saturday my wife and I visited Club DeVille, on Red River, about 10pm, had a beer and then started walking. We parked at Club DeVille because we can. It's the only club with a true parking lot. So we had the one beer there and started to walk around and check out the scene. Across the street the heavy metal was starting to crank it up, on down the road there was something that sounded and looked like hip-hop. That's interesting. We walked all the way over to the Elephant Room to check out the live jazz there 7 days a week. That place is so mellow and relaxed. Then we got back to the Red River area, close to Club DeVille - around 12 midnight. I love that area from that time. The 6th street/Red River area is interesting. There is not much going on around there until around midnight, and then everyone starts to come out.

Austin has always had the real blues music, from the 1920s on. Earlier on in the early 6th Street days Joe opened a place called Joe's Generic Bar. He operated that place on 6th street up until about 2 years ago. Then he got shot and died (None of us really know what happened there.), Joe's Generic Bar suffered a fire and finally closed. But it was a cool place, always free and just laid back. One could get a cold beer for around a couple of bucks and just sit back and listen to the real blues from local skilled artists. Every so often they passed around a plastic bucket for the band money. I typically dropped in a $5 for those guys. They deserved it.

After we lost Joe's there was no place on 6th for the real blues. But along came Nuno's. They opened up in 2005 shortly after the fire at Joe's. Nuno's is the same style, no cover charge, just cheap cold beer and that wonderful sound. They pass the plastic bucket for the band there also. So last Saturday when we got back to Red River we cruised on over to Nuno's for the real blues. I just can't get enough of that sound. There are 2 or 3 bands that play there and it is for real. These guys have been playing the blues for 30 years or so and they know their stuff. I love that place.

About 1:30 we returned to Club DeVille and had one more cold beer. They have that Negro Modelo which I love to consume - responsibly. Then we drove on home, about 20 minutes away in North Austin, and went to bed. What a night, can't wait for next weekend.

More about the music in Austin

Austin, currently the live music capital of the world, has a lot going on all the time. In the old days, before Stevie Ray Vaughan and in a sort of response to Armadillo World Headquarters the powers at be tried their best to stifle the live music scene here in Austin. That was before the 1980s and they thought that the music was a bad element. Sure, it makes sense, young children need not be out late at night listening to live music. But for adults - hey why not? The city and those powers began to finally realize the financial, and of course cultural, potential from the live music and the reputation Austin has gained from it.



At first the public television station on the University of Texas campus, KLRU, started the Austin City Limits TV show featuring live music from famous musicians in various genres. It was successful and is currently offered on public televison all around the world. Then South By Southwest began their festival in the late part of the 1980s. Both of these have become major Austin institutions over the last 20 years. Along with those promotional activities the radio stations around Austin have also pitched in. Currently at least KLRU and KUT-fm have hours of music dedicated to the live music in Austin Texas.

KLRU offers a 10pm to midnight show every Friday. That is American Central Standard Time, the same as Chicago. And KUT plays "Blue Monday" every Monday evening and that starts from around 7pm. For those of you outside of Austin I am sure you can find it online somewhere. KLBJ-FM also offers Austin Music only shows often. And yes, the LBJ part of that name is more than just the call letters. Lady Bird Johnson ran that station until a few years ago. So everyone around the world can enjoy the blues and Austin music for free. That is cool.

ACL and SXSW - ACLフェスティバルとSXSW（サウス バイ サウスウェスト）

So Burton, you have mentioned the ACL Festival and SXSW several times in your blog. What are they? Those are 2 festivals in Austin every year? When are they?
僕のブログで、ACLフェスティバルとSXSW（サウス バイ サウスウェスト）を何度か紹介しているけれど、「いったい何だろう」と思っている人も多いはず。両方とも毎年オースティンで開催されるフェスティバルのこと。

ACL stands for the Austin City Limits Festival held every September in Austin. That one is on a weekend that doesn't involve a major football game for the Texas Longhorns. Approximately 150,000 people do attend the ACL festival and that would be too much for the city along with a game that would attract another 85,000 rabid football fans.
ACLは、Austin City Limits Festival（オースティン シティー リミット フェスティバル）の略で、開催は毎年9月。テキサス大学フットボールの大きな試合がある週末を避けて予定される。主要フットボールの試合にオースティンを訪れる観光客は、およそ8万5千人。対してACLフェスティバルには15万人の観光客が見込まれるため、街がパンクしないようにとの計らいだ。

The ACL Festival is unique in that it attracts about 130 bands every year. Around 30 of the bands are headliners and famous in most parts of the world. This festival is held outside and there are several stages. It is in a huge park that features soccer games on most other weekends. There is also a large spring fed pool in the park that is a great place to kick back and swim. Listening to the music and hanging out at the natual spring fed pool can be a very natural experience. Despite the crowds, and the heat, the festival is run very well and overall it is a comfortable experience. All of the food for sale at the festival is from local Austin restaurants and the drinks at the bars set up on the grounds also come from local distributors. It is truly an Austin event in every way. There is absolutely no parking anywhere near the festival so many people ride bicycles. Every year there are about 50,000 bicycles parked at the festival.

ACLフェスティバルに参加するバンドは、毎年約130。そのうち30組ほどが、世界的に超有名なバンドである。野外に会場が設けられ、いくつかのステージに分かれて演奏が行われる。週末にサッカーの試合が催される広大な公園がメイン会場だ。公園内には天然水があふれる大きなプールもあり、のんびりと泳いだりリラックスするのに最適。大自然の雰囲気もたっぷりと味わう事が出来る環境である。 フェスティバル会場は混雑しているし、ものすごい暑い。だけど、イベント自体は全体的に快適にすごせるよう、とても上手く運営されている。会場で販売されているフードは、すべてローカルのレストランによるもの。グラウンドの至る所に設置されたバーでは、地元自慢のドリンクも楽しめる。とにかく、どこからどこまでオースティンの魅力がたっぷりのお祭りなのだ。ただ、パーキングには注意が必要。会場付近には利用できる駐車場は、まったく無い。だから、多くの人は、自転車かバスを利用する。毎年、フェスティバルには約5万台の自転車が利用されると言われている。


The effort on keeping everyone comfortable even extends to personal cleanliness. I noticed last year that even though one is stuck using those portable toilets they are very clean. There is a hand cleaner in front of every toilet and they are restocked all weekend. One year it was dusty and since then the festival people have been careful to keep the grounds well watered to keep the dust down in the mornings before the festival begins. There are several cooling stations with misting areas around the festival grounds.
フェスティバル会場は、細やかな所まで大変清潔に保たれている。会場で用意されているのは簡易トイレのみなのだが、去年見たトイレはとても清潔で驚いた。個室ひとつずつにハンドクリーナーまでもが常備されていた。また、数年前、フェスティバルがひどい埃に見舞われたことがあったため、それ以来、早朝イベントが始まる前に水を地面に撒き、埃が舞い散らないようにとの配慮がされている。会場のあちらこちらで霧状の水が噴出すクーリングステーションも用意され、居心地良くイベントが楽しめる用意は万全だ。

Overall the ACL Festival is a very postitive experience. Typically around 140,000 people enjoy this festival every year and everyone I have talked to had a great time and plans to be back the next year. I plan to be there every time.
ハッキリ言って、ACLフェスティバルは最高の体験だ。毎年約14万人がこのフェスティバルを楽しむためにオースティンにやって来る。そして、一度このフェスティバルを体験した人は、必ず来年も戻ってくる、そんなお祭り。僕も欠かさず参加している。

SXSW, or South by Southwest, is also a wonderful experience. SXSW has 3 parts actually. There is a wonderful film festival that runs about 10 days. Over the last 10 years or so SXSW has also developed an interactive festival that features many of the latest high tech innovations in the world. And of course all of you here know about the music festival which runs about 5 days. The music festival features about 2000 bands every year from all over the world. At the last festival there were even 30 bands from Japan.
SXSW（サウス バイ サウスウェスト）も、ワンダフルな体験ができるお祭りである。SXSWの会場は、3箇所。1つは、約10日間の「フィルム フェスティバル」。2つ目は、世界最新のハイテク技術が集結する「コンピュータ フェスティバル」。最近10年ほど続いているイベントだ。そして、なんと言っても有名なのが「ミュージック フェスティバル」。開催期間5日間のこのイベントには、毎年世界各国からおよそ2,000組のバンドが参加する。ちなみに去年日本からの参加バンドは、なんと30組。

Most of the bands are the indie type bands that are desperate for that chance to be seen by some record promoter. Many of the top recording agency people are at SXSW every year looking for that special sound. There are parties daily all over Austin and it is even difficult to walk in some areas downtown because there are so many people. Those indies bands play at those parties and they are wild affairs. There are also major acts every year. Typically SXSW provides about 25 to 30 chances to see major acts and it's fun because they typically play at a small club and it is possible to talk with those people. The SXSW music festival feels like a serious party time for that entire week every year. SXSW is held every year in Austin during the major college spring break week so that those college students can make the festival.
その多くはインディーズバンドで、レコード会社のプロモーターの目に留まるチャンスを願っている。SXSWには新しいサウンドを求めて多くの一流レコード会社のエージェントが多く集まるからだ。そのため、この時期は街中でこれらの人物を対象にパーティが毎日繰り広げられる。ダウンタウンの一部が大変混雑するのは、このためでもある。インディーズバンドだけでなく、著名なバンドによる演奏が行われるこれらのパーティは、ものすごくワイルドだ。
SXSWでは、毎年25～30組のメジャーバンドが参加する。たいてい彼らが演奏するのは、小規模のクラブ。メンバーと直接おしゃべりできる可能性大なので、本当にお勧めである。SXSWミュージックフェスティバルは、一週間を通してまさにパーティタイム。ちょうどその時期は大学の春休み期間中に当たることもあって、学生らがフェスティバルをさらに盛り上げる。

So there it is. Those are the 2 big music festivals held in Austin every year. There will be more discussion about both of these in this blog. Stay tuned.
以上、オースティンで毎年行われる二つのミュージックフェスティバルの紹介でした。詳細はこのブログでまたお話しする予定です。それでは、また。

Evening activities

Gee, what do most of us do in the evenings, or at night. According to recent research most Americans spend a lot of time in front of the TV, about 28 hours a week, that's roughly 4 hours a day. Wow! Some days I might spend that much time in front of the TV, but usually I am around 1.5 to 2 hours and there are those days when I miss it completely. One of my good friends and a neighbor watches TV in his garage everyday, rain or shine. He comes home from work and turns it on about 5:30 and enjoys himself until he rolls into bed about 10:30 or so. While watching TV he drinks about 5 to 10 beers a day, he only drinks MGD, and has about 10 cigarettes. That is probably not the best way to live a long, healthy life. But I love him and he is a good friend, just hope he makes it past 55.

My evenings are locked up at work. I am a personal trainer so I have to train people when they are free to exercise with me. It's hard to train people when they are at work during the day. So I spend 4 evenings a week at work until about 9:30pm. When I return home I then enjoy watching Fox TV, usually King of the Hill or the 70s Show, something that is light and puts me to sleep. Everyday I miss those most popular TV shows that run around 7 or 8pm in the evening. My local Fox station shows The Simpsons, Seinfeld, King of the Hill, and The 70s show every night from 10pm so I can catch these if I want.

Austin is special though. One can enjoy the TV time until 10 o'clock or so and then go out for the evening. Typically most of the music doesn't really start until 11pm or later. Most live music venues close up between 2 and 3am, so the last band will play around 1am. It's funny to visit Sixth Street or Red River in the evening before 11pm and see just how empty it is. Then about 11 o'clock the streets start to fill. For friend's bands or someone special, I'll be there from 11pm and that doesn't bother me at all. The cover charges for Austin are still dirt cheap, usually between 5 and 8 dollars. On Friday last week I saw the ArcAngels at Antone's and it was $7, that's all That was an incredibly quality show. For those of you who don't remember them from the 90s it was an incredible line-up. Double Trouble was the bass and drums. The lead guitar was Doyle Bramhall Jr. and Charlie Sexton sang and helped out. This was one incredible band but they broke up from drug problems. Occasionally they play a show or 2 in Austin just to keep us happy. Everytime it's amazing. Check them out if you get the chance.

That's very interesting in Austin. Typically the musicians get along with each other quite well and understand that they have to pull together to make this happen. So it's kind of like the NFL, they switch bands often. We are lucky in this city to have so many qualified musicians to entertain us all the time. I remember the old days with my mother dragging me to the local Holiday Inn to watch a local band suffer before 5 or 10 people while they played cover songs just to eke out a living. Do you remember Billy Joel's old song "Play me a song the Piano Man." It was like that. There is little of that in Austin, just good music everywhere.

Austin current events

Hey, it Summer time here in Austin. The live music is everywhere but you know it is possible to detect a little slowdown in the movement. We just jumped into Summer about 2 days ago, late this year because of the month and a half of rain. We were in drought for about 6 years. But now that's over and Summer is here for real.

One thing that is fun this year is visiting the lakes. In recent years past, at a restaurant, one would sit outside on the deck. Before the big drought one could look down and see water but during the drought the lakes lost so much water that in some places the deck might be one hundred yards from water. That was interesting. But with all the rain this year the water is back where it should be. We even have one well known venue that was a floating restaurant in the past but during the drought it sat in the sand. Now it is floating again.

But the music is everywhere. Last week my wife and I went for a quiet dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. We sat down and ordered and began talking. But we were unable to talk because of the band that played. We both support live music so it was okay. But that was just one more piece of proof that there are so many bands in Austin that they have run out of places to play

Actually Sixth Street is kind of a dump now.

Many people in America have heard of Sixth Street in Austin Texas. Some have compared it to Bourbon Street in New Orleans. Others have said it reminds them of Times Square. I think it would be correct to say that it really does not resemble either of those. The current version of Sixth Street is quite different from what it was originally. Currently Sixth Street is full of those cheap shot bars and cheap disco type places that play loud bad music. Much of the live music scene has left Sixth Street for Red River, just over a little bit or Austin's Warehouse District. The businesses on Sixth Street went after the money, not the culture. (I remember being on Sixth Street on January 5th at 1:30 in the morning right after Texas had beaten USC in the Rose Bowl. Of course I was celebrating along with thousands of others. While standing in front of one of the newer clubs on Sixth I was told to move along by the bar's bouncer because my attire didn't fit, I was in shorts and a Longhorn T-shirt. Weird, huh?)

Through most of the 1970s Sixth Street was just a place in downtown Austin, where most of the businesses had moved away and after dark there was not much going on down there. Indeed it had become kind of a bohemian area with many artists hanging out and even painting in the street. At that time cheap places to live or stay were plentiful. One could have a nice apartment or loft on Sixth Street then for about $200. There were a few places to hear live music, but these were mostly the true 'blues' music places that had been there for some time. Steamboat, one of the better known live houses in Austin, opened up in 1979 along Sixth Street as the first modern live house in that area. Stevie Ray Vaughan and others were definitely influenced by those old blues places on Sixth Street. Armadillo World Headquarters was still around until about 1981 also. Sixth Street was fun but not the big tourist spot like it is today. But in the 1970s there were some more expensive restaurants and coffee house type places but typically it was quieter at night. Now 6th Street is open until the wee hours of the morning.

I think that Sixth Street really started to ramp up the live music scene with the 1980s. Stevie Ray Vaughan and his brother's band, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, played down there often. There were any number of live houses on Sixth Street where one could get in very cheap, hang out and hear some awesome music. One place called the Black Cat Lounge, it burned down in the 90s, was one of those places that so many of the later famous Indie type bands played while they were trying to make it. Another place on Sixth Street that featured original blues, Joe's Generic Bar - burned down in 2005, was really cool and free of cover charge. Joe's was in business on Sixth Street from the 1970s. But Sixth Street was the hopping place in Austin for a long time probably up until the late 90s when those businesses decided to make a run for the easy money. Most of Sixth Street now is full of shot bars and those cheap discos with the loud worthless music. The customers in those places probably don't even know about Stevie Ray Vaughan.



Stevie Ray Vaughan first played in Austin in his teens. He and his older brother, Jimmy the blues guitar player, moved to Austin from Dallas to get into music. Stevie first played in Paul Ray's band, The Cobras, and often slept under tables at nights in the bars where he played. SRV really did suffer financially for a long time until David Bowie offered him a job in his band. He left David's band in Dallas though and returned suddenly to Austin. I actually saw him jam with his brother and the Fabulous Thunderbirds on Town Lake in the middle of Austin the very night he returned after leaving David Bowie. That was one hell of a show.

So a lot of the live music has left Sixth but it is still in Austin. Right next to Sixth is Red River, famous in the 1950s for hookers plying their trade, it is now full of places with live music. There must be 20 places to hear live music on Red River any night of the week. Other venues are around downtown Austin and one other area, the Warehouse District, is also full of live music. Recently I was talking with a much older woman about the music scene in Austin. She wasn't aware of it but remembered her good old days at the Holiday Inn in one area of Houston and the band they had there. I pictured the band from the "The Blues Brothers" before Jake and Elwood pulled them away from the empty hotel ballroom. Anyway, the music in Austin is there and waiting. I just saw the Austin band from the 90s, The ArcAngels on Friday night at Antone's.

Austin Music History, the next step.......

Last time I began to mention the Armadillo World Headquarters. What a place. The Armadillo was an armory building used by the Army Reserve during World War 2. The building was old and not that beautiful. It was surrounded by a dirt field which became the wonderful famous parking lot. Inside the building was the music hall which was perfect because the ceilings were high, great for sound, and it was spacious, though not glorious. Armadillo was not the kind of place people took their mothers.

Anyway, the owner and his friends fixed it up. They took some old chairs and tables and placed them outside and called it a beer garden. In the music hall, of course, beer and cheap wine was readily available. However the most popular instrument for relaxation at Armadillo was the marijuana joint. Good marijuana was plentiful and everywhere at all concerts there. There was also a grill which served the world's greasiest and healthiest nachos. About 1500 to 2000 people could fit in easily. That dirt field which became the parking lot was awesome. There were any number of large holes and pits in the parking lot and of course there are any number of stories about that parking lot. It was fun because fans and the musicians all parked there. The parking lot was one of the best places to meet famous musicians and hang out together. Many of us ended up in the parking lot for much longer than expected - typically that's where the fun began!

But how about the music? The music was outstanding. Most of the famous musicians in the world played there during the 1970s. At that time there was also a revolution in country music. Austin was the home for the "Cosmic Cowboys". They played country music with a little more rock n' roll sound at times, quite often real country too, but they dressed differently than the more traditional country artists in Nashville. Those cosmic cowboys had long hair, facial hair, and wore jeans and comfortable clothing instead of the more formal outfits those country musicians wore in Nashville. There was a cosmic country radio station in Austin called "KOKE-FM". That station's logo featured a cowboy in a cowboy hat with a big fat joint in his hand and a big smile. At that time the young people were very much into cosmic cowboy music. The local rock n' roll radio stations in Austin played that music along with their rock n' roll music.

Willie Nelson and his friends had a lot to do with the cosmic cowboy revolution. Of course they all played at the Armadillo and even hung around there often. Willie and his friends rarely, if ever, put on airs and the atmosphere at the Armadillo was incredibly laid back. Concerts were interesting. One might see a concert featuring Willie Nelson followed by Ted Nugent, or the other way around. Everyone was there for a good time. All everyone wanted was good music, the genre really didn't matter. The local Austin musicians also chipped in and performed professionally. Some were so good it was hard to imagine they were only a local band at times. The scene at Armadillo World Headquarters was unique and very interesting.

I give a lot of credit to Eddie Wilson and those who started Armadillo World Headquarters. It had a lot to do with Austin becoming one of the big centers for live music in America. Austin had live music before the Armadillo but this was the first time it was centered in one place. Next we'll talk about sixth street and Stevie Ray Vaughan.