The Complete SXSW 2010 Experience

We uncovered a secret stash of pix from our trip to Austin last March.  So without further ado…

Mammoth Life practice space in Lawrence

The Flint Hills north of Wichita

Manmade lake in Kansas

The Eight Track Museum in Denton, TX

Eight Track Museum

Bucks Burnett with the world's largest 8-track

The Bible on 8-track

Loitering in Denton

Vocal isochamber at Sundayhouse Studio in Bastrop, TX

Sundayhouse

Sundayhouse

Stephen and Kacynna in the Sundayhouse control room

Alex lounging at Sundayhouse

Sundayhouse

Will laying down a guitar track

Insert Geico Gecko comment here

Sundayhouse control room

Sundayhouse progress chart

Cupcake truck on Sixth Street in Austin

Upcoming Showz

Sorry we’ve been so quiet in the blogosphere in recent weeks.  We really haven’t had a whole lot to crow about, because we’ve just been working on new material for our forthcoming full-length debut in our new lair.  However, we do have a few shows coming up, so we thought we would let the world know.  Here ya go:

Friday 6/11 @ O’Leaver’s Pub w/My Pal Dragon, D.L. Diedrich, and She’s the Fastest.   My Pal Dragon is Matt Hutton’s solo set, and he’ll be here all the way from his new stomping grounds in Indiana.  Come out and give him a big ol’ bear hug!  You know you’ve missed him as much as we have.

Matt "The Fucking" Hutton

 

Friday, 6/18 @ The Replay, Lawrence, KS.  This will be a fun one with two brand-new Lawrence bands (at least brand new to us): Muscle Worship and Weather is Happening.  Yeah…Thunder Power and Weather is Happening.  A meteorological theme.  We get it too.

Saturday 6/19 @ Urban Outfitters, Lawrence, KS.  This one will be a 3 pm’er and will mark our first-ever in-store at a non-record-store store.  Yeah bitches!!!

Friday 6/25 @ The Slowdown w/Mates of State.  Mates of State are incredible.  And that’s simply that.

We also have some exciting happenings in the works for the rest of the summer, including a Colorado mini-tour!!!  Also, check back here for more SXSW pics and more super-cute pics plucked from the internet, such as this macaque that is enjoying a banana:

Screw you, asshole! I'm a macaque, not a monkey. But thanks for the banana!

 

-Ian

Vinyl release show

We’re just putting the final details on our vinyl release show, set for May 27 at the Waiting Room in Omaha NE. We’re happy to say that our friends the Burning Hotels (myspace.com/theburninghotels) we met at SXSW will be supporting us in the celebration of our first ever vinyl release–the split 10-inch with The 1959 Hat Co. released on Slumber Party.

But that’s not all. We are even more excited to say that the Mynabirds have agreed to play this show as well. If you’re not familiar, it’s the new project of Laura Burhenn (you know, from Georgie James). Burhenn recorded a record with pop genius Richard Swift in Oregon last year. Saddle Creek apparently liked what they heard and just put out the results: the Mynabird’s debut record “What We Lose in the Fire We Gain in the Flood.” And let’s put this as simply as possible: it’s great. Even Pitchfork loved it. We couldn’t be more happy to be playing with such a great band (who are all amazing people).

By the way, that photo collage was made by Kacynna for a story that ran in the Omaha City Weekly a couple weeks back.

A very busy April…

We are pleased to announce that our UK debut single “Take a Hike” is out now on Mono Music and is confirmed for airplay by some BBC Radio staples, including spots on shows hosted by Steve Lamacq and Andy Weatherall. We hope to get some spins from even more British rockmeisters in the coming weeks.  We will follow the single with our UK full-length debut in the next few months.

We also have a full schedule of shows coming up this month:

4/14 O’Leaver’s w/A Weather & McCarthy Trenching

4/16 Slumber Party Showcase @ Slowdown

4/17 Stir Live & Loud w/Garfan (@ Harrah’s Casino in Council Bluffs)

4/23 Slumber Party Showcase @ Bourbon Theatre (part of Omaha Invasion in Lincoln)

4/24 Barley Street Tavern w/Cat Island, Mammoth Life, & The Black Fortys

-Ian

SXSW part deux

Friday night, we headed back to the hotel after the festivities at Doc’s and then headed out to more shows.  Highlight #1: Terry Poison.  They kicked even more ass than at CMJ.  Spill was packed and a whole new generation of American hip-hop fans had their electrodance cherries popped by this international ensemble of Madonnas-in-training.  Highlight #2: Little Brazil.  Unfortunately, I was late to that show because I wasn’t about to miss a minute of Terry Poison, but they brought down the house with selections from their new album “Son”.  It was nice to see a large Omaha delegation in attendance as well.

Terry Poison, Terry Terry Poison!!!

Little Brazil

Saturday was our biggest day of the trip, with two shows including our official one at Mi Casa Cantina.  For better or worse, an arctic blast gripped Texas that day, creating temperatures in the low 40s with high winds.  All of this served to take much of the glamour out of the supposedly warm-weather SXSW experience and may have kept a lot of people at home, but we took it all in stride and had a couple more fantastic shows.

The afternoon show was at Lovey’s Loot, a vintage boutique in northwest Austin.  It was originally planned to be an all-day entertainment extragavanza in the parking lot, but the weather caused things to be relocated into Lovey’s new art space directly adjacent to the main store.  Overall, though, the show was a great success.  The sizable crowd on hand was pretty into our set and they absolutely loved It’s True, who shared the bill with us.  In between TP and IT was an interlude of bellydancers from the Desert Passion belly dance troupe.  I must admit that this was my first time experiencing the art of live bellydance, and I have to say that it was most impressive.  Those ladies are no joke!

After Lovey’s Loot, we headed straight down to Mi Casa Cantina for our official show.  Being the geniuses we are, we left our load-in pass at the hotel and had no time to retrieve it, so after being booted from our designated loading zone by the Austin Parking & Loading Police, we found a nice spot about a half-block away from the venue and schlepped our gear into the back of the venue.  We were on first, which meant we were last to sound check.  It worked out well, though, because we were able to go right into our set without having to do any teardown in between.  We played a pretty decent rendition of the set, and all was well.

Thunder Power's SXSW debut at Mi Casa Cantina

Kacynna and Alex at Mi Casa

After the show, Will, Jeremy, and I headed down to the Victorian Room at the Driskill Hotel and caught the set of Wave Machines, another of our favorite bands.  There’s not much to say about them other than they are absolutely incredible.  Their live show is amazing and inspired us to step things up a notch with our own live show.  Will posted their video in an entry in this very blog last week, so please do check that out.  Otherwise, you’ll never know just how much you’re missing.

Wave Machines at the Victorian Room

Wave Machines frontman Ringo Starr III

True to form, the next day we endured a 16-hour drive-a-thon that included lots of traffic congestion due to construction on I-35 in Oklahoma, a wrong turn/detour, and lots of gas station food.  We didn’t even have time to sit down at a truck stop restaurant for a decent chicken fried steak.  We have now managed to get back on our normal sleeping scheduled and can be considered to be fully recovered (except for the fact that I’m writing this at 1:30 on a Wednesday morning.)  Well, anyway, we hope to see you tomorrow (tonight), Wednesday, March 31st at the PS Collective.  We’re doing another show with Cleemann, who we met at last year’s Nebraska Pop Festival.  The dude is incredible and is on tour from his native Denmark, so come on down and check it out.

-Ian

SXSW, part 1; or, Wednesday and Thursday (and Friday afternoon)

After Lawrence, Denton, and Bastrop, we rolled into Austin on the afternoon of Wednesday, March 17th.  After checking into our hotel, we made our way down to the massive Austin Convention Center and picked up our wristbands, loading passes, booze coupons, tote bags, and the like.  Wednesday night, we took in the expected assortment of incredible shows, including Basia Bulat at the Rough Trade showcase, before hitting the sack to rest up for our assortment of shows which started the next day.

Thursday afternoon, we did an interview with Scottish journalist and blogger extraordinare Ewan Spence before heading to Cherrywood Coffee where we played the Real Fruit Smoothie Party and saw a most interesting duo called Gay Science, which featured a chick who can play a wicked trombone, as well as monster rock trio The Gary and gossip-rockers Hollywood Gossip, which now features one of the dudes from early ’00s traveling punk troubadors Silver Scooter (as seen at the Cog Factory back in the day).  This last development was much to the delight of several Thunder Power members.

Gay Science

The next afternoon, we played the RVCA/Goorin Bros./PF Flyers/Stag day party at Doc’s Motorworks on South Congress Street.  Here we met several more awesome bands, including The Burning Hotels from Ft. Worth and The Pretty Black Chains from Oklahoma City.  We were also able to do a serious wardrobe upgrade courtesy of the sponsors.  The venue also had the stupidest bar game ever, which could be popular in Texas for all we know but certainly isn’t in Omaha.  It’s this weird thing where you pull back this ring on a string and let it go in an effort to try to get it stuck on a hook on the wooden frame that supports the whole apparatus.  We just wanted to check it out, but somehow Alex and I ended up not only playing it for way too long but also sucking at it horribly.  We were beaten by numerous challengers, but since the game isn’t really any fun, they just hooked the ring after a few tries and left, leaving us to haplessly swing our rings like some type of homo erectus awkwardly attempting to familiarize with the basic usage of crude tools.  It’s not like pool, etc., where the winner holds the table.

 

The Burning Hotels

 

bar sport fail

After that, we headed back down to Sixth Street for another round of shows, the highlights of which included The Mynabirds and UUVVWWZ at the Saddle Creek showcase at Maggie Mae’s as well as Nive Nielsen at the Hilton Garden Inn 18th Floor.  She had originally been scheduled to do the same CMJ showcase as us last year but had to cancel, so it was nice to finally get to see her in person. 

Check back soon for SXSW, Part Deux.

-Ian

NX35

Before making our way to Austin for this year’s round of South by Southwest festivities, we made a stop in Denton, TX where we played a nifty little festival called the NX35 Music Conferette.  It could be thought of as a kind of precursor to SXSW, but with The Flaming Lips headlining this year and Steve Albini delivering the keynote speech, it is definitely a worthy event in its own right.  We played at a coffee shop called Jupiter House with a number of very cool bands, including Eurorockers Drive Like Maria and the Florida-based Stranger’s Family Band, whose vintage-psychedelia-inspired set included the use of an electronic tanpura, making this the first show we ever played with another band who also used one.  It is worth noting that theirs was the Raagini, which is the primary competitor to the Radel Saarang series, which is what I have.  However, I must say that the Radel wins out in this epic Ford vs. Chevy-style clash of the titans.  Also playing the festival were our amigos Icarus Himself from Madison, WI, with whom we did a show at O’Leaver’s earlier this month.

Thunder Power membership has its priveleges

Denton County Courthouse-on-the-Square, across the street from the center of NX35 events

We also had the privelege of attending the grand opening of the Eight Track Museum, a repository and archive of some of the rarest eight track tapes from around the globe.  We met founder Bucks Burnett and got an up-close-and-personal look at the extremely rare Lou Reed eight track pictured here.

Bucks "Ochotracko" Burnett, founder of the Eight Track Museum

During NX35 we stayed at the Comfort Suites near the University of North Texas.  Normally, this is the type of thing that no one would give a rat’s ass about, but I thought I’d mention it because the hotel features an excellent combination of spaciousness and affordability which makes it a great choice for bands on the road.  We were all able to pile into one suite in relative comfort and we didn’t have to break the bank in order to do so.  We may well look for Comfort Suites in other towns on future tours.

-Ian

A little inspiration

This video is from a Liverpool-based band called Wave Machines. They are one of my favorite groups of recent years. This particular track is called “The Greatest Escape We Ever Made,” off of their 2009 debut LP “Wave If You’re Really There.” I was lucky enough to pick up a copy and also catch them live this past week in Austin. If they’re playing anywhere near you, check them out!

-will

The Sundayhouse Sessions

Can you spot our naturally-camouflaged new pal?

Before heading to Austin for SXSW, we stopped at Sundayhouse where we laid down three tracks in anticipation of our forthcoming full-length (more on that later.)  We received the royal treatment from our new friends Stephen and Phoebe Ceresia, and the session went exceptionally well considering the relatively limited time we had to work with.  We recorded Spiraling Sky and Two Fins, both of which are brand new, as well as Bite Marks, which has been around for a while but has previously only gotten studio attention at Daytrotter.  The tracks are currently in post-production and are not yet ready for public dissemination, but all three are in our current set and will be performed at our next show at the PS Collective in Omaha on March 31st.

Sundayhouse is a fantastic studio in a 150-year-old house in historic Bastrop, Texas.  The house was originally built in the 1850s and was first owned by the Mathis family, and in the last few years the Ceresias have more than doubled the size of the house with an addition that contains a state-of-the-art control room, a vocal iso-chamber, and a living room/recording space with a cathedral ceiling to promote ideal acoustics for recording.  The original part of the house features the original wood floors, ceilings, and walls, and two bedrooms with accomodations for up to five musicians.  And, not to be overlooked is the amazing cooking of Phoebe and Stephen, which was not only incredibly delicious but contained enough nutrients to keep us sustained through Austin and back home to Omaha.  We have recorded in some first-rate studios before but never experienced anything quite like this.

Here are some selections from our Bastrop photo gallery:

Alex, Phoebe, Stephen, Ian, Kacynna, Will, Jeremy

Jeremy hard at work

Chicken coop in the back yard

Antebellum mansion next door

Pastoral beauty just down the street

Old-time soda fountain on Main St. in downtown Bastrop

Sundayhouse AKA Mathis House

Check back soon for the full report from SXSW and NX35!

-Ian

The anticipation builds…

Well, ladies and germs, our big SXSW trip is finally almost here!  Unfortunately, as we all remember from, say, the countdown to Christmas in our formative years, the last days are the most agonizing.  We’re having trouble keeping ourselves from peeing our pantaloons out of sheer excitement.  Oh well, only 11 more days ’till we hit the road for Lawrence and then Denton and Austin.

In the meantime, we’ve been working hard fine-tuning our new tunes and polishing the oldies-but-goodies.  The song using the electronic tanpura has been titled “Make Up Your Mind” and is sounding groovy as hell, and “Your Pretty Face”, another new one, is pretty solid as well.  “Two Fins” is the third in our trio of the newest of the new, and it is dreamy but intense in evil ways that your mother told you never to even think about.   What the fuck does that even mean, you ask?  Well, it opens our new setlist and you’ll have to come to one of the following shows to find out:

• Sunday 3/7, O’Leaver’s Pub, Omaha
• Friday 3/12, The Replay, Lawrence
• Sunday 3/14, NX35 @ Jupiter House Coffee, Denton
• Tuesday 3/16, The Parlor, Austin
• Saturday 3/20, Lovey’s Loot, Austin (afternoon show)
• Saturday 3/20, SXSW @ Mi Casa Cantina, Austin

Thunder Power Saturday 3/20 @ Mi Casa Cantina

-Ian