A Curious Mix of People : The Underground Scene of '90s Austin / Greg Beets and Richard Whymark.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Beets, Greg, author.

Whymark, Richard, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Underground music--Texas--Austin--History and criticism.

Underground music.

Punk rock music--Texas--Austin--History and criticism.

Punk rock music.

Rock music--Texas--Austin--1991-2000--History and criticism.

Rock music.

Nightclubs--Texas--Austin--History.

Nightclubs.

Punk rock musicians--Texas--Austin--Interviews.

Punk rock musicians.

Rock music fans--Texas--Austin--Interviews.

Rock music fans.

Alternative radio broadcasting--Texas--Austin--History.

Alternative radio broadcasting.

Underground press publications--Texas--Austin--History.

Underground press publications.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (361 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Austin, TX : University of Texas Press, [2023]

Summary:

"Ask anyone outside of Austin what they know about the city and chances are the first thing they'll mention is the music. While the Armadillo Era has been well-chronicled, there is no book about Austin music in the 90s. Greg Beets and Richard Whymark were part of the scene at that time, making zines, playing in bands, and DJ-ing at the college radio station, and have put together an oral history of the decade. Beets and Whymark are not trying to cover all of the music made in Austin during the 1990s; they're most interested in the underground/punk community in which they participated. While a few of those bands got big (e.g., Spoon), the music remained mostly local, DIY. It was driven by live shows, though local media (radio, TV, print), record stores, and a few labels were also important to the story. Beets and Whymark devote chapters to those elements, but almost half of the chapters are based around a particular club. Organizing the book around physical spaces is not only appropriate for telling the story of the music, it is nice framing for the larger story of Austin. As the authors note, the city was still a relatively sleepy place in the early 1990s, with vacant blocks downtown and loads of small clubs that opened and closed simply because music-minded people wanted a place to play. By 1999, longtime venues like the Electric Lounge and Liberty Lunch were bulldozed to make way for development and tech companies"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Cast of characters

Chronology

Introduction. Nobody here but us wounded chickens

The Cavity : the Cavity creeps

Emo's : Johnny Cash sat here

Radio : none of the hits, all of the time

Hole in the Wall : cheap music, fast drinks, live women

Blue Flamingo : those horses do bite!

Chances : we'll just rock for ourselves

Sweatbox Studios : Sweatbox is burning (or, honk if Dick Cheney shot your landlord in the face)

TV and video : raw meat in the studio

Zines, flyers, and the press : putting the word in the streets

Sound Exchange : bitter people with no future selling music

Record labels : bitter people with no future starting labels

Trance Syndicate : Love and napalm

Electric Lounge : my childhood hero is getting pelted with roses

Liberty Lunch : by the '90s, we were rocking

The end : it doesn't go on forever

100 essential underground releases (in chronological order)

In memoriam.

Notes:

Includes index.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-4773-2815-7

1-4773-2814-9

OCLC:

1367237160