Best of SXSW 2006 (Q-R)

Your River City Tanlines are showing

...this is just a quickie cuz I gotta gotta break out of here for some fambly business.

So, here's what I think is notable in the Q-R run of the SXSW Bittorrent - all songs guarenteed listened to for at least 45 seconds... I'll try and complete the rest next week (whew):

Qien, es Boom! - "Brittle Britches" - OK indie pop that takes cues from Paul Simon and just about every other indie pop band.

Rachel Goldstar - "Christmas Day" - Languid guitar shoeglaze psyche from ex-Experimental Aircraft Rachel Staggs.

Ralph White - "Morning Sickness" - Sounds like a live recording of this banjo singer-songwriter type. White has that hippie hillbilly outsider feel of Johnny Dowd or Michael Hurley often adding in notes to fit his lyrics or stopping mid-song to exclaim thank you apropros of nothing.

Real Ones - "Ballad of an Old Man" - What the Pogues did for American-Irish bar last calls with "Body of An American", I'm sure these guys are gonna do for all those American-Norwegian bars that are popping up everywhere. If you get drunk enough, you'll even forgive the mid-song guitar solo and sing along with the shambling Polyphonic Spree-ish chorus.

River City Tanlines - "Black Knight" - Some ol' fashioned punk rock like Runaways jamming with Ramones.


Ronny Elliot - "Mr. Edison's Electric Chair" - He's lucky I like Johnny Cash so much otherwise I'd say this is stone-cold rip-off of The Man in Black. But the way I see it, this is more a not-so-embarrassing tribute, with a slight tongue in cheek, and we can never get enough murder ballads.

Rosanne Cash - "Black Cadillac" - Speaking of Johnny Cash.... Rosanne sings a song for her Dad (his voice is sampled in the beginning). I don't really like this predictable C&W song but am including it mainly for the tribute lyrics/historical interest. The MP3 has some encoding errors so there's an annoying digital "sn-snitch" every few seconds. Picture via Richard Silverstein. R.I.P. JC...


Ryan McPhun and the Ruby Suns - "Maasai Mara" - More oddball Brian Wilson Unbound stuff - this time from New Zealand.