Dogs, Jugs, and Spankers. Man, that's Austin.

We got out for a benefit show (suggested donation, $5, so that's just about our speed right now) over at Ruta Maya, one of my favorite venues. We saw four good Austin bands. First one was Combo Mahalo, which plays fun Hawaiian music, that pretty much sums them up. Hire them for your wedding reception! Next was Barrelhouse Dogs, a band I never even heard of but they did a fine show. I love this town. So many undiscovered treasures you'll never find them all.

Next up was a great set by my beloved South Austin Jug Band, (that page has music clips to play) just unbelievably great pickers -- you wonder how one town, let alone one band, could have that many. The Asylum Street Spankers closed out the night with what must have been a 2-hour set! I first heard of the Spankers on the Bob and Tom show, an crude, crass, comedic syndicated morning radio show from Ohio (I listened to them pretty much every morning until they lost their affiliate here), and the Spankers (a swing jazz group being of the crass comedic genre themselves... even their acronym is A.S.S.) had a regular spin on that show with I think it was "The Scrotum Song". If you're not familiar with the Asylum Street Spankers, here's a video of one of their rare political songs. They said that when they had just done this one in Ft. Worth, two women in matching track suits got up and walked out. (Audio NSFW, be warned)

Stick Magnetic Ribbons on Your SUV

Saying on a t-shirt for sale at Ruta Maya:

War is Peace
Freedom is Slavery
Bush is President

There's one more video I wanted to post, but this Blogger template strongly objects to it for some reason. It's a cultural commentary, really hilarious, called "Hick Hop". I will post a link rather than embed.

HICK HOP

Tags: Music - Austin - Texas - Texas Music