Bad News Time: Teenage Kicks Call It Quits (After Playing Tonight)

I’ve often suspected that there’s some kind of quasi-Newtonian Law of Houston Scene Coolness Equilibrium at work here, y’all. Every time something genuinely good and cool happens, bad shit follows. sigh. Naturally, right after posting about Something Fierce gearing up to put out stuff on Dirtnap Recs, I get word that another one of my favorite bands ’round town (and outside of town, for that matter), Teenage Kicks, are calling it quits.

Fuck. This depresses me in a big way — the Kicks boys were one of those bands that I’d dearly hoped to see stay together for the long-term, enduring Bring Back The Guns-like to rock the stage for years and years to come. Nobody, not even the much-loved SF crew, channels ’70s/’80s Brit-punk/power-pop like these guys (SF are a bit more on this side of the pond, to my ears); hell, I’d go so far as to say they are/were better than some of the bands they obviously hold as influences. I’d had my fingers crossed they’d be around a while (maybe I’m the jinx, here? hope not…).

But alas, ’twas not to be. They’re being somewhat cagey about the breakup, downplaying the reasons why and instead focusing on the fact that they were able to do what they wanted to do, and I can’t fault ’em for that. Here’s the full missive from the band’s MySpace blog (linked above):

As much as I hate to be a downer, unfortunately tonight will be the last Teenage Kicks show. There’s no reason to worry about why we’re breaking up because we had a good run and that’s all that matters. At The Mink tonight we will have 7″ records and full length Tapes for sale. The money will be put towards our LP, which we are still releasing. There is a very small possibility that we’ll play a show to celebrate the LP’s release, but as f now that is up in the air.

Thank so much to anyone who has supported us since we played our first show a little over a year ago and everyone we’ve met since. Extra special thanks to Willow from Hatetank Productions, Eric and Val from I Heart U Productions, JD from Secret Saturday Shows, Travis from He Said She Said and Bucky from Totally Wired. We would not have had the opportunity to play on some of the amazing shows we’ve gotten to if it wasn’t for those people. Thanks to Teenage Bottlerocket, The Queers, The Cute Lepers, The Ergs, Broadway Calls, Boats, Bermondsey Joyriders, Pink Razors, Something Fierce, The Estranged, Red Dons, The Mydolls, and every other awesome band we’ve been honored to “share the stage with”, as they say. Thanks to Jeremy from Space City Rock and most importantly, thanks to Aaron Danger.

Dammit, this is gonna make me get all teary-eyed…argh.

On the upside, you’ve got one last chance to see the band do their thing live and in-person, as John mentioned above; they’re playing tonight, Thurs., March 26th, up at The Mink, opening for Swedes Masshysteri and local punks The Secret Prostitutes. Ironically, tonight is/was supposed to be the band’s release party for the “Electric Girl”/”Another Night” 7″ on Team Science, but now it seems like it’ll be more like a wake. Go pay yr respects, y’all.

Crap, crap, crap. Universe, why do you keep screwing with me? I haven’t kicked any puppies or anything, I swear…