Yr. Weekend, Pt. 1: Cashus + Sunrise and Ammunition + Hoofprints + Closet Drama + Golden Cities + The Phlegmatics + Dax Riggs + More

Hey, folks — it’s now (late, sorry) Friday, August 29th, heading into a long (for some, at least) Labor Day weekend, and yes, there’s most certainly cool stuff going on. Granted, there’s not as much as some Friday nights, but what is happening is damn, damn good. Here we go:

Cashus (CD release)/Sunrise and Ammunition/Downtown, Nowhere/Caralarm @ The Summit (3536 Navigation)
This one’s the top of my list because it features two of my current favorite promising bands in town, {Cashus} and {Sunrise and Ammunition}, both of whom A) are badass and B) resolutely do not give a fuck. The latter are this crazy mishmash of prog-rock, jazz, instro-metal, and psych-rock, somehow spaced-out and highly, highly technical (as in, drop-your-jaw, how-in-the-hell? technical) at the same damn time. And mellow, too, believe it or not.

Cashus, on the other hand, are poppy and sweet but noisy and rough-edged, with a defiantly dissonant, distorted tinge to their often romantic, quasi-emo songs. They’re like ’90s Britpop funneled through Kurt Cobain’s skull, and that’s no bad thing from where I sit. Tonight’s their album release, and I sadly have not yet heard the album, but last year’s three-song cassette-only release, Never Was, is one of a small handful of 2013 releases I seriously wish I’d heard earlier on. Try on “Zero,” for example, which sounds like a hazier, sweeter Silversun Pickups:

Tonight’s also reportedly an art show, as well, so get on over there and chill to the music while perusing the artwork and clothing. Do it now, people.

Hoofprints/Closet Drama/Far Out @ Mango’s
Or, okay, okay, you could go here, instead. Mango’s has a pretty sweet show going tonight, too, headlining by excellent emo-indie throwback rockers {Hoofprints}, whose lone release so far (also only on cassette!), 2012’s Secretly Destroying Honesty, is/was a great, great chunk of harmony-filled, Braid-meets-Get Up Kids melodic post-rock. And if any of the song structures sound at all familiar, well, it’s because Ramzi Beshara used to be in both Stadium and Little Compass, two of Houston’s best-ever emo bands.

I’m not real familiar with show-mates Closet Drama, out of Austin, but I’m liking what I’ve heard so far. There’s an emo influence here, too, but it’s leavened by more straightforward pop-punk and power-pop tendencies; there’s a little Jawbreaker, a little Hüsker Dü, a little Samiam, and a little Jennifer Echo, and I’m enjoying the heck out of it. Plus, the band apparently sprang out of the ashes of longtime Austin band Joe Jitsu, so if you were a fan…

Part Time/Sea Lions/Children of Pop/Golden Cities @ Walter’s ($8)
Alright, I know they’re playing first, and I’m late, but still: I am so, so glad {Golden Cities} are back together once again, even if they’ve lost original members Lance Higdon and Meghan Hendley to the vagaries of, well, life; that’s how it goes sometimes, y’know? Don’t get me wrong — Pleasure Shapes were good while they were around, but dangit, for a little while there in the late 00’s, Golden Cities promised a bright, hazy, wavery, ear-filling future of gorgeous, uplifting space-rock awesomeness.

So, are those days back again? Damn, I sure hope so. I haven’t seen anything new from the band since 2010’s Sunrise Over The Danube (which I shamefully missed at the time, I cringe to say), but I’ve got my fingers crossed, and so should you. They’re playing tonight with fellow cool people (er, person?) {Children of Pop}, who appropriately also plays some seriously spacey stuff, albeit with more electronics and less Explosions in the Sky-style guitars.

The Phlegmatics/Straight Jacket/Theory/Daylight Down/Jacks Anger @ Acadia Bar & Grill
Okay, this is a weird one, I have to admit. I dearly, dearly love iconoclastic, Weezer-worshipping power-pop/arena-rock dudes {The Phlegmatics}, but they’ve never really fit in with the rest of the already-fractured scene ’round town, so they play sporadic oddball shows at venues most Montrose-dwellers rarely visit. Like, say, the Acadia Bar & Grill. Nothing against the place at all, mind you — I’ve heard it’s very cool — but it’s a little off the beaten path, as it were, and a lot of the bands that play there aren’t really my thing, y’know?

That said, this one’s well, well worth making the drive, you Inner Loop snobs (you know who you are, dammit). The Phlegmatics play unapologetically nerdy, pop-culture-referencing, guitar-heavy rock that owes as much to the aforementioned Weezer as it does to Cheap Trick or The Stereo, singing about NPR hosts, Greek epics, stalkers, kung fu fighting friends, and Ms. Pac-Man…and yes, it’s freaking great.

Dax Riggs/Saccoustico @ Fitzgerald’s
And finally, Fitzgerald’s tonight plays host to my favorite gritty, dark, blues-slash-metal music-maker, Dax Riggs. If you’ve never heard the guy, he’s what Jack White would sound like if he did a shitload of acid, lived in a run-down church at the edge of the swamp, channeled the ghosts of Louisiana bluesmen long, long dead, and took vocal lessons from both Mark Lanegan and Jim Morrison. If that doesn’t sound incredible to you, well, you need to be smacked — unfortunately, Internet technology hasn’t yet advanced to that point, so you’ll have to handle that yourself, alright? He’s got local boy Chris Sacco opening the evening, do an acoustic set rather than fronting his now-iconic alt-rock band {duneTX}, so get there right damn now and catch him, too. Got it?

Runners-Up:
The Lotus Effect @ BFE Rock Club
The Snow Indian/Love Knife/The Witherees @ Rudyard’s
South Austin Moonlighters/White Ghost Shivers @ McGonigel’s Mucky Duck
Cassette Tape/Recovery Room/Swimming With Bears/Hyper Hyper @ Fitzgerald’s
The Journey Agents/Mellow Riot/Locate/WellWell @ Alley Kat Bar & Lounge