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Although Cincinnati was represented by only three bands at South by Southwest, the annual music bacchanal held in Austin, Texas, what they lacked in numbers was more than compensated by their style and diversity. The area 2005 SXSW delegates were the Kim Taylor Band, Heartless Bastards and The Sundresses. While the differences among them are numerous, one common thread united them — a strong, primary female presence.
After years as a solo singer/songwriter with occasional band accompaniment, Kim Taylor has finally assembled a stellar band, which she directs with a quiet self-assurance. Erika Wennerstrom is the possessed yet coolly controlled guitar eye at the center of the Heartless Bastards’ tumultuous Blues maelstrom. And Makenzie Place is the diminutive dervish on bass who supplies the powerful bottom end for the Sundresses’ unholy assault on the sanctity of the Blues.
First up on Thursday evening’s festivities was the Kim Taylor Band, who had the opening 8 p.m. slot at the posh 18th Floor Lounge at the Crowne Plaza. As tony as the surroundings clearly were, with the Austin skyline as a panorama and the city’s dramatically lit capitol building a prominent feature, they were evenly matched by Taylor’s ephemeral songs of love, loss, despair and hope, and her crack band’s stunning soundtrack. Taylor is a master at constructing songs as fragile and as delicate as a crystal globe while her brilliantly intuitive band provides a cool and achingly gorgeous snowstorm that swirls constantly on the inside.
Former Over The Rhine guitarist Ric Hordinski takes time out from his own music/production career to lend Taylor a gifted hand, providing a sinewy and atmospheric thread to her equally evocative songs.
Taylor’s rhythm section is the hypertalented duo of Amos Heller on bass and Josh Seurkamp on drums. Heller plays a classically stoic and perfectly accented bass pulse until Taylor uncorks something a little more visceral, which propels him into a more furiously manic frame of mind and body. Seurkamp, Heller’s partner in beat, plays his drum kit with everything at his disposal (sticks, brushes, gong strikers, even his hands) and underscores every song with an absolutely appropriate foundation, from whispering cymbals to driving heartbeat.
Taylor and her magnificent band offered a perfect set of songs from her new 5-song EP titled, aptly enough, Extended Play, as well as some from her previous releases to a sparse but appreciative crowd which included Sundresses members Jeremy Springer and Makenzie Place and MidPoint Music Festival founders Sean Rhiney and Bill Donabedian, on hand to provide hometown moral support.
The next two Cincinnati representatives were studies in contrast to the Taylor experience in both style and venue. Heartless Bastards and The Sundresses brought their distinct variations on the Blues to the Fat Possum label showcase featured at the outdoor stage at the tiny but intense Club de Ville.
The Bastards were up first at 10 p.m. and after some initial technical difficulties, the trio launched into a raw and riveting set comprised of songs from their Fat Possum debut, Stairs and Elevators. Erika Wennerstrom is an unlikely guitar hero; thin, blonde and waifish, she seems more suited to being a willowy Folk singer on a stool with an acoustic guitar. All assumptions based on appearances are shattered when she stomps her foot pedal and unleashes her astonishing take on the Delta Blues form, while her band (bassist Mike Lamping, drummer Kevin Vaughn) forms a bedrock-solid base for her frenetic guitar ministrations.
Wennerstrom is rarely demonstrative or physically emotive as she attacks her guitars, but her intensity and passion plays out on her face as she wails from the well of souls where all great Blues originates. Her two sides were evident as she stormed through the first two songs of the Bastards’ set, then demurely commented on the Death Metal leaking over from the neighboring club, “They’re rockin’ out over there tonight, aren’t they?” After the band finished their blistering set, Daytonite Dave Doughman from Swearing at Motorists dropped by to congratulate Wennerstrom on the show, as did a number of appreciative audience members who clearly didn’t know what they were going to hear when they walked in.
After a problematic but incendiary set from Jon Spencer guitarist Judah Bauer’s side project 20 Miles, The Sundresses took to the Club de Ville stage for another incredible spin down the swampy back roads and urban back alleys of the Blues. Imagine, if you will, Kurt Weill inspired by Howlin’ Wolf to write Blues songs for Captain Beefheart, subsequently unearthed by Pere Ubu and subjected to their Punk/Art Rock basement experiments.
Guitarist/drummer Jeremy Springer continued his tradition of home boosterism in Austin with this year’s introduction — “We’re The Sundresses from Cincinnati, Ohio. Don’t ever go there.” He and drummer/guitarist Brad Schnittger traded spots a couple of times as they always do (“You were supposed to close your eyes,” Springer informed the crowd after the first switch), both of them projecting a unique yet fervently distinct branch of the Blues tree.
As Place reeled and pummeled her bass (and even took her beloved trombone off its stand for a couple of songs), Springer and Schnittger challenged the crowd at Club de Ville, some of whom had been drawn by the Austin Chronicle’s spotlight pick of the band in their annual SXSW preview edition. The Sundresses are clearly not every Blues fan’s cup of bitter tea, but for those with an open mind and a pure sense of musical adventure, this is one of the city’s most inventive and passionate new bands.
For all of the new and marginally known bands in Austin for the week, two of the greatest performances of the festival were turned in by old-school rockers. Elvis Costello celebrated his 28th year of making incredible music by playing nearly the entirety of his excellent new album, The Delivery Man, and sprinkling in a liberal dose of his amazing catalog, including early faves like “Pump It Up,” “I Don’t Want to Go to Chelsea” and a heart-stopping rendition of “What’s So Funny (‘Bout Peace, Love and Understanding).” Costello’s two-hour set at La Zona Rosa on the first night of SXSW came at the close of the Lost Highway label showcase and set a high bar for the rest of the week.
Two nights later, at the very same club, former Velvet Underground multi-instrumentalist John Cale defied expectation (and the direction of his last few albums) and blew the dust off the rafters with an astonishingly powerful Rock set comprised of a handful of brand new songs and some old favorites, including “Dirtyass Rock and Roll,” “Ship of Fools” and his mesmerizing show-closer, the Velvets’ “Venus in Furs.” For kids who had shown up early to witness the evening’s 1 a.m. anchor, Spoon, Cale’s unexpectedly energetic and highly charged set was a total surprise, particularly since he’s old enough to be their grandfather.
Other highlights in Austin were several appearances by former Dream Syndicate frontman Steve Wynn, much talked-about sets from the Kaiser Chiefs, The Magic Numbers, teen sensations Smoosh, the reunion of Jay Farrar’s previous outfit Son Volt and a paint-peeling set from Sleater-Kinney. Led Zeppelin legend Robert Plant delivered the festival’s keynote address and gave SXSW festival-goers a taste of his forthcoming album.
As is the norm in Austin during the insanity of SXSW, the greatest dilemma is trying to figure out what to see at the expense of everything else. And just like every year, it is an incredibly wonderful dilemma to have. ©
This article appears in Mar 23-29, 2005.