Returning

It get hards to breathe in this August heat but new ideas start to arrive everyday.

 listen

 drive

 dance

dine

 love

live

Soul Searching

 We custom made t-shirts for this band when their belongings were stolen in San Francisco.

Vintage Video Friday

Ahhh, Dierks Bentley's first big hit.  Anybody else remember this one?  While this song was still popular, MJ and I went to see him at the First Avenue Club in Iowa City.  I think it was a Labor Day weekend, 2003? 2004?

Last Friday night in Austin

...outside the G&S Lounge on South First - hanging out back during the not-official, NotSXSW showcase.   That's probably a sufficient explanation...

Adios, Cheapo's

Cheapo's on Lamar in Austin was our favorite record store.  It was just a warehouse with CDs and LPs, new and used but mostly used, nothing fancy.  CDs were separated by genre and alphabetically, except for my favorite section to dig through: CD singles and full albums that just had cardboard sleeves instead of jewel cases.  Those were all just thrown together.  Over the 4 years we shopped there, we found a few advance copies, sometimes before the album was even released.

I somehow really thought we'd meet the loves of our lives there, that one day they'd come walking in the door at 10pm on a Friday night when we were there.  This never panned out quite like I planned, although it DID look like a large percentage of the few men we saw there could have used a girlfriend...

Anyway, tragically but not surprisingly, Cheapo's finally closed its doors at the end of December.  These paintings, mostly done in spray paint, covered the outside of the building.  I have no idea what the plans for the building are, but I was glad to get a few snapshots before it gets remodeled.  

Vintage Video Friday

The house and vibe of this video is perfect. I'm constantly working to achieve a home that's retro cool with equal parts of indoor and outdoor living. And the song ain't bad either. Cyndi made one album that was perfect, fell in love with a dude she met on a video shoot and retired from music. Not a bad way to go out on top. I hope she's doing well :)

Vintage Video Friday

This is one of my favorite videos. It takes place in some wonderfully glamorized (and completely unrealistic) old-timey time period where everyone wears a sexy sundress to Sunday Service in a clapboard church. My kind of dream world. Watch this video and see if it doesn't inspire a summertime fling in the middle of February. xoxo, MJ

Kat's Image Icon - Doyle Bramhall II

 

 This fine specimen is the object of my longest standing, most massive crush.  I fell in love with him in after seeing his Austin City Limits performance in 2000.  The following summer, I made my big brother drag me all over Manhattan to every record store he knew until we found Doyle's out-of-print first album.

For those of you who don't already know: Doyle Bramhall II (born 24 December 1968) is an American singer and guitarist. Known for his work in Arc Angels, he has also toured with Roger Waters; he has played as guitarist and vocalist in his band Smokestack and was also the second guitarist in Eric Clapton's band from 2004 to 2009.

Doyle will rejoin Clapton's band in 2013 for a series of concerts in the United States and Europe between 14 March and 19 June culminating the fourth Crossroads Guitar Festival at New York's Madison Square Garden in 12 and 13 in April. 12 and 13 April.

What can you possibly do with hair this pretty?

Put it in a dude-headband!!

Here's the performance when I lost my heart forever (which I was only able to see on a scratchy VHS copy after it had already aired):