Cory Graves
Noteworthy New Album News and The Death of the Goaticorn.
It's been seven days, and we're already noticing a few glaring omissions from last week's column in which we detailed a baker's dozen of the local albums we 're most looking forward to getting our mitt's on in 2013. But if being just a week into this new year and already having so many anticipated records on our docket is any indication, then you've got to figure that this is going to be quite the year for local music, right?
So, first off, let's take a look at some of the records we forgot to mention last week.
For starters, it was about a month back when we first heard that Marked Men/Mind Spiders centerpiece Mark Ryan was recording the debut effort from Denton punks Pink Smoke. We're hearing now that the 12-song record, which will be called No Party, will be released on vinyl most likely some time around March. The first single, “Death Trap,” however, just became available on Pink Smoke's BandCamp page. The '70s-inspired throwback bit of power-punk clocks in at just under two minutes, but what else would one expect from an outfit that sometimes masquerade as the country's best (and possibly only) tribute band to The Damned?
More noteworthy area bands expected to release new albums in the next 12 months: True Widow, Fungi Girls, Goodnight Ned, Bitch Bricks, Home by Hovercraft, Year of the Bear and Ice Eater.
The first part of the year should also see the release of the long-anticipated sophomore effort from Denton favorites Spooky Folk, which will come almost exactly three years to the date after that band's debut took North Texas by storm in 2010. If this record has a single anywhere as close to as fist-pumpingly infectious as “Bible Belt,” then it's safe to say this album should satisfy area fans for yet another three years. As of this weekend, the band posted to their social media outlets pictures of Chris Hughes hard at work mixing the album.
Hughes, it should be noted, also just released the first official recorded work by his project The Calmative. Additionally, that band's cover of Pleasant Grove's, “Nothing is Beautiful” features Spooky Folk's Petra Kelly on backing vocals, Pageantry's Pablo Burrull and Ramon Muzquiz on bass and drums respectively, and The Blurries' Matt Shasteen on guitar. Burrull, Muzquiz, and Shasteen, you may remember, previously played together as part of onetime Denton indie outfit Young and Brave.
Staying in Denton, we'll venture over to last Saturday's much-talked about New Media House Recordings show with Shiny Around the Edges and a return performance from Denton native Night Game Cult. Before pulling out a few old Night Game favorites, Kyle Cheatham also debuted his new solo project at this show. No doubt inspired by his favorite genre of Twilight-inspired teen lit, his new Paranormal Romance project finds the often quirky Cheatham performing with just an acoustic guitar. A video of the performance was posted online by Gutterth Records' Michael Briggs, whose own outfit celebrated its seventh anniversary over the weekend.
And now for a bit of bad news: We regret to write of the passing of one of the Dallas music scene's most beloved icons. After Granada Theater refused to cough up the $2,000 that one local costume rental shop was asking for the now-legendary Goaticorn costume, the costume company decided to ship the thing off to Florida, where it will purportedly be used in an off Broadway play. Granada promotions manager Gavin Mulloy is already threatening to “rebuild it,” but we're still not entirely sure exactly what that means.
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