Cory GravesChanges Abound, Symbolyc One Drops Another Big Beat and New Albums Are Everywhere.
The local music landscape is most certainly an ever-changing one. Keeping up with it can be fairly overwhelming. That''s partly why we started this column in the first place.
Turns out, the same goes for those keeping tabs on the scene as well. Well, at least it's seemed that way of late.
Just 13 months after our own bossman, Central Track editor Pete Freedman, resigned from his post as music editor of the Dallas Observer, his replacement is now set to do the same.
At 9 a.m. this morning current Observer music editor Audra Schroeder announced that she'd be stepping from the post she's held for the past year. In her announcement, Schroeder, who relocated to Dallas from Austin last year, intimated that she'd be staying in the area for the foreseeable future and continuing her relationship with the Observer as a freelancer — albeit not for the music section.
Other music landscape changes are in store as the calendar flips to December as well. For instance? Tarrant County folkster Clint Niosi will be taking over booking responsibilities at Crown and Harp the first Monday of every month. For the past few months, the weekly Monday night slots have been filled by the doomgaze stylings of Dallas trio Soviet. Joining Niosi for his first showing on Monday December 3 will be Denton's Warren Jackson Hearne and Fort Worth's Darrin Kobetich.
In other exciting residency news, the Prophet Bar should be extra packed next Wednesday for their weekly jam. While RC and The Grtiz's regular Wednesday night joints are one of the hippest midweek spots in town already, they seem to pull out all the stops on nights when Erykah Badu shows up. And, indeed, Badu's alter ego, Low Down Loretta Brown, is listed as the event's guest DJ on Wednesday December 5. You can also pretty much bank on the fact that the Grammy winner will also join The Gritz on stage for a song or two at some point in the night.
Speaking of Grammy winners, Symbolyc One who is also a part of Badu's live production collective The Cannabinoids was responsible for crafting the beats behind 50 Cent's new track “My Life,” which features guest appearances from Maroon 5's Adam Levine and Eminem. Last night, 50 performed the track on NBC's The Voice along with Levine, who serves as a judge on that show. Interestingly, Eminem was a no-show for last night's performance, but that probably won't stop the track from blowing up before too long.
Meanwhile, thanks to a successful Kickstarter campaign, December will also see the release of People on Vacation's new holiday album. An update the duo posted online this morning stated that they had finished recording their album, which is currently being mixed and features a guest vocalist spot from Letters to Cleo's Kay Hanley. The twosome of Bowling For Soup's Jaret Reddick and Smile Smile's Ryan Hamilton also revealed that the upcoming disc would be called Holiday Vacation. While that's no stretch for the band — their current album is called The Summer and the Fall after all — it does make for a pretty funny title. Well, if you're British, anyway.
A couple of other noteworthy releases on the horizon? West Dallas gospel group The Relatives just announced that their debut disc would be released next year via Yep Rock. The 40-years-in-the-making album features production from Spoon drummer Jim Eno. We've also gotten word that Ben Harper and Epic Ruins drummer Jordan Richardson has begun producing tracks from Fort Worth garage rock outfit The Longshots. Richardson, you may remember, was responsible for recording Skeleton Coast's debut earlier this year.
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