Exile on Main Street

Sunday was like getting tossed into the deep end after one or two swimming lessons. I figure I'm well-acquainted, musically if not personally, with about ten Houston bands, somewhat familiar with maybe two dozen more, and the rest might as well be from Mars. Or Dallas. Kidding. So I was eager to dive into this buffet of Bayou City talent, but once I got to Main Street, it was disorienting. I move away from Austin after 14 years — barely making it downtown in time for the showcase, in fact — and the first thing that happens is uncomfortable South by Southwest flashbacks start popping up like migraines.

The showcases are obviously patterned after SXSW before it became the out-of-control, all-consuming vortex of beer, bands and BSing it is today: A handful of clubs in reasonable proximity, wristbands affordable without a second mortgage and an overall vibe that's still Texas friendly, not New York/L.A. douche bag. That alone was a tremendous relief, as I still don't know very many people in Houston. And I'd never been inside the Rice building beforeÉdamn, that shit is tight. But I also found a few familiar pitfalls.

Walk into a club at the wrong time, or sometimes even the right one, and you either get ten minutes of sound check or a band's last song, which happened with the Poor Dumb Bastards (shirtless Southern punk), Dizzy Pilot (lurching Primus/Butthole Surfers spaz-rock), Cl'Che (fierce feminine rap), Skyblue 72 (Alanisian vocals, Zeppelin backbone) and the Blaggards (floor-shaking Celtic booze-rock). You wind up seeing bands in venues not outfitted for regular live music: sports bars, bistros, Irish pubs, Indian dance clubs — actually that's a new one — and the sound mix often suffers accordingly. People pass you their demos on the street entirely unsolicited; thanks, Cymblem. (Incubus-like moody metalÉdecent, just not my bag.) And sometimes a showcase goes totally off the rails.

Depending on who you talk to, Insect Warfare's set at Slainte was cut short because one member was so intoxicated he could hardly stand, let alone play an instrument; they were dangerously close to blowing a circuit (or several) in the soundboard; or one of the stage managers simply didn't care for them and pulled the plug. Whatever happened, the five minutes or so they did play were almost indescribably awesome. Over a frenetic bed of staticky noise that sounded like a busted radio turned up to 11, the "singer" let out periodic vocal blasts that were a fair approximation of someone retching. The crowd ate it up; even the blond in the "I was eating pussy before it was popular" T-shirt seemed bemused.

Other stuff I dug: Like the Cure and Ramones, Black Math Experiment explored the seam between pop and something darker and edgier; they also turned Nine Inch Nails' "Closer" into a pop-punk romp. El Orbits singer Tomas Escalante gave it his all on Freddy Fender's "Wasted Days and Wasted Nights." Satin Hooks were terrific, evoking early R.E.M., Guided by Voices and TV on the Radio with driving rockers and beguiling melodies, plus they had crowd-surfing mannequins. And Karina Nistal is the total package: singing, dancing and rapping like a Latina M.I.A., she captivated the crowd at the Red Cat Jazz Café, many of whom stuck around all evening just to see her.

Some bands I saw either did one thing really well — the Flaming Hellcats' adrenalized rockabilly; Aqua Velva's genial B-52's bop (nice beehives) — or varied wildly from song to song, with mixed results but moments of brilliance. Bring Back the Guns were intense, enervated and a little at loose ends, then completely changed course with a perfectly sculptured, Pixies-ish song that radiated an eerie inner calm. Sharks & Sailors employed broad dynamics, interlocking arrangements and methodical builds to overcome a frightful mix, passing Explosions in the Sky and Austin's late, great Ed Hall to arrive at a place not far from...Trail of Dead, Sonic Youth or Kyuss.

"It's a killer day in Houston," Allen Hill, one of the few local musicians I do know (so far), told me during Satin Hooks.

But not, he added, an ordinary one, having all these bands play mere blocks from one another.

"In Austin, you walk out your door and it's right there," he said. "Houston, you walk out your front door and nothing. You walk down to the corner and still nothing. Stuff doesn't come to you, you have to seek it out — but if you do, it's bad-ass."

So it seems. Can't wait for more. — Chris Gray