#AtCentral
Laurie Gallardo, a DJ at Austin's KUTX radio station, moderates a chat with Carrie Clark of the bands Sixteen Deluxe and The Living Pins, and A Curious Mix of People authors Greg Beets and Richard Whymark for their book launch party at the Austin Central Library in partnership with The Austin Library Foundation.
A CURIOUS MIX OF PEOPLE: The Underground Scene of '90s Austin by Greg Beets and Richard Whymark is out now! Grab your copy wherever you get your books!
[ABOUT THE BOOK]
It’s 1990 in Austin, Texas. The next decade will be a tipping point in the city's metamorphosis from sleepy college town to major city. Beneath the increasingly slick exterior, though, a group of like-minded contrarians were reimagining an underground music scene. Embracing a do-it-yourself ethos, record labels emerged to release local music, zines cheered and jeered acts beneath the radar of mainstream media outlets, and upstart clubs provided a home venue for new bands to build their sound.
This vibrant scene valued expression over erudition, from the razor-sharp songcraft of Spoon to the fuzzed-out poptones of Sixteen Deluxe, and blurred the boundaries between observer and participant. Evolving in tandem with the city’s emergence on the national stage via the film Slacker and the SXSW conference and festivals, Austin’s musical underground became a spiritual crucible for the uneasy balance between commercial success and cultural authenticity, a tension that still resonates today.
The first book about Austin underground music in the ’90s, A Curious Mix of People is an oral history that tells the story of this transformative decade through the eyes of the musicians, writers, DJs, club owners, record-store employees, and other key figures who were there.
[ABOUT THE AUTHORS]
Greg Beets is a music journalist and musician who wrote for the Austin Chronicle and performed as a vocalist with the 1990s Austin bands Cheezus, Noodle, and the Peenbeets.
Richard Whymark is a documentary filmmaker and the executive producer of the documentary series A Curious Mix of People.