Sandy Ewen, Wols, Dogebbi – Sunday 05 April 2009 @ Avant Garden

Sandy Ewen – Employing various tools and techniques, Sandy Ewen coaxes sounds from her guitar that have a fragile fleeting otherworldly beauty. That may be because Austin’s Ewen seems to approach the guitar less as an instrument than as a canvas. This is nothing new for fans of her band The Weird Weeds (pictured at left) – a band who Popmatters raves “can make you scratch your head, cover your ears, or dance with abandon. If you let it, though, it can also break your heart.” while Pitchfork describes them as a band that “excel at creating moods and demolishing formulaic songwriting.” This evening Ewen will be performing an improvised set of music that will show why Austin 360 calls her an “improvisational guitar wunderkind.”

Wols– Amye McCarther is one of Houston’s most engaging songwriters. Her low-fi cassette recordings are essential examples of how melody, voice, and instrumentation can say more through simplicity and understatement than the most baroque of recordings. Live performances are another matter entirely as, without compromising the emotion and wit of the recordings, she surrounds herself with musicians who add color and texture to expand on the original song structures. By design the musicians – who have included Will Adams (Black Snakes & Kangaroo), Abe Houck (Hungry Villagers), Mlee Suprean (Hearts of Animals), and the lovely guitar work of brother Jake McCarther– perform without rehearsal and follow McCarther’s muse to wherever it leads. It’s performing without a net to be sure but that openness to the moment is what makes each performance singular and demanding of attention. (Photo John Van)

Wols ( http://www.myspace.com/wolsies )
Bonernap Cassettes ( http://www.myspace.com/bonernapcassettes )

Dogebbi – Michelle Yom incorporates her classical training as a flautist (she received a masters from NYU) with a love for improvisation and takes the flute to places most people would never expect. With a range that encompasses the classical and jazz traditions to the more abstract and experimental, it is music that celebrates the versatility of the instrument and the joy of music’s communicative embrace. For this performance, Yom will be performing with Spike The Percussionist (Astrogenic Hallucinauting) a noiz freak who studied under master percussionist Dr. Norman Weinberg. Together, the duo goes by the name Doggebbi – named after a breed of monsters in Korean folklore possessing supernatural powers and a penchant for pulling pranks on humans (transforming themselves into furniture and such). It’s an appropriate name for music that overflows with intelligence, energy, and mischievous wit.