The Ugly Beats @ Lamberts

As planned I went to Lamberts last night to see The Ugly Beats for the second time. I went to Eeyore's Birthday Party earlier in the day and wore my tie-died Eeyore's t-shirt. I think I may have stood out a bit. I was totally self conscious not having been to Lamberts before and not knowing where I could hide, or even where the restrooms were. I've heard of the place before from swing dancing class. I imagined the place to have a wide open dance floor based on that, but there couldn't be more than enough room for one or two couples to dance in front of the stage. This restaurant is probably a little too high class for me, and maybe for barbecue joints in general. The tap beer I bought was $6 when I would've guessed $4. Maybe that's why I think it too high class! It took forever to get that beer, too, BTW.

The first band was Nagel, consisting of a girl on keys, a girl lead vocalist, and guys on bass, guitar, and drums. The lead singer was really belting 'em out at times, very impressive. Sometimes it sounded like she was more shouting than singing, but that's nothing against her, it's just part of the song. She sang very well. And loudly, like I said! I was curious about the keyboard as it was an Alesis which is what I've been playing exclusively for over ten years now. Wow, I didn't realize that until I wrote it. I didn't recognize the keyboard model but it was small, probably a Micron? It really stood out in the mix too, more than the guitar which I could barely hear at times. That's a nice change of pace. All the band members were dressed very differently, enough for me to notice which must mean *very* different.

Since I've seen the Ugly Beats before, I'm beyond initial thoughts and into more details: keyboard is an Ace Tone. She still smiled alot but not as much as the first time, so I know she's not crazy. Lead singer plays a Fender Jaguar, a guitar I'd never heard of but I'm not that knowledgeable about guitars. The lead singer (rhythm guitar), lead guitar, and drummer all sang lead for at least a song. The drummer had two toms none of which were supported by the bass drum, which for some reason I really liked--it keeps all the drums isolated from each other, right? The other guitar player plays left handed.

The lead singer and bass player wandered out into the crowd like last time, only this time they were right next to me. I deserved it, since I think I was the only guy dancing the whole time. They surprised me during the last song when the bass player handed off the bass to another musician mid song without skipping a beat, then proceeded to play tamborine for a bit and then do push-ups on stage. They are my favorite Austin band now. I don't know if it's because I really like their music or that I've really familiar with almost all their stuff now, probably a bit of both. They are in LA this week so if you are in that area, go check them out!

I start to lose track after their set, but they had a guest musician along with members of the first two bands playing surf music. I guess the guest musician was somewhat of an inspiration to those musicians. Lastly Death Valley (again composed of members of the first two bands) played more surf music, which sounded great but started to put me to sleep after fifteen minutes or so. If I was sitting down I'd be head bobbing like I saw someone else doing. Maybe I was visualizing the rolling surf, sea breeze, and sun wearing me out. In that case, the music was dead on.