Category Archives: de musica

“Rock is no longer a dirty word in Austin”: The Armadillo at 40

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Above: “On August 7, 1970, a new music venue opened at 525 1/2 Barton Springs Road in Austin. The city would never be the same. The Armadillo World Headquarters.” (“The Armadillo at 40,” KUT.org).

An article published by TIME Magzine on September 9, 1974, entitled “Groover’s Paradise,” recently came to my attention. Here’s the opening paragraph:

    Back in the good old days in Austin, Texas, say 1970, a guy could risk trouble for deriding country-and-western music, or merely hollering the words “rock ‘n’ roll.” This was, after all, the ancestral home of Texas Swing, where the Light Crust Doughboys had helped elect a flour salesman, W. Lee O’Danile, Governor in 1938. Even such talented native Texas as Singers Janis Joplin and Johnny Winter, blues rockers both, had been forced to head as far away from Austin as possible to make the big time.

That was just four years after the Armadillo World Headquarters opened in the Texas state capital, about a ten-minute drive from where Tracie P and I live now.

This week, KUT.org, the University of Texas at Austin radio station is playing every artist that ever played at the ‘Dillo (as it is affectionately known). And I’m here to tell you, people, that I’m glued to my radio, whether in the car or at home working on my computer.

You can find the stream by visiting KUT.org (9 a.m. – 3 p.m. local time).

My highlights for today were Jerry Jeff Walker’s version of “Mr. Bojangles” and his “London Homesick Blues” (and for guitar geeks out there, Eric Johnson’s early band The Electromagnets).

The title of the TIME Magazine article is culled from one of my favorite songs by one of my favorite Cosmic Cowboys, Doug Sahm, and it ends with a quote from him:

    The Armadillo is filled each night night with a curious amalgam of teenagers, aging hippe women in gingham, braless coeds, and booted goat ropers swigging Pearl beer and swinging Stetsons in time to the music. Doug Sahm, a 32-year-old fugitive of San Franciso psychedelia, who sings there regularly, says that “leaving Austin now is like climbing off a spaceship from a magic place.” As he put it in a song, the whole town is a groover’s paradise.

O, man, I can almost smell the doobage wafting up Lamar Blvd.!

Picking grapes with Tony Coturri in Texas

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Above: The cowboy hat that Melvin Croaker gave me isn’t just for show. I can probably do more damage at computer keyboard than I can with pruning shears in the vineyards but this singing cowboy managed to fill a crate or two with Blanc du Bois in the Texas sun yesterday.

There are many mysteries in this big ol’ world and many of them leave me scratching my head. But one of the ones I find the hardest to fathom is why every single wine professional in central Texas doesn’t head down to Comal County to get a glimpse of natural winemaker Tony Coturri, who arrives promptly each year to harvest grapes and make wine with maverick winemaker Lewis Dickson of La Cruz de Comal winery. (For a recent and truly wonderful interview with Tony, please see this excellent post by my friend and blogging colleague and fellow Californian-Texan Amy Atwood. And for a profile of Lewis and his wines, please see this post I did for the 32 Days of Natural Wine.)

Above: No, that’s not Billy Gibbons, it’s Tony on “the Gator.”

It was a thrill for me and Tracie P to get to “rub shoulders” with Tony in the vineyards and the thought of getting to hang with him even got us out of bed on a Sunday morning at the crack of dawn (can you believe that?). Harvest of Lewis’s Blanc du Bois grapes began yesterday at daybreak in Comal County on the southern side of Canyon Lake (about an hour and half from our place in Austin).

cruz de comal

Above: Tony and Lewis destemming the Blanc du Bois harvest. From the quality and quantity of grapes, it appears that Cruz de Comal will have one of its best vintages of Blanc du Bois, which is used to make the winery’s Pétard Blanc, one of my favorites and white with remarkable aging potential.

In case you don’t already know Tony, he’s a leading Californian grape grower and winemaker and a pioneer of natural winemaking in the Golden State… AND he makes killer wines. I love what he said to Amy in the interview she did:

    The basic principles and procedures of my winemaking haven’t changed over the years. I have remained a believer in natural, and traditional and additive free winemaking. If anything, refining the natural process has been the change. As my understanding of the development of all aspects the vineyards through the use of organic and biodynamic practices deepens I realize that I’m not so much a “winemaker’ but a custodian of grapes. The wine is made in the vineyard. My job is to take care of it. The magic is in the vineyard not the winery.

O mamma, you’re speaking my language!

cruz de comal

Above: A little grape porn for ya’ll.

Tracie P and I are both a little sore from picking those grapes yesterday but we’re no worse for the wear. And what a good night sleep you get after a day of working in the vineyards in the sunshine and fresh air! Man, I can’t wait to taste that wine…

I’d rather trust a man who works with his hands,
He looks at you once, you know he understands,
Don’t need any shield,
When you’re out in the field.

—Peter Gabriel (can anyone name the tune? Thor, I’m counting on you!)

PRODUTTORI TIME

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Both Tracie P and I had a tough week this week. Let me just put it this way, people: sometimes work is a bitch.

And so last night, when work was done, we decided to treat ourselves to an evening of dueling DJs (Tracie P took it over the top with MJ’s “Wanna Be Starting Something”), kitchen-dance-floor grooving, Polaroid self-portraits, and a bottle of 2005 Barbaresco by what is probably our favorite winery of all time in history: Produttori del Barbaresco.

The wine was bright, tannic but generously nimble in sharing its lip-smacking wild berry fruit and succulently muddy flavors. We paired with gruyère and crackers, we dedicated songs to each other, we danced around the dining room table, and we forgot all of the worries of our world. It was PRODUTTORI TIME.

Tracie P and I aren’t the only ones obsessed with Produttori del Barbaresco: one of the wine bloggers we enjoy and respect the most, Cory (and one of the funnest and nicest people to hang and taste with, above), wrote about Produttori del Barbaresco in his wrap-up to the 32 Days of Natural Wine, in a piece I highly recommend to you.

Like last year, Cory had to deal with plenty of משוגעת from folks who didn’t agree with this or that and other bullshit.* But, man, this dude deserves a medal. He’s the nicest sweetest and brightest guy and his hypertextual project, 31 32 Days of Natural Wine, represents a truly fascinating study in semiotics, not to mention an encyclopedia in fieri of natural wine around the world. Wine writing is by its very nature an affliction otherwise known as synaethesia — humankind’s overwhelming and at times unbearable urge to capture in words the literally ineffable, ephemeral, and ethereal experience of tasting wine. With his unique project, Cory has warped the boundaries of wine blogging in an exhilarantly meaningful way.

So, people, whether Puzelat or Produttori, pour yourself a glass of your favorite wine on this hottest weekend of the year, squeeze your loved ones tight and remind them how much they mean to you, remember that first kiss and the way you felt when those lips touched yours, and remember that very first moment you tasted a wine that made your heart flutter…

* Yiddish meshugas, Esp. in Jewish usage: madness, craziness; nonsense, foolishness; (as a count noun) a foolish idea; a foible, an idiosyncracy (Oxford English Dictionary, online edition).

Jimmie Vaughan’s 1967 Fender Coronado (how friggin’ cool is that?)

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From the “does this town rock or what?” department…

1967 Fender Coronado

Above: Guitar legend Jimmie Vaughan’s 1967 Fender Coronado and Ronnie James’s 1967 Fender Coronado bass. Photo via Hair by Felice.

My friends often hear me say that moving to Austin to be with Tracie P was the smartest thing I’ve ever done. The second smartest thing? Moving to Austin to be with Tracie P.

One of the coolest things about living in this central Texas town is how you can run into a guitar hero at the super market and then see him take the stage that night at Antone’s.

When the super cool lady who cuts my hair showed me the above photo of Jimmie Vaughan’s 1967 Fender Coronado and the matching 1967 Coronado bass that he got his bass player to take on tour with them to support Jimmie’s new album, I BEGGED her to let me put it on my blog (you see, lady in question, Felice, goes steady with Jimmie’s bass player Ronnie James).

And I gotta say, Jimmie’s new album is some pretty, bad-assed smoking music that puts some seriously deep-fried boogie in your butt. So far Tracie P’s favorite track is “Wheel of Fortune,” which features Lou Ann Barton on vox.

We’re going to miss Jimmie’s show next weekend at Antone’s ’cause we’ll be out of town but that’s okay. I know I’ll run into Jimmie at Whole Foods market when we’re back…

If you still had any doubt that Austin is America’s most rockin’ city, check out this photo I snapped yesterday by our favorite hippy-dippy convenience store/gas station.

Buon weekend, ya’ll…

Chianti and Brunello, the brand names

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Inspired by that Prince of Paronamasia, Thor, I was tempted to entitle this post, “Brand on the Run”… But have you ever known me to mince words?

Above: The Castello di Brolio, site of the Ricasoli winery. The “Iron Baron” Ricasoli, winemaker and Italy’s second prime minister, re-branded Chianti in the late 19th century when he replanted his vineyards with Sangiovese. Would he recognize the wine his family makes today?

Reading Eric the Red’s brutally honest column on Chianti Classico yesterday, I couldn’t help but wonder out loud: would the “Iron Baron” Ricasoli, father of pre-industrial Chianti Classico, recognize the wines that his family makes today?

Even more chilling was the thought: in the light of Montalcino’s “vote for modernism,” as Ms. Robinson put it, is Brunello heading down the same path as Chianti Classico?

In other words, will we not recognize the wines that are going to be made there 20 or 30 years from now, leaving us as befuddled as Eric and his colleagues? “Of the 20 glasses before us,” wrote Eric, “many did not look like Chianti Classicos, the designation for Chiantis made in the Chianti region’s heartland in the hills of Tuscany. Or at least they did not look the way I expect a Chianti Classico to look.”

By the time Ricasoli was purchased by behemoth Seagram’s in the 1970s, Chianti had already achieved antonomastic status in the collective consciousness of the American consumer. In other words, it had become synonymous with “Italian wine.”

I cannot tell you how many times I come across the common misconception that Italians pair pizza with Chianti. The other day, a young Sicilian woman here in Austin told me that the traditional pairing for Parmigiano Reggiano was Chianti.

As the apologetic title of the column reveals (“Tasting Report: Chianti Classicos, So Dark and Oaky, but Still Recognizable”), the wines that Eric and colleagues tasted did not resemble the wines that they expected to uncork. In fact, “Many were densely colored and dark, almost impenetrable in their blackness.”

As rumors of corporate take-overs in Montalcino abound (reminiscent of the heady Seagram’s years), I fear I see a (literally) dark cloud in my wine horizon. To borrow a phrase, from Mel Brooks, “Let’s hope for the best…” You already know the next line…

Ginny appreciation week at the Little Longhorn Saloon: No Cussin’, No Fussin’, No Hasslin’, No Wrasslin’!

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Above, from right: three generations of Ginny, Ginny Kalmbach, her granddaughter, and her daughter. All three manage this national treasure.

On Friday night, Austin music icon Dale Watson emceed “Ginny Appreciation Night” at the Little Long Horn Saloon in Austin, Texas (on Burnet Road, on the north side of town, not far from where Tracie P and me live).

ginny's little longhorn saloon

Above: I’ve been to many great honky-tonks across our fine nation but Ginny’s — let me tell you, people — is something special (and I say this in a town famous for its honky tonks).

We were at Canyon Lake (in the Texas Hill Country) with family on Friday night but we took friends Brenna and Jason, who were in town from Orange, Texas there last night: no night on the town in Austin would be complete without a stop at Ginny’s.

Above: Ginny showed us her new Lone Star hat, which she had made especially for her.

Ginnny’s real fond of Tracie P (can you blame her?) and every time we visit, she and her daughters ask to see her wedding ring. There’s a sign up at Ginny’s that reads: “No Cussin’, No Fussin’, No Hasslin’, No Wrasslin’!”

jww and the prospectors

Above: Last night, JWW and the Prospectors were playing. You really can’t go wrong at Ginny’s. I’ve been blown away by the caliber of musicianship we’ve seen there.

Folks like Ginny rarely win Kennedy Center Honors or Congressional Medals but, man, she and her saloon are true national treasures, if only for the traditions and music that she fosters and if not for the immense joy that she brings into so many folks’s lives with her bright spirit and motherly affections.

Above: You’d expect Jason to get your back in a bar fight but you wouldn’t expect him to turn to his lovely wife Brenna and say, “damn, it honey! I forgot to cook that beautiful asparagus we have in the fridge.” Jason is an amazing cook and writes a food blog via Facebook. He and I also share an obsession and fascination with Doug Sahm. But more on that later.

Ginny’s was one of the first places Tracie P took me when I started coming out to Austin to visit her. Whether it’s with friends visiting from out-of-town on a Saturday night or just getting our honky tonk on on a Tuesday, we try to get there as often as we can.

Above: If you ever meet a woman who loves country music and knows how to play Chicken Shit Bingo and speaks Italian and cooks a mean ragù, thank your LUCKY STARS!

Ginny, we can’t imagine a world without you.

A correction on white Musar and a Tracie P[olaroid] moment

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Above: I met Serge Hochar, owner of Musar, a few years ago at a food and wine festival. Super nice guy and a lot of fun to be around. I’m not sure where he wrote or said this, but Georgios Hadjistylianou in Cyprus quotes him, “the harmony of nature is better than anything we could ever create. I believe it should be a priority to seek to drink what is ‘true’ rather than what is ‘good.'”

Reader Georgios Hadjistylianou in Cyprus was entirely right to write me, pointing out that Musar white is, in fact, made from Obeideh and Merwah, grapes indigenous to Mount Lebanon. (See a fact sheet on the wine here.)

He was writing me in reference to yesterday’s post on the super restaurant Marouch in Los Angeles. The restaurant listed the wine under “Chardonnay” but the other wine professionals with whom I dined were under the impression (as was I) that it was made from Sémillon.

Thanks, Georgios for the correction! :-) I can tell you — for certain — that the wine was delicious. ;-)

Obeideh and Merwah didn’t make it into Eric the Red’s (Eric the Green’s?) excellent post today on “a dozen obscure grapes that are the foundation of some wonderful wines and will reward intrepid explorers.” But I highly recomment both the wine (Musar) and Eric’s post to you.

In other news…

Couldn’t resist sharing this Polaroid moment from Kate and Dan’s wedding over the weekend. Among other fun activities, they had set up a Polaroid studio where you could take photos with some of the western artifacts lying around the Figueroa Mountain Farmhouse.

O my goodness, my Tracie P, you are the most mellifluous melody this singing cowboy has ever heard! I love you so! :-)

Wines I drank with Russian spies in LA at Marouch

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Above: The 2000 Chateau Musar white (Sémillon) was FANTASTIC at Lebanese/Armenian restaurant Marouch in Los Angeles last night. At 10 years out, this wine is just coming into its own: oxidative and richly aromatic, with gorgeous nutty and stone fruit flavors.

Strained diplomatic relations between the two countries and the delicate nature of my mission as cultural attaché do not allow me to reveal the names of the persons with whom I dined last night. Let it suffice to say that they were all ethnic-Russian Jews who — at some point in their lives — have harbored sympathy for the Communist Party and/or own or have at one time owned a copy of Chairman Mao’s “Little Red Book.”

Above: Not to be missed at Marouch, the fried sardines. Serge, a wonderfully convivial host who came to this country more than 30 years ago, allows corkage in his fine establishment, which I cannot recommend enough.

Owner Serge Brady blew our communist party away with his superb cooking. I can’t believe I’ve almost reached 43 years of age without knowing about his restaurant. Amazing… While I was waiting for my friends, I sipped the Musar and noshed on turnips pickled in vinegar and red wine and cured olives. Perfection… simple and utterly undeniable and inconfutable perfection…

Above: My decoder ring was embedded in the Fattouch (Lebanese Salad).

Among other bottles opened last night, it was the Pascal Janvier 2009 Coteaux du Loir Rouge “Rosier,” made from Pineau d’Aunis, that captivated our senses more than any other. Some of my companions preferred it chilled, but espionage, my friends, is a dish best served température ambiante. Lip-smacking delicious wine. [PHOTO UNAVAILABLE FOR SECURITY REASONS!]

Above: Secret messages where imprinted in the Bastourma (Armenian Salami), which melted in your mouth after the for-your-tongue-only information was decoded.

But as if to prove the axiom that the signifier precedes the signified, it was another bottle brought by Comrade H, its contents now defunct, that contained the logogriphic dispatch with our orders.

Need I say more?

Get to Marouch AS QUICK AS YOU CAN!

In other news…

Readers of Do Bianchi have asked for it and here it is. A short video of The Grapes debut performance last week by the lovely Gross sisters (with whom I attended La Jolla High School). Enjoy!

Congratulations Kate and Dan! Mazel Tov ya’ll!

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What a beautiful setting and gorgeous wedding in the Santa Ynez Valley!

This is just one of the amazing sunset photos that Tracie P took with our trusty Nikon.

Among other wedding duties, musical and otherwise, Dan enlisted me to play the hora.

I think it’s safe to say that I got the job done. ;-)

It was so great to see so many old friends, from NYC and LA, and to meet Kate’s family from Scotland.

Mazel tov, ya’ll!

Texas tones pair well with La Jolla sushi!

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HEARTFELT THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO CAME OUT TO SUPPORT THE GRAPES!

The Grapes had a blast last night playing our first gig at Zenbu Sushi in La Jolla. Nearly half of the graduating classes of La Jolla High 1985 and 1986 were there… What a night…

Who knew that Texas tones would pair so well with sushi? Well, then again, it makes sense that a little Tex Mex would jive with the Mexican- and Californian-cuisine influenced Japanese at Zenbu. That’s the “Mexicali Roll” above.

And the icing on the cake was Nephew Cole who sat in on 2 numbers and played like a pro! How cool is that?

Even Mama Judy got a dedication: “Mama Tried” by Merle Haggard… ;-)

The first I remember knowin’ was the lonesome whistle blowin’
And a youngun’s dream of growin’ up to ride.
On a freight train leavin’ town, not knowin’ where I was bound
No one changed my mind, but mama tried…

Mama tried to raise me better, but her pleadin’ I denied
That leaves only me to blame cause mama tried.

Thanks again to everyone, family, friends, and La Jolla High School, for coming out to tap your toes to some Texas twang!

In other news…

Tracie P and I are headed to Dan and Kate’s wedding in Santa Barbara County, staying in Solvang tonight. Stay tuned…