Welcome to Austin mural

Welcome to the Club

Congratulations, if you are reading this you are one of the first visitors to this site! Take a look around, there is some content available but a lot more is brewing. What you will typically find in this section is a brief biography of an artist. A lot of them will be the original Cosmic Cowboys who shaped the Texas Music scene and don’t be surprised to see the likes of Doug Sahm, Ray Wylie Hubbard, and Alvin Crow. Part of the purpose is an exploration of Austin’s unique musical heritage, but without getting stuck in the past. There will also be a focus on the artists pushing the genre forward like William Beckmann, Kacey Musgraves, Maren Morris, and so many others.

A profile will be paired with a featured album in the Listening Lounge. This lounge is a hall of fame, each album is pulled from our personal collection and is a well loved favorite that is wearing out the needle on our turntable. As a bonus, each album is paired with a suggested cocktail recipe.

Glad to have you here and hope you stick around. We’re just getting started. Follow along with our instagram if you’d like to see what we’re listening to and get alerted to new content.

Cosmic Culture Club logo that includes an armadillo

Featured albums from the Listening Lounge

Read My Lips front album cover

Read My Lips might be the purest example of Austin blues music available, and a statement album from one of the city’s biggest stars. Lou Ann Barton dominated the Austin Music Awards in the eighties. She won female vocalist of the year three times in five years before they gave up and put her in the hall of fame. Her voracious style was something legendary music journalist Margaret Moser liked to describe as “a voice that can peel chrome from a trailer hitch.”

Under the Double Ego album cover

Under the Double Ego was Kinky Friedman’s melancholic goodbye note to the music industry. It would be thirty-two eventful years before he recorded another studio album. When he recorded this one he was disillusioned and chose to work with the Austin based Sunrise label, despite their limited distribution network, rather than deal with corporate record executives. The album was produced locally by Sammy Allred (member of the Geezinslaws and long time radio personality who would eventually be included in the Texas Radio Hall of Fame.) The Texas Jewboys disbanded before the album was recorded leaving Kinky to assemble studio musicians from the crowded local talent pool, which included recruiting Chris O’Connell from Asleep at the Wheel fame.

On a cold February night in 1978 The Skunks played what is widely regarded as the first punk rock show in Austin, and for the next six years they continued to be a definitive presence. The three piece lineup evolved over the years, with bassist Jesse Sublett serving as the anchor. They pioneered a new sound leading acclaimed journalist Margaret Moser to declare, “In Austin’s punk rock history book, the Skunks are the first page.”

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