Jul
19
with Thor & Friends
Tue July 19th, 2016
8:00PM
Main Space
Minimum Age: 18+
Doors Open: 7:00PM
Show Time: 8:00PM
Event Ticket: $25
Day of Show: $30
Ticketing Policy
Table seating for all seated shows is reserved exclusively for ticket holders who purchase “Table Seating” tickets. By purchasing a “Table Seating” ticket you agree to also purchase a minimum of two food and/or beverage items per person. Table seating is first come, first seated. Please arrive early for the best choice of available seats. Seating begins when doors open. Tables are communal so you may be seated with other patrons. We do not take table reservations. A standing room area is available by the bar for all guests who purchase “Standing Room” tickets. Food and beverage can be purchased at the bar but there is no minimum purchase required in this area. All tickets sales are final. No refund or credits.
An Evening with Jack & Amanda Palmer
Amanda Palmer official site | Amanda Palmer on Facebook | Amanda Palmer on Instagram | Amanda Palmer on Twitter
Provocative, irreverent, controversial and wildly creative, Amanda Palmer is a fearless singer, songwriter, playwright, blogger and an audaciously expressive pianist who simultaneously embraces – and explodes – traditional frameworks of music, theater and art.
Amanda first came to prominence as one half of the internationally acclaimed punk cabaret duo The Dresden Dolls. In 2008, she released her debut solo album, Who Killed Amanda Palmer, produced by Ben Folds and accompanied by a fine art photography book featuring text by esteemed author Neil Gaiman (who Palmer has since married). After parting ways with her record label in 2010, she self-released two EPs: Amanda Palmer Performs The Popular Hits of Radiohead On Her Magical Ukelele and Amanda Palmer Goes Down Under, along with a musical theater-esque Evelyn Evelyn album and tour with Jason Webley.
Amanda is widely known as “The Social Media Queen of Rock-N-Roll” for her constant and disarmingly intimate engagement with her fans via her blog, Tumblr, and Twitter (800,000+ followers), and has been at the vanguard of using both “direct to fan” and “pay what you want” (patronage) business models to build and run her business. In May of 2012 she made international news when she raised nearly $1.2 million pre-selling her new album, Theatre is Evil, along with related merchandise and “experiences” via Kickstarter. Theatre is Evil went on to debut in the “Billboard Top 10” when it was released on Sept. 11, 2012, and has been released in over 20 countries on her own label, 8ft records.
Amanda was invited to present a “TED Talk” at TED’s 2013 Conference. To date her Talk, “The Art of Asking”, has been viewed more than 8 million times worldwide. 2013 also saw the release of “An Evening with Neil Gaiman & Amanda Palmer”- a 3 CD collection of tracks culled from a live tour with her husband and best-selling author Neil Gaiman.
Following upon the success of her TED Talk- Amanda expanded her philosophy into a book. The Art of Asking was released worldwide in November of 2014 and became a New York Times Best Seller. In support of the book, Amanda is currently touring solo for the first time since 2011, hitting stages with a mix of rocking keyboard originals, ukulele ballads, and readings from The Art of Asking.
Thor & Friends
After five years of touring as the percussionist of The Swans, Thor Harris began Thor & Friends in the autumn of 2015 as a vehicle to experiment with a cast of rotating Austin based musicians in the vein of American minimalism. As an instrument carpenter and acoustic polyglot, Thor & Friends is the sound of Harris’ return home — an elongated greeting and ode to his community, woodworking shop and the instruments his hands bring texture too.
With the three core members of Harris, Peggy Ghorbani and Sarah “Goat” Gautier, the expanding and contracting ensemble works within the flux of compositional and improvisational contexts, where the range of tonal color depends on what instrumentalists are joining or absent from the process. They can perform acoustically or with hues of electronic instrumentation, as a stripped down trio or a large ensemble. In addition to drawing on minimalist composers such as Terry Riley and Steve Reich, Thor & Friends amalgamate the diverse influences of Brian Eno, Aphex Twin, Moondog and The Necks through a polyrhythmic center of mallet instruments, primarily marimba, xylophone and vibraphone. Around the core motifs of the aforementioned mallet timbres are shifting streams of everything from processed pedal steel and analog synthesizer to violin, viola, stand up bass, clarinet, duduk and oboe.
The group builds off of the similarities and contrasts of Harris’ past projects and continuing collaborations, which include The Swans, Ben Frost, Bill Callahan, Hospital Ships, Shearwater and John Congelton. The result ushers in a utopian optimism contemporized through 20th century predecessors via the promise of improvising with neighbors and friends and utilizing what and who is around at any given moment.
Thor & Friends debut LP will be out on LM Dupli-cation in autumn 2016 — recorded with A Hawk & A Hacksaw’s Jeremy Barnes and Heather Trost and Deerhoof’s John Dieterich in Albuquerque, New Mexico — at which point the transcendent live performance that’s drifted across Central Texas over the last year will continue its crescendo across North America and Europe.
Photo Credit: Thom Washburn