Facebook/YouTube, Monday 18, 6:30pm
Martin Luther King Jr. Day makes for a memorable cleanup project in CenTex this year. An obelisk celebrating the Confederate Army and a headstone commemorating 22nd governor of Texas and Confederate Army Officer Joseph Sayers on the Bastrop County courthouse lawn call for relocation (or worse), so with $28,000 of $50,000 raised for the endeavor, a who s who of song activists livestream on Monday to bring home the remaining $22,000. Huge headliners Natalie Maines and the Chicks lead a burning pack of ATX singer-songwriters including James McMurtry, Eliza Gilkyson, David Ramirez, BettySoo, and others, alongside veteran Americana favorite Dar Williams, and more. Then, local reps Akina Adderley, Ruthie Foster, and Ray Prim wrap it all in roots soul and gospel. All monies benefit the Bastrop County Monument Relocation Committee. –
Newport Beach News
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NPD Founder Doug Freeman, who received the 35th Anniversary Founders Award, Co-Chairs Elizabeth Kurila and Joan McBride, Amy Sfreddo, representing Presenting Sponsor OCBJ. Photo by Tony Lattimore
In 1986, Orange County businessman and philanthropist Doug Freeman convinced President Ronald Reagan to establish National Philanthropy Day to thank those in the community who are the “ultimate givers.”
In November, 2020, National Philanthropy Day celebrated its 35
th anniversary with the theme of “Bringing Philanthropy Home.”
Each year more than 130 Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) chapters throughout the U.S., Mexico and Canada honor the philanthropic efforts of individuals, businesses and groups. Freeman, who continues to participate, says of AFP, “I am so grateful that AFP took on the responsibility early on of sponsoring this effort all these years.”
One deep sleeper of 2020: November s
Brand New by Honey Made. Chances are the eight-foot scrim in the front window of Waterloo Records didn t register thanks to the graham cracker album art – and maybe just maybe a global pandemic. Inside the CD, producer (Steve Berlin of Los Lobos), engineer (Jim Vollentine), and studio (Texas Treefort) all make the credits roll, yet zero mention appears of the actual group turning soul-infused retro nectar into viscous ear candy.
Online, however, behold a nonet straight outta the Stax/Volt annals: three pieces of brass punctuating a trio of Black vocalists – Donald Ford Jr. and brothers Chris (also drums) and Willie Barns II – overlaid atop a triptych of Caucasian rhythm pushers (keys, bass, percussion). Party band proclaims the locals website, and indeed, several of the 10 tracks do a Dirty Sixth Street shuffle. Slick Eighties dance-and-drink-more Steppin Out and the naked drink-after-every-line funk thrust of Canadian Mist leave
Facebook Live, Saturday 26, 8pm
Ten months of social distancing hardly lends itself to hands-on community volunteerism, but even after the last four years of narcissism and division – and especially in 2020 – Austin recognizes a musical milestone. Meal program and publication from Jazz Mills, Carrie Fussell Bickley, and Jade Skye Hammer, Free Lunch outreaches into Austin to those experiencing homelessness via maximum nourishment. Indie rock firebrand Lolita Carroll (aka Lolita Lynne) and synth-pop peer Dena Hope now take up the standard in a fundraiser matching local ladies of sound with blue holiday cheer. Basically, it s an all lady/nonbinary bill of covers chosen by the artist and written by women! explains Carroll. Our goal is to raise money for Free Lunch and promote their lunch monitor program of regular monthly donations. Free Lunch is very small, but making a big impact on a local level! Jazz is sort of a superstar in the music scene. She s an amazing musician and
Bandcamp
Alongside Austin s Dicks and Big Boys, Houston s Really Red proved as integral to early-Eighties American punk
culture as Black Flag or Dead Kennedys. Lasting 1978-85, the aggregation of singer/frontman Ronnie U-Ron Bondage Bond, drummer Bob Weber, guitarist Kelly Younger, and bassist John Paul Williams rarely followed regulation punk templates. Old enough to recall Texas psychedelia on ramalama like Crowd Control, their trace elements of art-damaged funk and blues seeped into – from 1981 onward – the band s ballistic thrashing à la Bad Brains on tracks such as I Was
a Teenage Fuckup.
Meanwhile, Bond s lyrics engage race, sexuality, police brutality, and resistance to authoritarianism.