The Best of JB & Crew on Austin 360 Radio Podcast

The Best of JB & Crew on Austin 360 Radio Podcast

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The Best of JB & Crew on Austin 360 Radio Podcast episodes

  • Peter Blackstock on Daniel Johnston passing

    Daniel Johnston, who passed out cassette tapes of his songs to fellow Austin musicians in the 1980s and eventually became renowned worldwide as a songwriter, died early Wednesday in Houston, his manager Tom Gimbel confirmed Wednesday afternoon.

    Johnston had been in the hospital with kidney issues but was released Tuesday night to the assisted living facility where he had been living recently. He was found unconscious there Wednesday morning, Gimbel said.

    A statement released by the family Wednesday said Johnston died of natural causes. Gimbel noted that Johnston’s health “had been touch and go for awhile” with complications from diabetes and other issues.

    » From the archives: Faith, hope, ‘Fear Yourself’ and Daniel Johnston

    Dick Johnston, Daniel’s older brother, said in the statement: “I always wanted Danny to feel like his own person, and in control of his own life. Since beginning to work and travel with him in about 2003, we gratefully were able to travel the entire globe for over a decade to get out before the fans. He was always, everywhere, warmly received and he at least knew he was well loved. Health issues have plagued us for years; I’m glad for the time we had.”

     

    For years in the 1980s and 1990s, thanks to a timely clip on MTV, Johnston symbolized underground rock in Austin. His charming songs, no-fi recording style and devotion to distributing his unique music on cassette made him an indelible figure on the American margins.

    Johnston also made his mark on Austin culture with the iconic “Hi, How Are You” mural at 21st and Guadalupe streets. A well-known landmark near the University of Texas and a popular spot for photos, he created it in 1993 on the exterior wall of what was then the Sound Exchange record store. The frog-like character in the mural, who also appeared on Johnston’s 1983 album of the same name, is known as “Jeremiah the Innocent.”

    Born Jan. 22, 1961, in Sacramento, Calif., and raised in West Virginia, Johnston moved to Austin in the early 1980s. He was working at McDonald’s in Dobie Mall near the UT campus when he began circulating his songs within the local music community. The rudimentary recordings featured Johnston accompanying himself on instruments that included a toy organ and a simple drum machine.

    Related contentDaniel Johnston through the years

    Austin musician and DJ Jason Asnes was among those who got one of Johnston’s early cassettes. “When I was 18 and playing in a local band in Austin, we’d often do shows at The Beach Cabaret,” Asnes wrote in a social media post Wednesday. “Sometimes, this guy in a McDonald’s uniform would come and hand out cassettes that he made to people. At first, most thought he was a joke or a weirdo, but he kept showing up.

    “Once I listened to one of his tapes, I was blown away at how good the songs were. We let him open some shows for us, as did other bands of the time. As more and more tapes got out and word started to spread, he became popular around town and later, around the world. He was always friendly and liked talking about music with strangers. We’ll miss you Daniel.”

    PHOTOS: Fans create memorial Wednesday at Daniel Johnston ‘Hi, How Are You’ mural

    Help came early on from Jeff Tartakov, who began managing Johnston in the mid-1980s and played a key role in circulating Johnston’s recordings far and wide. First it was Austin bands who performed his songs onstage or recorded them in the studio, including Glass Eye, the Reivers, True Believers and the Texas Instruments.

    In 1985, MTV included Johnston in an Austin-focused episode of its “Cutting Edge” program. Soon, national acts became fans, including Jad Fair of Half Japanese, who recorded a 1989 album with Johnston, and members of Sonic Youth, who also collaborated with him.

    After performing at the Austin Music Awards in 1990, Johnston was flying to West Virginia in a private plane with his father when he had a psychotic episode, resulting in a crash landing. They both survived, but Johnston was temporarily committed to a mental hospital. Austin Chronicle editor Louis Black wrote a story in Spin magazine that further detailed both Johnston’s art and his mental health issues.

    When Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain wore one of Johnston’s “Hi, How Are You” shirts to the MTV Video Music Awards in 1992, Johnston’s fame grew exponentially. That same year, France’s Lyon Opera Ballet performed a piece by renowned choreographer Bill T. Jones that was set to Johnston’s music. Johnston painted the “Hi, How Are You” mural the next year.

    In 1994, Atlantic Records released “Fun,” the lone major-label album of Johnston’s career. In an American-Statesman article that ran upon the album’s release, Johnston spoke with writer Don McLeese about his lifelong ambitions as a songwriter.

    “I wanted to be famous. That was No. 1 in my mind,” Johnston said. “I wanted to be the Kenny Rogers on my block. In everything that I did, the way that I acted and what I said to people, I was thinking, ‘This is my plot to become famous. My fame will grow.’ It was wild. I flipped out about it.”

    In 1995, Austin musician Kathy McCarty recorded “Dead Dog’s Eyeball,” a full album of Johnston’s songs. McCarty’s recording of Johnston’s song “Living Life” was played over the closing credits of Austin director Richard Linklater’s acclaimed film “Before Sunrise.”

    “When I met Daniel and I first heard (his cassette) ‘Hi, How Are You?’,” McCarty said Wednesday, “I really felt like he was the first genuine genius I had ever personally met in my life.” She remembers offering him an opening slot for Glass Eye, then nervously consulting the rest of the band, hoping they would approve. Before a rehearsal, she played them Johnston’s tape.

    “Everyone else in Glass Eye totally clicked with it and got it right away,” she said, noting that they ended up skipping the planned rehearsal. “All we did was just listen to his tape over and over again.”

    In 2006, director Jeff Feuerzeig’s documentary “The Devil and Daniel Johnston” became a hit at film festivals and received a theatrical release. “To my ears as a young music geek,” Feuerzeig said in a statement Wednesday, “Daniel was absolutely in the pantheon of great songwriters, with Lou Reed and Bob Dylan.

    “He was a songwriter’s songwriter and an artist’s artist. His visual art was as powerful as his songs. I was lucky to commune with him. Making that movie took about four or five years of my life and it was the best chapter of my entire life.”

    In 2009, Oscar-winning songwriter Glen Hansard’s band Swell Season brought Johnston onstage with a children’s choir to sing one of his songs on “Austin City Limits.”

    » Watch: Daniel Johnston performing at the Belmont during SXSW 2012

    Johnston’s best-known and most enduring song is “True Love Will Find You in the End,” which initially appeared on his 1984 cassette “Retired Boxer.” Among those who covered it over the years were Grammy winners Beck and Wilco. Beck’s version was featured on the 2004 tribute album “The Late Great Daniel Johnston: Discovered Covered,” which also included versions of songs by artists including Tom Waits, the Flaming Lips, Bright Eyes, M. Ward and Mercury Rev.

    Johnston’s last national tour was in the fall of 2017. He played in cities across the country with different bands made up of notable musicians in each city, including the Preservation Hall Jazz Band in New Orleans, Built to Spill in the Pacific Northwest and Fugazi in Washington, D.C.

    “I just feel really privileged to have had the chance to work with him,” said Gimbel, speaking from Nashville where he’d just arrived for Wednesday evening’s Americana Music Awards. “I think he’s one of the greatest geniuses of our time.” Gimbel said he expects an Austin memorial concert for Johnston may be organized in the near future.

    Austin bassist and producer Brian Beattie, who met Johnston in the 1980s when he and McCarty performed Johnston’s songs in Glass Eye, recorded Johnston many times over the decades. He has been working in recent years on recordings he’d made with Johnston that have not yet been released.

    “Everyone he collaborated with felt like they were sprinkled with stardust,” Beattie said Wednesday. “There was something very special about being with him.”

    One of Johnston’s last musical performances in Austin came on his 57th birthday, when he appeared as part of the first Hi, How Are You Day at the Mohawk. Austin Mayor Steve Adler read a city resolution recognizing the day as an occasion for awareness about mental illness. The evening closed with many of those who’d performed Johnston’s songs throughout the event joining him onstage for “True Love Will Find You in the End.”

    American-Statesman writer Joe Gross contributed to this report.

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    20 min
  • Mathew Odam thai and El Patio

    Charles Attal knew within a minute of hearing the news from his cousin that something had to be done.

    Kristyn Ciani, granddaughter of El Patio founders Paul and MaryAnn Joseph and daughter of longtime El Patio employee Roseann Joseph-Ciani, had alerted Attal that her uncle David had decided to close the restaurant his parents opened in 1954.

    “We have to save it,” Attal, a co-founder of C3 Presents, told his cousin.

    Ciani had supported her uncle in his decision to close the restaurant after four decades and never imagined she would have the opportunity to continue the family legacy. The call from Attal, who is also a partner in Stubb’s BBQ, changed all that.

    And a visit to the restaurant and a glimpse of the seemingly endless lines of people saying farewell to the Tex-Mex institution, which closed Aug. 9, reaffirmed their decision.

     

    The next generation of family formed a group that included Ciani, Attal,his sister Jennifer Attal-Allen, her son Sled Allen and Sway and La Condesa founder Jesse Herman to reopen the business, which has been in the family for 65 years.

    “It’s literally in my blood,” Kristyn Ciani said. “I never thought I would have been able to be a part of something so cool like this.”

    El Patio will reopen at 2938 Guadalupe St. by the end of September, the family said.

    “Our roots run deep in Austin, back to the late 1800s,” said Jennifer Attal-Allen, whose grandmother was a half-sister of El Patio co-founder Paul Joseph. “Family is everything to us. So to now, along with my brother, son, and cousin, be able to continue this tradition Uncle Paul and Aunt MaryAnn started, means more than I’m able to put into words. It’s especially a very proud moment for me personally, that the next generation who is stepping up includes my son, Sled.”

    When longtime guests return to visit El Patio, they will see familiar faces and familiar dishes. The staff from both front and back of house is returning to the restaurant, some of whom have worked at El Patio for more than 35 years. The menu will remain the same, though the bar will expand with additional drink offerings. The new owners say they have no intention of messing with the heart and formula of what made their family restaurant such a treasured institution.

    “Jennifer and I grew up in that restaurant, so it’s an honor to be a part of something that now my own kids can grow up in,” Charles Attal said. “We will continue to bestow the same respect upon it that David and the rest of our cousins have since day one.”

    El Patio will be open 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Sunday.

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    11 min
  • H.E.B. takeover of Tarrytown Randalls

    University of Texas System regents voted unanimously Tuesday to authorize the system’s staff to negotiate a lease with grocery company H-E-B for 2.6 acres on the UT-owned Brackenridge Tract in West Austin. The parcel at the intersection of Lake Austin and Exposition boulevards has been leased by Randalls for a grocery store since 1977.

    The university sought proposals and bids last year for leasing the parcel and a nearby half-acre parcel occupied by a 7-Eleven convenience store, as the leases on those parcels are scheduled to expire May 30 and May 31, respectively. The regents authorized negotiations to renew the lease with 7-Eleven, and financial terms with that company and H-E-B were not disclosed given that negotiations have not been completed.

    “H-E-B is thrilled to be awarded the opportunity to bring a long-awaited store to West Austin at 715 Exposition Blvd.,” the company said Wednesday in a statement provided by spokeswoman Leslie Sweet. “The process now begins to engage with the city of Austin, University of Texas, community leaders and neighbors to ensure we provide our future customers with a state-of-the-art shopping experience that will be a welcome addition to the West Austin community.”

    The company did not elaborate. Nor did it say whether it plans to build a new store or occupy the existing one, although the former seems more likely.

    Lease proceeds benefit the UT-Austin campus.

    Muny and Red River

    In other action, the regents agreed to extend the city of Austin’s lease on 141 acres of the 350-acre Brackenridge Tract for operating Lions Municipal Golf Course, also known as Muny, by a year, to May 25, 2020. The same extension was approved for the Brackenridge Development Agreement with the city, which established building standards for commercial development on other portions of the tract.

    The regents also voted to work out an agreement with the city to straighten portions of Red River Street through campus to accommodate construction of a new arena for basketball games, concerts and other events. That move also will make way for expansion of the Dell Medical School when UT tears down its existing multipurpose arena, the Erwin Center.

    The regents’ actions regarding Red River Street, Muny and the development agreement were expected since the Austin City Council approved its end of the bargain on those matters Feb. 7.

    The regents also firmed up plans to construct a new, $40.4 million building at UT’s Applied Research Laboratories in North Austin. The three-story building, with office and work space, will be adjacent to and connected with the existing building. The laboratories, at UT’s Pickle Research Campus, conduct extensive research for the federal government, including work in acoustics and sonar for the Navy.

    And UT’s athletics director, Chris Del Conte, will get a $200,000 annual raise as a result of a consent agenda item approved by the regents. The length of his contract, which runs through the 2023-24 athletic year, was not changed. With the raise, his base pay for the current athletic year is $1.54 million.

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    5 min

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