Oct 3: Billy Joe @ Waterloo, David Garza @The Cactus 

Oct 3: Billy Joe @ Waterloo, David Garza @The Cactus

Monday was a big day. And a fun day. And it totally fit my budget and my musical appetite.

I had heard that Billy Joe Shaver was playing a free in-store performance at Waterloo Records---one of the coolest record stores anywhere. I also heard there was going to be free beer. Free beer and free music legend? Even though the concert was taking place at 5pm, the exact wrong time to be out in traffic in Austin, I knew i had to be there. I didn't exactly expect there to be free beer, but a free Billy Joe mini-concert was reason enough to convince me to get to Austin at about 4pm.

I had thought it was going to be a solo acoustic performance, and it was acoustic, but not solo. He had his band Diamondback with him. A pretty large crowd of people had gathered in the aisles at Waterloo by the time Billy and the boys took the stage. The owner of Waterloo, gave Billy a nice introduction, and said the beer wasn't here yet, and then the band started playing. They sounded great. They started out with "Heart of Texas" and then played some songs from the new album. I figured it would be mostly new songs, but they threw in a number of other songs which were great.
In addition to the new songs, which sounded superb acoustic, they also played "Live Forever"--one of the most perfect songs ever, "Jesus Christ is still the king", "try and try again", and maybe another older song or two.

The beer people showed up at about the second song, and it was perfect. A free Billy Joe performance, and free beverages. Seriously--- does it get any better?

Billy Joe Shaver and the band played acoustic for about 45 minutes, and it sounded great---every minute of it.

After that, I headed got some food, and then headed up the road to catch a free show by David Garza at the Cactus Cafe. I love the Cactus Cafe. It might just be my favorite listenening room anywhere. They get sound incredible musicians there, and the sound is always tremendous. I'd heard good hype on David (pronounced 'Dah-veed'), but didn't know anything about him really. I was looking forward to seeing him, and anticipated a laid back, acoustic, singer songwriter set. Holy crap. I was totally wrong. DG and band were totally rockin. They were loud and raucous and the fans loved it. I'd never seen people dance at the Cactus before. People danced at this show. Lots of them. Mostly ladies. Ladies apparently love David Garza. Everyone in there seemed to love David Garza. It was like i had crashed a private party, and was the only one not in the know. but i didn't tell anyone. I pretended i knew what i was doing. And i enjoyed it. Quite a bit actually. The second song of the night was a song called "Discoball World" which sent the crowd into a frenzy, and made me quite happy as well. I'd heard that song before, but never knew who sang it. And the version monday night was a lot more rockin than the version i heard on the radio once or twice. I need that song. I need a live version of it maybe.

The second set was more subdued than the first. There were some guest stars. The love-fest between crowd and performer continued. I'd been out for awhile, and unfortunately had to leave early, and didn't get to see all of his second set. But i enjoyed all the music i saw that night.
When he comes around again, I'm pretty sure i'll go check him out again.