.: A Giant Dog

May 24, 2016

Previewage: A Giant Dog, Black Beach, Zip-Tie Handcuffs, The Dazies | O'Brien's Pub | 25 May

People have a lot of good things to say about the bombastic live show put on by Austin's A Giant Dog, and for good reason, so obviously attending tomorrow night's show at O'Brien's in Allston Rock City is the best idea you've had in a while. Fewer people (it feels like) seem to be talking about the garagey quintet's flagrantly fun new long-player Pile, released May 6 on Merge, and that warrants redress. A Giant Dog's greatest strength -- it's magic, in a sense, because we're not sure how they do it -- is that it makes all the trite tropes of rock and roll feel fun again. It did so on its similarly monosyllabic 2013 debut Bone, and it does so again -- with apparent ease -- on the new platter. Big hooks like those spangling the tune "Sex & Drugs" certainly help, as does the winking, but not cutesy, self-awareness in fronter Sabrina Ellis' lyrics. The latter gives the songs greater dimension than one might expect on paper. Better still, the new songs are unrelenting and anthemic. Tales of excess set to fuzzy guitars, popping rhythms and pounding piano are the order of the day, and there's just enough weirdness -- like, how do they make that constantly stumbling snare cadence work within the big-swinging rhythm of "& Rock & Roll" -- to give Pile a singular sound even as the band figuratively wraps its collective arms around glam, punk and garage signifiers and draws them close for a big, sweaty hug.

While the touring top-liners are certainly noteworthy, the slate of supporting acts is nothing to sneeze at (what the fuck does that even mean?). Fuzz-blasting now-band Black Beaches, punk mainstays Zip-Tie Handcuffs and power-pop purveyors The Dazies lead the charge, perhaps even in that order, and we suggest arriving early, staying late, hoovering the Uber, videoing the whole thing with your video cassette recorder on the Super Long Play setting, or whatever it is that the kids do these days. The A Giant Dog juggernaut rolls through the American Southeast through June 3, and the band also has additional festival dates on the books; the full list of shows of which we are aware is below. Below that, make sure to hit the embeds to hear the delicious rock sounds of all four bands performing tomorrow night. Longtime readers will recall we spoke to A Giant Dog back in 2013 for our stop-and-go Show Us Yours feature about band practice spaces. Check the band out in episode 14 right here.

05.26 -- New York, NY –- Cake Shop
05.27 -- Brooklyn, NY –- Our Wicked Lady
05.29 -- Richmond, VA –- Strange Matter
05.31 -- Chapel Hill, NC -– Local 506
06.01 -- Atlanta, GA –- The Earl
06.02 -- Nashville, TN -– Queen Ave
06.03 -- Memphis, TN –- Hi Tone
06.11 -- New Braunfels, TX -– Dia De Los Toadies
07.09 -- Columbus, OH –- 4th & 4th Fest
09.08 -- Raleigh, NC –- Hopscotch Music Festival

A Giant Dog: Bandcamp | Faceblorp
Black Beach: Bandcamp | Faceblorp
Zip-Tie Handcuffs: Bandcamp | Faceblorp
The Dazies: Bandcamp | Faceblorp

April 30, 2013

Show Us Yours #14: A Giant Dog

A Giant Dog's Practice Space, Superpop, Austin, Texas

[Yes, somehow, miraculously, after a four-year hiatus, we are resuscitating our ancient feature Show Us Yours, wherein Clicky Clicky asks notable bands about where they make their magic: their practice spaces. It has always fascinated us to no end to see where bands spend their time shaping their sound, and that curiosity has only intensified now that we're 10 years removed from playing in our last (relatively) serious band. Let's dig in. -- Ed.].

We were compelled to check in on Austin-based garage punks A Giant Dog earlier this month after listening to their completely arresting new collection Bone three times in a row. With our inbox constantly overflowing, we don't ever listening to *anything* three times in a row these days -- unless it's a vinyl 12" we're too lazy to pull of the turntable -- so we knew the quintet was one worth digging into a little deeper. Bone, a melodic and driving collection of shouty garage-rock anthems, was issued two weeks ago on Tic Tac Totally and the quintet is out on the road this month promoting its release. Indeed, A Giant Dog will perform at O'Brien's Pub in Allston Rock City this coming Sunday on an insane bill with Earthquake Party, Idiot Genes and Ex-Magicians. Not only is that Cinco De Mayo, but, well, this band is awesome, so if you are fortunate enough / young enough / stupid enough to use Cinco De Mayo as a reason to be out drinking on a Sunday night, why not smarten up for a second and see a kick-ass band while you are at it. We were fortunate to be able to wrangle A Giant Dog fronter Sabrina Ellis to share a little bit about the good-looking practice space pictured above, as well as the optimal activity to accompany listening to A Giant Dog's concise rockers and the band's potential demise (that last one, not really). Bone, A Giant Dog's second full-length, is available now via Midheaven right here, and we've embedded a stream of the entire album below the interview. If you need to be sold on the record before diving in, we suggest starting with the fiery, completely non-P.C. album closer "Teasin' Ass Bitch." Bon appetit!

Clicky Clicky: So why do you use this space?

Sabrina Ellis: This space is my husband Seth's recording studio [Superpop! -- Ed.] and also side B of our duplex. We bought the place condemned and turned it into a recording studio. A Giant Dog practices here because it is paid for and we're a bunch of broke-asses. Also, the air-conditioning doesn't hurt.

CC: Is there an idiosyncracy or quirk of the space that has affected one of your songs, or even your overall sound?

SE: The violent orange of the walls has us writing some disturbing material lately. Horny and deranged material. Our former space was the garage at the Giant Dog House. The garage is definitely what gave us our garage sound. The garage is like the vagina of a house. The hot, dark place where music embryos grow.

CC: You walk into your space. What's the first thing you smell?

SE: Incense. To cover the weed smell. Because The Bad Lovers were just recording in here. There's also this awesome, musky, old tube amp smell at Superpop.

CC: I remember a friend telling me about 20 years ago that the perfect rock song length was the amount of time it took to smoke a cigarette. I think at the time he pegged that at about three-and-a-half minutes... which, now that I think about it, seems kind of fast. But he was a heavy smoker. Anyway, most of your songs are around two minutes long. What's the perfectly suited activity to accompany one's listening to a single song from the new record?

SE: At about two minutes each, our songs are perfectly timed for a young man's first sexual encounter.

CC: You're out on the road for a couple weeks. Besides the tour, what do the next six months look like for the band?

SE: Pretty bleak, to tell you the truth. I sense a huge falling-out between the members of A Giant Dog on this tour. We wont be able to handle the pressure or the fame. Decade-long friendships are about to be torn apart on this bitch. We'll get a little crazy one night and do and say some things we'll regret. We wont be able to look each other in the face anymore. The next 6 months will see us on individual downward spirals, wondering what went wrong. Common story. What a shame.