Thursday night in Dallas marks a very significant event for the city. An occurrence that the storied streets of the Metroplex have never experienced. Downright historical, some would say. People will be arriving from all over just to see it. You know what I'm talking about... that's right! Shellac is playing Sons of Herman Hall in Deep Ellum. This is unprecedented in Shellac's thirteen or so years as a group. And to top off this Dallas first, they will be joined by the greatest existing band to claim roots here: The New Year. This show will feature two bands who are almost entire genres unto themselves.

For those who might not know, The New Year continued where Dallas legends Bedhead left off. Bedhead is considered by many to be one of the most important bands of the last decade, and The New Year continues to carry on in their tradition without being overshadowed by or repititious of their own past. The New Year is a dynamically different outfit than Bedhead, which is evident on both their debut "Newness Ends," and the followup"The End is Near". The tempos are increased, the guitars are crunchier, and yet for all the added rocking, they can still pull off gorgeous open passages like no other band. Bubba Kadane, along with brother Matt, are the principle songwriters of The New Year, and Bubba was an integral part of putting tonight's show together since he is the only official member of The New Year who still lives in Dallas. Some of you bands might also know him as one of the owners of Acme CD, who's client list includes many local and national acts. He was kind enough to answer 7 1/2 questions for We Shot JR:

Since you are maybe the only Dallas area resident that can answer this question, how does being on Touch & Go for the better part of a decade compare to being on Trance Syndicate in the Nineties? And do you miss Trance or maybe the era it existed in?

Touch and Go always did all manufacturing and distribution for Trance. I kind of feel like we have always been on Touch and Go in a way.

You run a compact disc duplication company called Acme CD in Exposition Park. Acme is widely known as having really high (internationally recognized) standards. I've heard that some bands have balked at your strict requirements such as images having to be 300 d.p.i. and up etc. Most of the work that comes out of Acme seems to avoid what I refer to as the "local look". What do you think makes Acme different from other CD duplicators around town?

Our customers definitely appreciate the care that we take to make sure that everything looks its best on a CD package. I would feel negligent if I didn't let people know everything that I have learned over the years. High resolution images are certainly not a"requirement" to place an order with us. We are just trying to be helpful when we let someone know that their print might not look how they hope that it will if they use low resolution files. Any time I have anyone do any work for me I certainly hope that they are looking for red flags on my behalf and that they let me know about any problems that they find.

I was surprised to see that The New Year had a track featured on "The O.C.". I know this has been a boost to other bands, but it seems like no matter how many great records you've put out or how much both of your bands have accomplished, you still seem to exist in this grey area of mild popularity. Do you feel that having a track featured on the show helped raise the band's profile, and would you recommend it to other bands if they were presented with such an oppurtunity?

The only thing it really helped raise was our bank account balance.We went over budget making "The End is Near" and the check from The OC paid for the excess amount that we spent almost to the penny. It was a rare lucky break for us.

One of the last Bedhead Releases was a split with Macha. I remember hearing that you and your brother Matt traded tapes back and forth by mail with Macha to write the record. Are you and Matt forced to work this way with each other now that he lives in the Northeast?

Matt and I have worked that way since 1994 when he first moved from Texas to NY. We always get together at various points throughout the year to make demos together, though.

I'm assuming the nature of running Acme as well being in a band keeps you very busy. It seems as if Matt was all over the place in the past few years playing with not only The New Year, but Consonant and the late and lamented Silkworm. Do you ever yearn to start other musical endeavors or are you opposed to side projects?

I am not opposed to other musical projects. Matt and I have done some soundtrack work and we may do some more later this year. In August we are planning to go into the studio with Josh and Misch McKay from Macha, who we have been friends with, and played music with, since we were kids. I have no idea what will come of that, if anything, but we have been working on music for it.

"The End is Near" was recorded and mixed partly at Electrical Audio in Chicago and partly at the EchoLab in Argyle, TX. Will the next record be done completely in Texas or will you split the process again?

I have never been more satisfied with the productionof a record of ours than I am with "The End is Near." First of all, you can't beat tracking with Steve [Albini] at Electrical. It is the ultimate. Secondly, I liked the freedom of mixing each song over the course of a few days, which was possible because the Echo Lab is local. I have no idea how we will do the next record, though.

Getting Shellac to play Texas might be the most shocking result of a negotiation since Jesse Jackson convinced Slobodan Miloševic to release U.S. Prisoners of War. Can you give me any insight on how you managed this?

About 4-5 years ago Steve asked Matt and I if we thought that Shellac would have good shows in Texas and said that he wanted to come here. It just grew naturally from there.

Pick the more dubious term: "Shoegaze", "Slowcore" or ...Beardcore

i totally took pictures of this guys house.

"Correction. They played my favorite song, Psychosomatica, from Transaction de Novo."

They didn't play any Bedhead songs at any of these recent shows, and The New Year has never played "Psychosomatica".

oh sweet! Everyone click on the link above, it must be awesome and shit! THNX! :-)

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"the new year played the end's not near, disease, chinese handcuffs, plan b, age of conceit, 18...i'm horrible at remembering more. and, sigh, no bedhead songs."

Correction. They played my favorite song, Psychosomatica, from Transaction de Novo. First time I remember hearing a recorded song in 5/4 that was not Take 5 by Dave Brubeck Quintet.

I'm finally back at my friend's house after taking in The New Year & Shellac again tonight at Emo's. Another great set by both bands & the crowd was immense and energetic, despite the swelter. I need to sleep now...Riverboat Gamblers/The Arm, etc...tonight, plus more shenanigans, I'm sure.

if you like the new year,
listen to macha
the first record is golden.

http://www.emusic.com/album/10588/10588992.html

the "four roaring guitars" was in reference to the last amazing song, "18".

http://www.fwweekly.com/files/2006-06-07/feature_pic2_6-7.jpg

Yeah that show started too late and went on too long. I only noticed the crowd thinning out near the very end as it creeped towards 1am though. Hell, I don't blame them. Long nite and some of us folks get up real early for work. I was waning near the end, it's not like Shellac's stuff sounds super-varied. It's about as repetitve and same sounding as what the New Year get accused of, but they are just louder and more exciting, definitely more of a crowd pleaser and Bob Weston was funny as hell.

Still, I enjoyed the New Year set more... but I like snorecore, snoozecore or whatever people want to deride it as. I find that quadruple guitar interplay real interesting.

"Four roaring guitars blew me away."

Are you kidding? I left after 5 or 6 songs, so maybe I missed something at the end- but there wasn't anything "roaring" about what I saw.

Not sure about some people leaving early, but we had to sadly. My wife and I were only there for Shellac. The tickets stated the show starts at 9pm. Well, as usual with Mike and Sons they never let people in on time, and the line takes way too long. I don't think people were allowed upstairs until around 10:00. Of course, TNY started around 10:30 and played too
long. Shellac started at who knows 11:45 or so. With a babysitter we just had to leave around 12:40.
Since both bands are around 40 years old I thought things might end early, but no such luck.
So, maybe a good portion of the crowd had work early Friday and family life to get back to.

I had to miss this show. So the crowd left during Shellac's set. I am glad I did not have to witness this. That is just messed up. I noticed that The Observer only made a passing referance to Shellac in their show preview. I believe this was the first show Albini has played in Texas since Big Black. The Big Black song "Texas" explains why. I guess the indie kids around prefer boring snorecore to anything with some guts. I guess Albini had valid reasons for hating Texas.

The New Year is an OK indie band. They don't suck, but they are kind of boring live. Raging guitars might be a little bit of an exageration. Shellac on the other hand. WOW!!! Not even remotely boring. Great show!!!

"These guys at The Observer treat them like the second coming jesus. Out of all of the great music to come out in the past decade or so these guys are reffered to as the most "important". Sounds to me like these so-called journalist are either really boring people or just need to expand their listening."

You nailed it with "so-called journalists". Take a johnny come lately out of the record store he's working in and plant him smack behind Wilonsky's ass with a happy pucker on his lips and presto- a new music editor is born.
It was funny to see a good portion of the crowd leave during Shellac because they had no idea why they were even there. The Observer told them to go! Why do people go to see bands in hopes that they're going to dredge up an old bands setlist? Totally different band.

Don't believe the printed hype.

I loved bedhead, and still do, but it is more of a personal love for the band, I really don't consider them the most important band of any decade, but they were great, as for the new year, I think its pretty good stuff, but doesn't quite measure up to any of the bedhead stuff.

the new year played the end's not near, disease, chinese handcuffs, plan b, age of conceit, 18...i'm horrible at remembering more. and, sigh, no bedhead songs.

"the most inactivity i've ever seen out of four guitarists"?! are you fucking serious? did you hear how awesome "18" was? four roaring guitars blew me away.

as for weshotjr "dissing" them at wall of sound, well, they do have more than one writer. "defensive listening" has good taste.

I loved that New Year set myself...

the new year played the end's not near, disease, chinese handcuffs, plan b, age of conceit, 18...i'm horrible at remembering more. and, sigh, no bedhead songs.

"the most inactivity i've ever seen out of four guitarists"?! are you fucking serious? did you hear how awesome "18" was? four roaring guitars blew me away.

as for weshotjr "dissing" them at wall of sound, well, they do have more than one writer. "defensive listening" has good taste.

The New year bores the hell out of me too. Way overrated. I dug the early Bedhead stuff, but they became a one trick pony real fast. The New Year is only a slight alteration to that trick. These guys at The Observer treat them like the second coming jesus. Out of all of the great music to come out in the past decade or so these guys are reffered to as the most "important". Sounds to me like these so-called journalist are either really boring people or just need to expand their listening. Funny how weshotjr was dissing The New Year just a few months ago for Wall of Sound.hmmmmmm?

i would love to see more shows at sons of herman hall if they would just do two simple things:

1. Start accepting CREDIT CARDS. Land-sakes! the lines for people paying cash for every single beer make you miss huge chunks of the show.

2. start hosting more local shows for less than $10! there's only a handful of local bands with big enough egos to even play a show there for $10, salim n. for one.

thanks for listening, defensively.

Shellac rocked. The New Year are terrible.

TNY bored the hell out of me. I can halfway understand why people would like them, but even so.. that was the most inactivity I've ever seen out of four guitarists.

what did TNY's setlist look like last night?

Thank you so much for writing this and for the interview. Yes, Bedhead was the most important band of the last decade. They are absolutely unclassifiable and stand alone. The show last night was amazing and I did the geeky fan thing by introducing myself to some of the members. I have seen every Bedhead and The New Year show (in DFW) within the last 11 years. Thanks for giving them their due. Too many people do not know about them.

yeeahhh- kinda saw that coming from a mile away as soon as they started taking questions..

Regardless- fuckin' rad show.

Quote of the night: Bob from Shellac, fielding questions from the audience. When asked how long of a trip it was to Texas, his response was "15 years." Classic.

According to Mike Snider, The New Year will start at 10:30 at the latest, more likely 10. Sorry, Mavs fans.

I'm going. This should be one of the year's best.

It does not appear to be sold out as of right now...

http://tickets.frontgatetickets.com/choose.php?pl=76&lid=5657

Think it's gonna be sold out?

Unreal show for only $12.

I love using the word "important" to describe bands. I do it mainly to piss my friends off who hate all music that is not grindcore.

most important band of the last decade????

i think your timing is a little off on this one.

you always gotta throw in that word, "important" though...

it's important.

This promises to be an amazing show. And I happen to be in Austin Friday, so may take them in twice. Fun, fun!