City of Songs

-How can I help you?

-Well, I wanted migas taco on corn.

I'm ordering it anyway.. -And for you, sir?

Thank you.

Sir.

-Best migas in town.

-It sure is.

You see that?

I saw that.

The whole string cheese, commercial grade.

-His poetry was born here!

There's a special kind of magic.

In seeing your hometown with fresh eyes.

Leaving and coming back.

It resets something deep inside of you.

And suddenly your corner coffee shop feels sacred.

And breakfast tacos taste like home.

After traveling around the world and now returning home.

I'm here to soak it in.

And for me, this homecoming hits different.

I'm seven months pregnant.

Yeah.

Surprise!

I was growing a human while filming most of this season.

And now standing here, I'm wondering how life, my life and my music are going to change.

But with any big shift in life, it's helpful to turn to community for a little reflection.

I'm excited to visit with a few dear friends who also happen to make some of my favorite music to reflect on what Austin was and what it's becoming to consider resilience and adaptation amongst profound change.

I was raised as the first son of a ceremonial chief in Nigeria, and his title was Nchanwu Chebe Oha which is the umbrella that protects the people.

-Kalu James immigrated to Austin from Nigeria with a dream to find a sound all his own.

Kalu and the Electric Joint is that sound a mix of Afrobeat, rock and soul into something psychedelic and alive.

[music] Garden!

-I feel like as artists, as creatives, you're always going against the grain of a society that's telling you, why don't you do something?

Why don't you get a job?

Why don't you always trying to validate, right?

Or saying that it's trivial to be an artist.

Exactly, and then also as an as a Nigerian, as an immigrant, it's like the idea that you're doing something out of passion for your job or your career is like, get real, man. But then you had Health Alliance for Austin Musicians saying, you can get health care and dental and all these health services just by being an artist -And what you do matters.

And I remember seeing that in New York and saying, that's that's where that's where I want to be. I didn't have a job or like, it was on the promise of a couch like my friend Ola.

I was like, listen, I am subletting with these other people and they are fine with you sleeping on the couch.

And I remember just looking in my car and I was like, I am going to Austin and if you get me there, -Were good.

I'm going to write you a song.

I wrote it to the car!

[music] Please, oh please.

Car dont die.

Weve got more hundred miles to cruise.

Im Austin bound, got my feelings checked at the door.

-How much of Austin do you think is responsible for your ability to evolve and to have grown?

You know, they always say location, location, location. It's, it has a huge part in that.

But I know that it also comes back to who I was able to meet, the people I'm able to interact with, their philosophies in life.

There's your work, and then there is the community that is that's that's the one thing we get.

I don't know what it would be if I was if I didn't make that, you know, that jump to sleep on that couch in 07.

I got big news.

What's what's the news?

I'm pregnant.

No way!

No!

[music] Can you stay a little longer?

Kelsey Wilson co-founded the beloved Austin band Wild Child back in 2010.

She wrote some of the songs that basically soundtracked Austin's youth over the past decade.

And now she's fronting Sur Woman, a new, more soulful and personal project to her that's totally exploded in the last few years.

[singing] When the lights are faded low, you look so pretty.

And theres no one you dont know at party city.

-Watching her grow reminds me you're allowed to reinvent yourself, and it can be beautiful to witness all the courage it takes to do so.

Cuties.

How long ago was that?

-Memory lane.

Anybody in the friend group could come and find a childhood photo of themselves on your fridge.

-Yeah, isnt that weird?

-I am curious, when you wrote your first song that you liked.

I like that addition to the question.

that you liked. -Because it's a big thing where you can write a song, but then.

Yeah, like, this is good.

They all started as jokes for me, so it took a while.

Like, I thought it was funny trying to convince my parents to get me a cat or like, get out of trouble.

That's what music started out as.

I didn't get you a mother's day present, but I wrote you this song. But a couple of years after that, I started falling in love.

The version, the version of it you have at that time.

And then I started writing songs about how I was feeling and utilized it for myself.

And that's probably when it started meaning more to me.

I was like, oh, this isn't just a funny tool.

It's for anything that you're feeling.

[music] Its not giving in.

when youre letting go, if youre thinking about taking the highroad, I can tell you that youre doing it wrong.

-A friend of mine had started going to Texas State in San Marcos, and she randomly met this drummer named Carrie.

This is my first semester in college.

Carrie hit me up and said, we need a string player for this tour at seven weeks.

We leave next week.

And I was like, okay, I'm going to drop out of college.

And then in that bus I met Alexander, who's the co frontman of Wild Child, and he was writing these little ukulele jingles.

And I kind of started putting jokes on top of them like I do.

And they just kind of became songs.

And then it just like worked.

I don't know how it happened, but I do think it's because of Austin and it's because of the community we were in, how supportive everybody was.

Like, the whole band consisted of just whatever friend was around.

It wasn't even like, we need cello, we need trombone, we need banjos.

All that's random.

It's just whatever our friends played.

[music] Wait around all day.

Id wait around all day.

I do think that there's a part of being an artist.

Where there's the next stage that you and I kind of went through at the same time of having, like, a little bit of a dark night of the soul of identity crisis in terms of what you want to make creatively.

When you follow the flow like that.

It is very easy to, like, forget what you actually want to make and why you started to make things in the beginning, Right before you started.

Sir Woman, right before I started actually playing Buffalo Hunt.

We were both in these other projects and realizing that we had more that we wanted to do creatively.

We'd have all these conversations about being scared -All the time!

-About being band leaders -Yeah.

-And then because there's a different vulnerability of stepping into more of control.

If you have a writing partner, a co frontman, which you did and I did, you have this ultimate safety net of like, it almost feels like if someone doesn't like it, they wrote it like it's just a weird, like subconscious safety net.

But yeah, when it's just you and you're calling all the shots, and you also want to honor the ability and creativity of all the people making the music with you, but you still want it to be a very specific way, but you want everyone to feel included and utilized.

It's totally different.

-No, I don't know.

don't Do Forever. Oh, you love that one.

It's like a junior high dance song.

I don't know Who You Dont Love Oh, you're going to love that one.

Rebound?

Its a love song for yourself.

Rebound is all Love and Basketball.

references.

Love that movie.

So good.

-How would you say that?

Austin music scene has changed or remained the same in terms of how it helps musicians?

It still feels like the same supportive city though.

Like it moves so fast and it latches on to so many bands that it feels like you can go on tour for a summer, like a festival season, and you come back and there's a whole new set of bands you've never heard of that are all really good.

When you can catch a good show almost every night of the week.

Somehow the city is holding that energy, which is really impressive.

-Where the magic happens.

-I know.

-Red River.

-Red River, baby.

[music] Someday when my life has passed me by... -Carrie Fussell, AKA Bruce, is a woman like no other.

She's been one of the most avant garde voices in Austin for years.

[music] Slipping through time, where the something meets the nothing.

-Her shows feel like fever dreams.

You don't want to wake up from.

Cinematic and wild, but somehow still tender and real.

Carrie is proof to me that even as the city changes, the spirit of Austin still lives in its artists.

-Does this look crazy to you in Austin, or how long have you lived here?

To be honest, like, it kind of always looked like this to me because I came from such a small town that I was like - Sometimes I still get teary when I like, drive in to town and like, see the skyline.

I'm like, I cant believe I live in a city! Carrie!

[singing] Perfect stranger I need you to see me.

-I think it can seem like what you're doing is effortless, because when you're on stage, you're, like, just captivating.

And so in it, you felt like you were seeing something really special and like, oh, nobody knows about this yet. which - Shhhhhh!

[laughing] I just think that that's so important to let yourself recreate yourself.

I wonder how much of living in Austin do you think has, like, nurture that ability within you?

I feel like Austin was like my permission city.

It was like, you get to do this and be this and like, I know that I wouldn't be the person and the musician, certainly that I am without living in this city.

It's special to me.

It's just like my life gets to be so full of art and variety, like and color and like new things.

Things I've never done before and never heard of before.

I get to do them and it's cool.

-I feel like you embody the spirit of the city.

Wow!

-You really do!

You hear that?

You hear that?

Its her!

[music] Im in need of a little adventure.

Ill go swimming in my family water pitcher.

-Of course, not.

Everything about Austin's growth feels good.

The cost of living has basically tripled over the past 15 years.

And that crushes the artists who built the heartbeat of this place.

Tameca Jones, the queen of Austin's soul, knows this grind better than anyone.

She's been named Musician of the Year, Songwriter of the Year, and she's fought to stay standing in a city that's seemingly pushing musicians out.

She's proof that holding your ground is an act of revolution, and she's not afraid to tell you about it.

When you get on stage, do you are you nervous because you just give it all?

You lay it all out.

Well, I'm always nervous.

I actually get nervous if I'm not nervous because I'm like, if you're not nervous, you don't care.

I kind of feel like, yeah, like there's something at risk.

And that's why you're nervous.

I try to shift it to, like, this is good that I'm nervous.

[music] -It was a couple of years ago.

You said, like, I'm quitting music.

I'm moving to L.A. Yes, I was going to retire.

Broke my heart.

I was like, okay, as your friend, I support you.

But, you know, Ill miss you.

L.A. was so hard.

And I think my mindset, I have a negative mindset.

Playing the victim because I. Oh, black woman in Austin.

It's so hard to get ahead, but I think you are a product of your circumstances and your drive.

And I know I try to get a quick fix by moving to L.A. thinking the grass would be greener.

It was not.

The grass...

There's no grass there.

[laughing] Austin has so much money, and they could be so much better at helping artists.

A few of my friends have gotten grants, and those grants requires us to create proposals.

Like, what?

Youre working.

I mean, and shows, its like well, then you're not getting paid to play the show...

Right!

The grant is you're getting paid to play a show, right?

You know, and you just have to evolve as artists and not just and not just depend on live music, because you will you will starve.

You will starve.

That's all you depend on, right?

It's so hard.

It's true.

I think that that needs to be voiced.

You know, there's this thing.

It's a real thing.

I don't know how to counteract that.

I guess this, makes this, plight visible.

Because I think a lot of people don't don't know how much we're suffering.

Yeah.

How we have to move far away for affordable housing.

I would probably have to do that.

I'm sorry.

It's okay.

Eventually.

And I don't want the artists to have to leave, because that is the magic of it, right?

Yeah, I've had to be my own agent.

My own manager.

My my own promoter.

I've learned so many hats.

And that's one of the reasons why I moved to L.A.. Because, like, my neck was breaking.

Bring all these hats.

Because there's very little industry here to help us.

Get ahead.

[music] Sleep.

Flying on wings of mercy.

I wait on your sweet kiss to bring me peace.

My red eyes are tired from battling the hours.

So sinking deeper each minute that goes by.

Im drowning... We want to collaborate, We want to incubate.

We want to innovate.

Austin is a city that hasn't done a lot for people of color -And then there's Shaka frontman of Writers Against the Storm, an award-winning hip hop group here who turned heartbreak into healing.

He started DAWA, a cultural center offering creative space and community care, especially for artists of color hit hardest by the rapid gentrification of our city.

When you walk through DAWAs doors, you feel it.

That medicine of belonging.

-I got commissioned by Cap Metro, which is the bus company here, for a Juneteenth bus.

They wanted me to design something, and everything I had seen was kind of, like, very, like, historical.

Like, this happened in 18 etc... and I just really wanted to do something very colorful and very vibrant and something inspiring because I know, like, if there's a black person from Austin that's going to see this, I want them to feel a certain type of way.

-It's really powerful that you have taken action yourself and you are, you know, like Gandhi, being the change that you want to see. like, you're not going to do it, I'm going to do it.

Yeah, it's a little crazy sometimes.

Yeah.

But I wonder what makes you want to stay in Austin and and fight this fight.

I was raised by African storytellers and former Black Panthers and community organizers.

It's like I was just raised in a way where it's like, no, you.

You confront, the oppression of the powers that be.

Yeah.

That you figure out your way and you don't separate your art from community.

Right?

Art is here to benefit the community.

You know, I started in 2019, basically because I was in a previous position because I had to stay in a sustainable career that we had built from the ground up.

I can now sit around and see when I can get back.

Right.

-That's where DAWA comes from.

In Swahili It means medicine. And the acronym is Diversity, Awareness and Wellness in Action.

And the key is the action part.

Because this city, like I said, is progressively, destroying people's lives, through the policy in the city.

And so there's a direct correlation between the city saying.

Oh, were the live music capital of the world and people coming here and feel like this is the place they want to stay, and the displacement of an entire demographic of people, especially when a lot of the roots of the live music capital of the world here come from the blues music.

You want to hear about the struggle, but you don't want to, you know, help people get out of the struggle.

You know, and if it's not dealing with dollars and cents and it's just it's just talk.

[music] Can't help the world with nuclear arms.

Can't stop the bombs with all this charm.

-Yeah I love being in this space because I feel like I could do anything here.

You know people can come in and they can record.

They doing podcasts are doing live streaming, theyre doing performances free of charge if they're BIPOC person or BIPOC-led organization.

So I want people that have energy like me to feel like they have a place, and they could come any day of the week and be a part of something like immediately.

So if you just moved here or you just found out about us, you're going to feel comfortable.

I think it's so important because Austin needs that definitely.

I totally agree.

[music] Well it is 3 o clock in the morning cant even close my eyes.

It is 3 o clock in the morning, babe.

cant even close my eyes.

Another effect of Austin's growth is that a lot of artists are moving just outside of the city to places like Lockhart, which has become a creative haven for ex-Austinites.

Tele Novela, one of my favorite bands, made the move.

Their lead singer, Natalie Ribbons, opened a vintage shop on the square, and they have quickly adapted to the joys of small town living.

-So had you already moved to Lockhart then?

Yeah.

When you opened the we moved here and we like bought a piece of property in 2015.

Okay.

So you can on the front end of Austin people moving here.

-Yeah.

It felt like that.

We knew of a couple people that had moved here.

But it definitely all our friends were like y'all are crazy!

-Right.

For moving to Lockhart.

And now I hear that you're kind of like the mayor.

[laughing] -Word on the street says...

But I actually usually say that Natalie is the mayor.

Also like the idea of Lockhart.

And this place is so cute and esthetically pleasing.

And I see that also in your music, and your band telenovela, that there's a real esthetic appeal to what you do.

How much would you say consciously esthetics play into your creative life?

-Yeah, I think it's pretty conscious.

I mean, we do like cute things and decorating and vintage clothes, obviously.

I think that it's pretty tied in.

-Yeah.

-And we think about that a lot with like making music videos for the songs and creating more of a whole world instead of just the music aspect of it.

[music] You hope some things will never die.

-I think that I think about music in terms of like atmosphere.

You know, that's the area where I feel like I excel.

And so definitely embedding that music with a certain style or atmosphere is really important.

And so pulling from Lockhart and the sort of small town life was pretty key to to Tele Novela, -There's a real teleportation into like a different time period and you can feel your love for it, but it also feels new, you know.

-Thats so nice to hear.

-Its true!

And I think that that's something about being an artist is you get to share your lens but then redefine it, you know.

[music[] Well you could have it all, but But where would you put it?

-My plate options are here.

I got brisket, chopped beef, chicken turkey or ham and three sides.

-Jonathan Terrell's another one of the artists who has made the move to Lockhart, JT, as his friends call him, writes beautiful and classic songs that could be defined as country with a twist.

His effortless style is both genre defying and incredibly cool.

How long have you and Kristine been living in Lockhart?

A year and a half.

Okay, yeah.

It has been so chill and, like, literally shaved a layer of stress off that I didn't really know that I walked around with.

Like, stress while living in Austin?

Yeah, just traffic or, like, just kind of the daily buzz of the city.

Here is just like.

Like I don't drive above 35 miles an hour.

Why would you?

I mean, I do that in the cityk I just get honked at.

[music] So color me lucky.

Color me free.

I always feel like the most punk rock s*** thats happening is like when somebody writes a song by themselves and it's something that they can.

They've just experienced, and it's just like, they like bleed it.

Because those songs to me, I felt like they lasted for decades.. -Right.

You know, I'd talk about this to my management when we first started, like getting together, you know, had a couple opportunities to kind of take the low road and do kind of a quick overnight thing.

And I told, you know, I said, you know, I don't know how long it's going to take for me to arrive at whatever position I feel like success means, but I just want to show up with my dignity intact and not have felt like I had to kind of like, do something that wasn't up to, like, my artistic standards.

[music] Let me drift on by.

One day youll find Even the stars have to let go of their light... -But I was, I remember I was in France, I was loading out of a show, and this guy was.

I was talking to him.

He told me something that I think about a lot, and, and he goes, you know, I don't know what you say, but the vibe is cool. And I was like, if the song translates, then the song translates.

[music] I got a little place out back.

Dont you know, I got myself a place out back... Creativity and life doesn't have a finish line.

It just keeps unfolding.

I don't know exactly who I'll be as I step into motherhood or who Austin will be as it continues to grow as a city.

But the mystery?

That's part of the adventure having a community that reminds you of who you are is everything.

Because with big growth comes big responsibility to stay rooted, to stay real.

And I guess in this case, to stay weird.

-Something I wanted to talk to you about is that I'm pregnant.

Oh my God, congratulations!

Oh my God.

Congratulations.

Im about to cry for you!

Its a lot!

I cannot!

Oh!

Yall going to make a beautiful baby.

Like.

I know, shes in there.

Oh, she kicking, girl?

How far are you along?

Six months.

Girl!

Can you believe that?

You got three more months to go?

Uh-huh.

Girl!

Time is a-ticking.

Have you been, like, vomiting and stuff?

Hell, yeah.