T Bird and the Breaks
High school for Tim Crane, A.K.A. T Bird, wasn’t a school at all; it was a record shop. T Bird spent most skipped schooldays tagging cars with fliers in exchange for records — really good records. An inch-thick stack of fliers might be worth Ray Charles’ “What’d I Say” parts 1 and 2, or James Brown’s “I Can’t Stand It (When You Touch Me)” backed with “There Was a Time.”
Fast-forward six or seven years: Crane hits the road looking for a place where the music’s going down, and it was a train — not a plane or a bus — that first brought him to Austin. T Bird spent the summer of 2006 riding the rails from the hills of New England through New York and Philly to the California coast. Along the way, he jammed with Nashville backups, toured the hallowed grounds of Memphis and (to hear him tell it) broke a heart or two in New Orleans.
But it was a cock-eyed stroll down Sixth Street in Austin that had the biggest impact on the wandering songwriter (other than his father singing him to sleep with Mississippi John Hurt and Howlin’ Wolf). Through the din of reveling tourists and bar-hopping college kids, Crane heard the unmistakable strains of some real blues. He walked into the bar and sat in with the band for a few tunes thinking, “Yeah, this is the place.”
As good as his word, he was back a few months later, showing up with a slim roll of bills, a car full of vinyl and very big plans for the city. It took him just one year in Texas to assemble T Bird and the Breaks.
The first call that the band was forming in Austin went to rhythm guitarist Sam “Sammy P” Patlove, an import from the hill towns of western Massachusetts who was raised on a hippy commune with no flush toilets or TV. He grew up listening to the music of The Rolling Stones, Chuck Berry, Elvis and Wilson Pickett. When he and T Bird met in ninth grade, they formed a musical connection — strong to this day — and played together in a band called The Wild Dogs.
Multi-instrumentalist and graphic designer Patlove was engineer-producer on the band’s debut album, LEARN ABOUT IT (Jan. 27, 2009), a collection of chunky, soulful originals by Crane that includes the Temptations-inspired “Two-Tone Cadillac,” a favorite of band members; the 100-proof “Blackberry Brandy”; the free-flowing “Juice”; and “Esmerelda,” with its hot, sexy groove.
In the formation of T Bird and the Breaks, next came guitarist Johnny “Too-Bad” Allison, a Texan from 10 miles outside The Middle of Nowhere with a mean crossover and killer jump shot who says he hasn’t “met a groove I couldn’t kick, or a solo I couldn’t lick.” Cody “Sir” Furr grew up in Lubbock listening to Stevie Wonder and Chaka Khan, stole from his brother when he was 12 a Rickenbacher and amp that had been his father’s, and now holds down bass like no other.
They’re joined by Houston “H-Town” Rawls on tenor sax and Austin native/UT jazzcomp degree-holder Matthew Price on trombone (chosen because, he says, it fits his embouchure). Baritone sax player Stephen “Beez” Beasley brings with him to the band a lot of experience that all started with his first childhood look at the shiny buttons and keys of a brand-new saxophone resting in a case lined in deep blue velvet.
It wouldn’t be much without the kind of backup vocals that fuel the band’s fire and put a stomp in listeners’ boots. Sasha Ortiz started out singing to Aretha Franklin songs at age 3 and went on to be the youngest performer at the Austin City Limits Music Festival three years in a row, gigging with her musical mother, Natalie Zoe. Vocalist Stephanie Hunt, also Austin-born and raised, has played violin since she was 6 and teaches the Suzuki method to children; she also appears on the critically acclaimed “Friday Night Lights” television series. Jazz Mills, from San Angelo, Texas, starting singing with her mother as a young girl (lots of folk by James Taylor and Joni Mitchell plus her mother’s originals) and was a huge fan of T Bird and The Breaks before she was asked to sing at its tribute to Stax Records and then asked to join.
Ten members in all, the group is a tight-knit unit, good friends who enjoy each other’s company (work or play), who connect with each other and with audiences, who love playing music and love the music they’re playing, who are living their dreams.
The band’s impact on the Austin music scene has been immediate, with T Bird and the Breaks headlining at five of the city’s best-known venues (including Beauty Bar, Antone’s and Victory Grill) within a year, placing second in the Best New Band category at 2008 Austin Music Awards that kick off South by Southwest, and becoming the second-highest vote-getter and a finalist in the 2008 Austin City Limits “The Sound and the Jury” competition.
“The backup singers may look too young to vote, but newcomers T Bird and the Breaks are old souls bringing serious R&B heat,” said Thomas Fawcett of The Austin Chronicle. “[It’s] at its best pounding out originals by dynamic front man Tim Crane, a slick-haired, gravel-voiced shouter in the mold of blue-eyed Texas soul sensation Roy Head.”
T Bird and the Breaks made several appearances during SXSW Music Festival 2009, including during 107.1 KGSR’s popular live broadcast from the Four Seasons Hotel lobby bar and the band’s first official showcase, sponsored by KUT 90.5, at Momo’s. Afterward, The Chronicle raved about the “blowout” showcase and the band: “… T Bird broke hard with the wicked bass line and horn blast of ‘Stand Up’ to open. A trio of female backup singers shadowed … Crane’s suave shuffle and strut through ‘Take Time’ before ‘Esmerelda’ jumped the funk and set the crowd dancing. … Few new soul shouters flare with such tight retro precision and infectious abandon. The crowd’s singing along to ‘Blackberry Brandy’ proved that there’s something that speaks to the spirit of South By Southwest in Crane’s growling chorus: ‘I know I should be looking for a job, but it sounds too much like work to me’.” |
