While driving us around in his car, my friend John introduced us to radio station KGSR , playing an eclectic mix of great rock and blues. He also gave us one of the station’s broadcast twin CD packs featuring (among many others) Los Lonely Boys. I’d never heard of them, and didn’t have an opportunity to listen to the CD during the trip, but my brother mentioned that they’re “all the rage” in Austin these days.
Austin’s Bergstrom airport is small, but, as befits “the live music capital of the world,” it’s got a selection of great music in the “Austin City Limits” store, and you can listen to some of it. So I got to hear Los Lonely Boys there, fell instantly in love, then was immensely frustrated that the CD was out of stock. So I bought a concert DVD instead, and am listening to it now. Wow! If you like hard-rocking Texas blues a la’ Stevie Ray Vaughn, you will LOVE this.
Austin airport also has a great bookstore, a branch of Book People, one of the few independent bookstores left in America. Even though I could get the same books cheaper on Amazon, I make it a point to shop at Book People’s main store when I’m in Austin: only at independent bookstores can you browse through shelves of books selected by intelligent readers who DON’T necessarily think the way you do, an experience which Amazon so far has not been able to duplicate.
I bought Jared Diamond’s new book, “Collapse,” which I eagerly anticipate will be as amazing as his Pulitzer Prize-winning “Guns, Germs and Steel.”
