While all the talk of South By Southwest has us excited (our preview begins on Friday!), those living in the Dallas area are fortunate to have an amazing festival of their own. 35 Conferette runs from March 10-13 in Denton, TX and features over 100 bands spanning a zillion genres. Frankly, not only are many bands passing through this event on their way to SXSW, but many music industry and music lovers are also stopping in Denton to check out the amazing lineup. Do yourself a favor and get a wristband!
Contest! You can enter to win a wristband by following us on Twitter and telling us why you should be a winner!
Narrowing the field down was a challenge, but here’s our list of ten bands we think deserve your attention.

Who: A Place to Bury Strangers
Similar artists: Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Gliss
Follow on Facebook and Twitter

Who: Pains Of Being Pure At Heart
Similar artists: Superchunk, Girls, Wild Nothing
Follow on Facebook and Twitter

Who: Gayngs
Similar artists:Bon Iver (duh!), Twin Shadow
Follow on Facebook and Twitter
TDOA Interview

Who: Cut Chemist
Similar artists: DJ Shadow, Jurassic 5
Follow on Facebook and Twitter

Who: Esben and the Witch
Similar artists: Warpaint, Glasser
Follow on Facebook

Who: No Joy
Similar artists: Women, Wild Nothing
Follow on Facebook

Who: The Civil Wars
Similar artists: Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová
Follow on Facebook and Twitter

Who: Turbo Fruits
Similar artists: Black Lips, Ty Segall
Follow on Facebook and Twitter

Who: Hooray for Earth
Similar artists: Twin Shadow, The Big Pink
Follow on Facebook and Twitter
TDOA Interview

Who: Local Natives
Similar artists: Arcade Fire, Ra Ra Riot, Freelance Whales
Follow on Facebook and Twitter

For more information, visit http://www.35conferette.com/

35 Conferette Lineup 2011 from 35 Conferette on Vimeo.

1. Alberta Cross- Broken Side of Time

2. The Boxer Rebellion- Union

3. Heat-Ray- Love All Over

4. Lovvers- OCD Go Go Go Girls

5. Fruit Bats- The Ruminant Band

6. Royal Treatment Plant- Hope Is Not Enough

7. Boat Beam- Puzzle Shapes

8. The Mountain Goats- The Life of the World to Come

9. The XX- S/T

10. The Big Pink- A Brief History of Love

11. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart- S/T

12. Julian Plenti- …Is Skyscraper

13. Jason Lytle- Yours Truly, The Commander

14. The Joy Formidable- A Ballon Called Morning

15. Gliss- Devotion/Implosion

16. Grand Analog- Metropolis Is Burning

17. The Black Box Revelation- Set Your Head On Fire

18. Ten City Nation- At The Still Point

19. Jaydiohead- S/T

Jaydiohead – 99 Anthems from Max Tannone on Vimeo.

20. It Hugs Back- Inside Your Guitar

Follow us on Twitter or Facebook to get a preview of upcoming interviews, music news and behind the scenes stories about our interviews.

1) The Boxer Rebellion: Union- If you loved The Verve and remember when it was still cool to like U2, you ought to be listening to this band.  This self-released album topped the U.S. and U.K. ITunes charts the week it debuted.  I’d like to think that TBR is our little secret, but I suspect there are a lot of you out there.

2) The Pains of Being Pure At Heart: Self-Titled- As British as The Boxer Rebellion sound, THOBPAH bring a sound that is distinctly super American chunky.  Great melodies that merge with an indie sensibility that is far from self-indulgent.

3) Gliss: Devotion/Implosion- Like watching the most beautiful carousel you’ve ever seen, Gliss switch instruments and vocal duties effortlessly and make you swoon every time.  How much do I love the re-emergence of the distortion pedal in music?  In a year where the great ideas of the 80′s are given new life, Gliss simulatneously seem original yet nostalgic.  I hate to throw the  JAMC reference around this list too much, but they were a brilliant band and Gliss make me realize what they’d have  become with better vocals and less self-indulgence.

4) An Horse: Rearrange Beds- 2-piece from Australia that harkens back to the best of The Spinanes (look it up.  you’ll love it.).  I interviewed them days after they first arrived in America after this album was released.  With an appearance on Letterman and accolades from numerous magazines, we can expect An Horse to be on many year-end lists for many years to come.  Deservedly so.

5) White Lies- To Lose My Life: Equal parts The Teardrop Explodes, Joy Division and Interpol.  Certainly enough to make Brandon Flowers shut up forever (hopefully…).  I had predicted that this would be my album of the year after hearing a few cuts.  If I have any complaint, it’s that the second half of the record is a little uneven.  Still a tremendous effort, though.

6) Zee Avi- Zee Avi-  This one snuck on the list at the last second!  I posted her brilliant cover of “First of the Gang” previously and just got a copy of the album this week.  Since then, I’ve had it on an endless loop.  Prepare to here a voice that will melt you in a second.  To compare someone’s voice to Billie Holiday isn’t something I would do on a whim.  The album alternates from moody, to playful, to beautiful in a way that seems natural.  An amazing debut.  Prepare to read about her for the next six months and the rest of your life.

7) East Hundred- Passenger: Erroneously posted in our revised ‘Best of 2008′, this was actually released in January of 2009.  Why this band isn’t on a major label is one of this years’ great mysteries.  Perfect vocal melodies from Beril Guceri coupled with a band that can write music that isn’t dependent on ‘hooks’, yet sticks in your head.  Quite a combination and a recipe for a great album.

Crocodiles- Summer of Hate: Fresh off their network debut on Carson Daly’s televsion show, this is a band with unbelievable potential.  Their resemblence to Psychocandy/ Mary Chain-style is eerie.  When they release their ‘Darklands’ expect them to be huge.

9) Jason Lytle- Yours Truly The Commuter: Yes, it’s the singer from Grandaddy.  Yes, it’s as good as anything Grandaddy did.  Anything other questions?

10) Gomez- A New Tide: I’ve intentionally posted this video which just shows the album cover, while the opening track plays.  Perhaps the best “pop” song I’ve heard in years.  Close your eyes and let this soak into your eardrums.

I was hooked and spent the next several years collecting every album (Damned, Damned, Damned is still my favorite), single (yes, I have the Stretcher Case Baby 7″) and promo 12″ I could find.  Live, they were chaotic yet perfect everytime I saw them.  Nobody on this planet can claim to be a fan of punk rock without owning at least one Damned album in their collection.

Since I began this website, tracking down a member of The Damned for an interview has been a dream of mine.  To get the great Raymond Burns (aka Captain Sensible) to take a few questions and wax poetic about the history of the band, punk rock and the state of music is a gift for all of us.

TDOA: The Damned were the first punk band to release a single and the first British punk band to tour the U.S.. The Sex Pistols tour of America has been widely documented, but I’ve never read much about The Damned’s first trip to the U.S.. There’s a 200 page book about the Pistol’s trip, but can you share a couple of stories; what cities did you play in, what were the crowds like, any craziness?

CS: We were sleeping on peoples floors, no money for hotels…. We did it the punk way with the innovative (but penniless) Stiff Records rather than the posh labels the Clash and Pistols signed with.  I remember the collection box at the door at an early gig in LA asking for donations for our air fare home as we were completely brassic.  They were fun times though…. totally uncompromising.  We didn’t give a s**t what anyone thought of us or our noisy new thing, which didn’t always go down that well it has to be said.  We actually cleared whole audiences in the UK in ’76…. gigs outside London mainly where they were into the country rock nonsense that was everywhere at the time.

Anyway, Patti Smith didn’t get us at all…. not art enough for her I guess – as her show was next that night at CBGB’s.  She didn’t waste any time chatting about this exciting new punk scene or anything.  It was “get out, this is MY dressing room now, you Limey assholes”.  We got on OK with The Germs, The Ramones and the Weirdos though, so I just put it down to Ms Smith being a stuck up bitch.

TDOA: Press clippings indicate that “the band” hated “Music For Pleasure”.  Problem Child and Stretcher Case Baby are two of my favorite Damned songs. Did everyone in the band really hate the album and why?  Production trouble?

CS: The biggest mistake we ever made was not getting the Who’s (amongst others) producer Shel Talmey to do ‘MFP’.  He DID do the free at the Marquee single (all attendees of the 4 shows got one) which sounded fabulous.  But the subsequent reworkings of ‘Stretcher Case’ and ‘Sick of Being Sick’ for the actual album, produced by Nick Mason were lifeless in comparison.  As is the whole record, which I would very much to see remixed in a vibed up and more spunky way.

TDOA: The fickle British press has gone hot and cold on the band far too many times. The attitude towards Damned, Damned, Damned and Machine Gun Etiquette was completely different than for the albums in between and after. How did it affect the bands spirits and songwriting?

CS: The press and the Damned never got on.  We didn’t play the game and could be pretty obnoxious.  Journalists would end up soaked in beer with chewing gum in their hair.  We simply didn’t care, so it might have been our fault, lol.  We were just a young snotty band with bags of attitude and that didn’t always go down too well.

I think our song ‘History Of The World’ had a line – about ink and decibels which is probably about our treatment by the music papers at the time.  Oh, and ’2nd Time Around’ too…. those lyrics are DIRECTLY aimed at the press…. “I remember what you said, don’t you wish that we were dead – now we’re BACK… to haunt you with our sound” or something like that anyway.

TDOA:  Patricia Morrison played with the band for at least one tour. Her resume is quite varied and I suspect there’s quite a few stories attached to her. What was she like while with The Damned?

CS: Patricia played and looked great. I wish we’d done more photo shoots with her as that lineup had a nice glamourous goth look to it.  I have to laugh thinking about that Edinburgh promoter who tore up our guest list turning away our friends at the door.  She gave him a severe roasting in his office later.  I could hear bottles smashing and all sorts from down the corridor.  Good luck to her!

TDOA: Rat Scabies was “dismissed” from the band for “having his fingers in the till”.  It seems like such a tragedy given his talent.  Can you give us more detail of what happened?

CS: No, life’s too short to start that row up again. We ALL get paid for the reissues now so relationships are improved. Rat certainly has a unique approach to drumming.  I’d have loved to have seen him playing on that recent tour with Donovan – is there any up on You Tube?  (ED NOTE: I couldn’t find any!)

TDOA: The packaging for The Damned albums was always great, but the things you did for your solo work was brilliant. I still have my 12″ single with the santa beard. Were you the brains behind all of that?

CS: Mike somebody in A+Ms London art department was brilliant and did those album and single designs.  My fave was the ‘Revolution Now’ cover with real McDonald’s fries in the depiction of Elvis.  We had a lot of fun, but those were the days before Photoshop, so the ship going down on the cover of ‘Womens And Captains First’ was like a film set with carpenters and set designers running around.  In fact, the tank of water took all day to fill and was (according to my co-singers the Dolly Mixtures) bloody freezing, “The things we do for you Captain!”.

TDOA: Did you find your solo work more or less satisfying than your work with The Damned?

CS: The Damned give my tunes a more rugged feel, which is good in some ways as I am a bit of a melody buff.  But you CAN have loud guitars and catchy tunes. ‘Noise, Noise, Noise’ is one of my faves.

On my own I can do what I want though and during the 80s.  I really liked the new-fangled synth pop that was about at the time, so I did some of that with genius producer Tony Mansfield.  Check out his own records by his band New Musik if you like that stuff.  That material is spectacular and I have it on my Ipod permanently.

I like dabbling with all kinds of music so if anyone wants to put me in a studio for a week or so get your cheque book out. And I’m sure I have a great movie soundtrack in me too!

TDOA: Phantasmagoria seemed to start the beginning of The Damned’s “goth” phase. You weren’t with the band during that period. Was this because you were focusing on your solo work or was the goth stuff not your cup of tea?

CS: I had to see what could become of my solo career, as we were having HUGE hits in Europe. ‘Wot’ in particular.

In fact I was always over doing promo TV in Germany, France, etc. It was a total whirlwind of activity with no time off at all, and as I always hated flying.  I was pretty knackered after a few years of combining all that AND the Damned so I collapsed with exhaustion in the mid 80s and baled out for a while.

The records the Damned made in their ‘goth’ period have proper producers and sound excellent to my ear.  The band looked good in photos too at the time with the frock coats, etc..  Mr Vanian in particular excelled showing he is one of the best singers of his generation.

TDOA: There are articles about the dispute with Vanian over “Not of this Earth”, which make it sound like you two aren’t the best of friends. At this point, is your partnership more of a business arrangement than anything else?

CS: I think you might be mistaking myself for Rat in your question.  I thankfully had nothing to do with the appalling ‘NOTE’.  I believe there WAS a serious falling out over those recordings (I won’t do it the justice of calling it an ‘album’) but it was between my two esteemed colleagues.

TDOA: Who is the Captain listening to these days? Any newer bands?

CS: I like the noise pop of ‘The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart’ and the deep melancholy of ‘El Perro Del Mar’.  Both extremely melodic, but tinged with a dollop of sadness and heartache that makes pop music occasionally so sublime.  As in ‘Alfie’ by Cilla Black.

Hold on – rant coming – Whenever I see Radiohead on TV I think…. blimey, this is SO derivative, and so inferior to the 70s prog bands they are pilfering from.  Get hold of ‘Thank Christ For The Bomb’ by the Groundhogs instead.  That’s where they are getting it from.  And they are right too -  it’s a total winner!

TDOA: If you could banish one band or artist from the planet, who would it be (pick from any period)?

CS: Any of those dreadful ‘boy bands’….TAKE THAT, BOYZONE, NEW KIDS, WESTLIFE.  It was soul destroying to go into a shop or taxi or wherever that crap was being played.  But that sad packaged manufactured ethic is still everywhere still, which is why we should possibly bring back capital punishment as a one off for that slimey Simon Cowell for the many vile criminal records he has been involved in.

Thanks Captain!  And for the rest of you, here’s a boatload of great videos of The Damned.  I also recommend checking out the Captain’s solo records, as they were always tremendous.

Our criteria:  1) Not a one-hit wonder.  They’ve got a 30 to 45 minute set at their disposal that’ll blow you away.

2) Great live band.  Either we’ve seen them personally or the weight of public opinion merits seeing this band live.  Their show at SXSW is going to be an “event”.

3) They’re on the cusp of something bigger.  This may be the last time you can see them in a smaller venue.

In no particular order:

An Horse

The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

The Duke Spirit

White Lies

The Soft Pack

Minipop

Longview

Ida Maria

The Living Things

Division of Laura Lee

No videos this time.  We’ve done oodles of videos on each of these bands.  Time to get out there and see ‘em folks!

KB: No, not really– we are having a lot of fun and we’re just grateful that people are into it. All that’s happened and yet to happen– it’s beyond any kind of expectation or thought or possibility– it’s all so cool and we don’t take it for granted. We really enjoy being together– we’re all best friends anyway, and the chance to play music together and get to go places and have adventures– it’s totally the best!

After playing at SXSW, TPOBPAH will be touring throughout the U.S. and abroad.  They’re album is available to order through Amazon.  Buy it, see it, live it!

I’ve been feeling like the pickings were pretty slim lately.  Have no fear, the P’s are here!

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart- Noise Blast Guitar Pop.  Yes, these are a few of my favorite things and TPOBPAH have them all.  Do we hold a grudge because they blew off our interview questions?  No, we just cry ourselves to sleep quietly, each night.  Compared to early My Bloody Valentine, but I hear alot of C86 (hello Wikipedia!) in them.  They’ve only been around since 2006, but have already made a huge impact.  In our top 5 of the “bands to watch” at SXSW.  Three videos?!  Yep, that’s us hoping that Kip will reach out.  Hi.

Passion Pit- It was bound to happen.  We’re actually taking the time to pick on a single band and explain why we don’t like them.  Trust us, there’s plenty of god-awful bands that shouldn’t even be in this festival (Katy Perry, cough).  Passion Pit doesn’t fit in that category.  BUT, someone needs to explain this to us.  Indie radio and all the “cool kid” blogs love this kind of stuff.  They made a habit of supporting this genre of music last year and we say, enough is enough.  It sounds like the kind of music that you’re going to be embarrased to admit you liked, five years from now.  Disco-esque beat. Check.   That wacky, zany, “I’m going to run my fingers up and down my electro-piano, cause it’ll be arty” keyboards.  Check.  It sounds like you sped the vocal track up to make it sound crazy, but it just sounds….clown-like.  Check.  No vocal melodies.  Check.  No guitar melodies.  Check.  Don’t get me wrong, at least they’re not Kelly Clarkson.  I just don’t understand the fascination.  Please send your hate mail to….

Pete and the Pirates- I’m going to assume that most of you already know who they are and I’m going to post a fun live video for “Come On Feet”.  Now this is music!  Great raw guitars and the ability to shift from chaotic to beautiful in a single verse.  Most Likely To Be Radiohead In 5 Years.  yup.

Peter, Bjorn and John- Yet another great Swedish band.  If they have a showcase of every Swedish band, I’m parking myself there and calling it a day.  I can dream, can’t I?

Pink Nasty- Sara Beck is based in Austin via Kansas.  SXSW calls her pop.  Her bio calls her folk.  I call her the living, breathing reincarnation of Kim Deal and Polly Jean Harvey rolled into one.  Talented, great singer, great guitar riffs.  Too raw (in a Stooges, good kinda way) to be called pop or folk.  The best “unsigned” artist at SXSW.   A must see.  Two videos for an unsigned artist?  I’d put more on here if I could find ‘em.

Port O’Brien- California band who’s also listed as “folk”.  Far too dense musically to fit in that category if you ask me.  I wondered how it’d translate live and then I watched this…  I’m in.

Primal Scream-  No need to talk about who they are.  They’ve been around forever and yet they still put on great live shows.  Yes Virginia, they’re still worth going to see.  Frankly, I think their last couple of records have been criminally ignored.