Music preview: Buttercup
As visual arts and musical arts come together on downtown Houston Street in Artpace’s biggest event of the year, we’re happy to announce that the Chalk It Up stage on Saturday, October 13 will feature San Antonio art rock band Buttercup. We interviewed band members Erik Sanden, Joe Reyes, and odie about art, their inspiration, and of course, chalk.
Artpace: Buttercup band members have been longtime friends of Artpace. What about us do y’all like the best?
Buttercup: Um, the art. But specifically the fact that a local San Antonian woman, who could have done countless other things with her personal fortune, founded a place where artists from around the world—as well as artists from San Antonio—can live, work, and exhibit in downtown San Antonio, which we call our home.
Artpace: What inspires Buttercup, in terms of songwriting? What are some of your recent musical/art project ideas?
Buttercup: Japanese cuisine, exaggerating, being 8 years old, love, odd chunks of dialogue from movies or books or especially friends, and tea have all been somewhat influential. Inspiration comes from everywhere. Today we have already fallen in love twice, first with a clean white shirt, now with a stray sunbeam.
Our most recent projects have been attempts at stripping down our music to the least amount of elements. Currently we are working on a performance art piece that utilizes two acoustic guitars, one bass guitar, and a chalkboard. We are writing a terribly pithy set of songs, 10 that clock in under 30 seconds each.
Artpace: What are you looking most forward to about Chalk It Up?
Buttercup: White lung (from all that chalk dust), and of course the chance to do something fun and whimsical with our music.
ABOUT THE BAND
Since Buttercup played their first gig together in 2003, it has been a constant production of maniacal bliss in the form of art rock, brought to an audience in unconventional and creative ways. Formed in San Antonio, the band has fused a true post-modern sound that crams their love of The Kinks, Neil Young, and The Talking Heads into something more at home with fellow Texans Spoon, Chicago’s Wilco, or New York’s Interpol. From their charmingly arranged harmonies to their unpredictable onstage antics, Buttercup is comfortable and chameleon-like in a live setting. The Cup revels in their ability to adapt from a stripped-down, intimate setting to a raucous, energetic, and unpredictable club show. Employing such whimsical tools as an old rotary telephone, tambourines, glockenspiels, and other fanciful homemade instruments, fans have come to expect the barriers between the stage and audience to be broken.
Image credit: Photo by Josh Huskin
Chalk It Up is a free, family-friendly event that promotes the importance of art education and proudly exhibits San Antonio’s creative vivacity by providing hands-on activities led by professional art educators, as well as interactions with contemporary artists. Artpace remains passionate about giving people an opportunity to explore their relationship with not only contemporary art, but their hometown community. Chalk It Up 2012 is made possible by presenting sponsor Argo Group.
Lindsey Smith
Lindsey Smith is the Assistant Curator of Education at Artpace and helps create tours, workshops, and education events for all ages. A native Texan, she enjoys drawing mermaids, fishing or floating in rivers, guacamole, running, and making up improvisational dance moves.