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Bourland

 

Bourland's biography would have to start in Kagnew Station, 1965. Haile Selassie was the emperor of Ethiopia. Bourland was born in Asmara, Ethiopia which is now part of Eritrea. There is far too much to cover between 1965 and now. So other than one quick mention about Bourland's first Roy Roger's guitar (See photo to the right) and the fact that he moved to Austin in December 1990, after receiving a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Texas A&M. Whoooop!, we will begin with the part of Bourland's life that has to with music in Austin. Bourland has been in four bands since he moved to Austin. In 1992 Bourland formed the band Grunge Bucket which featured Mark Maynard on drums, Bourland on lead guitar, Chris Morris on vocals and guitar and Randy Random on bass. On a sad note, Randy Random died a few years back of a drug overdose. The band was doomed anyway due to the sudden popularity of Grunge music. Who'd a thunk it? They name the band Grunge Bucket and then BAM! Grunge is everywhere from Cosmopolitan to trailer parks. As you'll see from the subsequent Texas Philistines days, Bourland had, in fact, created his own Grunge clothing line: none of the shirts had buttons and all the jeans were air conditioned. Sheesh! For his part, Chris Morris wanted to call the band Sludge Bucket.

The Texas Philistines

In 1993, Bourland left Grunge Bucket and  tried a brief solo venture with Mark Maynard called Groove Hole. Then one fateful day Bourland was looking in the Austin Chronicle's musician's referral when he happened upon an ad looking for a cowpunk guitar player. He thought to himself, "Hey, that's me!" Bourland auditioned and it was his infamous blano-nano-la-now riff that got him the job with The Texas Philistines. The Texas Philistines were one of Paul Crosby's many brain children. Paul is one of those big brained folks. He's a creative machine. The best writer Bourland have ever known. The Texas Philistines recorded a CD called Honky-tonk Sabbath, Bourland got a great write up in the Austin Chronicle for his Growler guitar effect and then BAM! He was fired. Several years later Bourland wanted to make streaming Internet movies so he contacted the best writer he knew, Paul Crosby. Bourland/Crosby made six short films and a full length feature film together. They also formed another band, Romancing Medusa. They launched romancingmedusa.com and attracted Ronna Braselton to the band. Romancing Medusa was a great band and a lot of fun. Romancing Medusa played at Bay Fest and opened for lots of awesome performers from David Garza to MC Hammer. Then Mark Maynard, the drummer, quit. Bourland's day job got way too busy and the film Barefoot On Broken Dreams drove him into debt. Bourland was at the bottom. Lonely, a failure of a movie producer and struggling to keep his engineering job in a tech economy gone WAY south, Bourland was ready to give up music and the arts.

 Bourland at Jollyville City Limits
Then Bourland finally settled down. For the first time in his life, he could sit still for more than 2 seconds. And it was then that he learned one of the secrets to success. Less is more. Do less,  get more done. Bourland quit chasing his tail. He quit living like a rock star and found out he could have a great life that had nothing to do with music, bars or fame. Bourland started playing open mics and learning to sing. He joined the Austin Songwriter's Group. Bourland played his first solo singer songwriter gig @ Poodie's Hilltop Bar and Grill in March of 2002. It was that year he finally got together with Dj Buffalo Phil and started playing Hillbilly Hick Hop. Bourland had wanted to play hillbilly hick hop for at least 5 years and he finally made it happened. In May of 2003,  Bourland took up residency at BB Rover's, hosting the open mic every other Sunday. That brings us to 2004. Dj Buffalo Phil and Bourland started playing all over Austin last year. They had the fantastic opportunity, thanks to Matt Hubard and JT Van Zandt, to follow Guy Forsyth, Carolyn Wonderland and Calvin Russell at Trophy's during SXSW 2004. A big thanks to JT and Matt for letting Bourland do his thing. That was in March of 2004. In the summer of 2004 Bourland launched Jollyville City Limits with D.P. Dunn. A special thanks to David Patrick Dunn for all he's done, pardon the pun. And another special thanks to Kieth Johnson for all the fantastic photos. Bourland was also voted onto the board of directors for the Austin Songwriter's Group in late 2004.Check out the Gig Schedule for live dates throughout 2006! Guess that's the short story. Come back soon and we'll surely have added something new!

Cheers,
Bourland