Austin snags most of the attention when it comes to Texas music scenes, but just a few hundred miles north, the sleepy college town of Denton has started to draw national attention as an incubator for laid back indie rock. Home to one of the most competitive music schools in the country (The University of North Texas), Denton has a reputation for turning out virtuoso musicians—Centro-matic, The Polyphonic Spree, DON HENLEY!—but it wasn’t until the recent success of hometown boys Midlake that the rock world started to view the town as an actual destination, rather than just a dot on the map.
When the band’s sophomore album, 2006’s folklorific The Trials of Van Occupanther, became an unexpected sleeper hit, Midlake found itself embarking on what would ultimately be an almost two year world tour. After a short period of post-tour decompression, the band set about creating its own studio space in downtown Denton.
“Our previous records were recorded in an old house where all five of us used to live together,” says guitarist Eric Pulido. “Since a few of us had gotten married or somehow managed to find girlfriends, it seemed like a good idea to build this neutral place to make our new record that didn’t also happen to be the place where we lived and did our laundry.”
The new self-built studio and the relatively cheap small town rents have allowed Midlake to take their time completing what has been tipped by many as one of the most eagerly anticipated albums of 2009. In addition to writing and recording loads of what Pulido describes as “more medieval”, the band makes the studio available to friends like Robert Gomez and The Czars’ John Grant.
“There’s a very edifying community of musicans here and it’s not at all competitive,” says Pulido, “We’re all basically trying to accomplish the same thing and there is a genuine sense of camaraderie with bands. There may be a ton of bands in Denton playing music in a lot of different genres, but it’s still pretty easy to know everybody. If they play in a band, you’ve probably met them at the bar.”
While the sense of urgency within the band to finish the new record (tentatively titled Courage of Others) is growing, the bucolic nature of Denton and the inertia of small-town living can slow things down. In addition to the band, Pulido also runs his own fair trade coffee importing company, Cappulido. “I’m actually delivering coffee beans right now,” laughs Pulido, “Then I’ll go into the studio to meet the band. It’s a pretty typical day here in Texas. Coffee and music.”
KEYWORDS: DENTON, Music, T. COLE RACHEL, TEXAS