The Bright Light Social Hour band members Jack O’Brien, Jo Mirasole, A.J. Vincent and Curtis Roush bring larger-than-life indie music to local stages.

For every local band that cuts an album in Austin, there are 30 others that can’t get a paying gig this side of Llano.

So, how can a struggling musician in this town find the Willy Wonka golden ticket for success, recognition and, knock on wood, funding for a new CD release? Good luck.

“You have to put in hundreds and hundreds of hours of hard work – practice on your own and practice with the band,” said Jack O’Brien, one of the founders, bassist and vocalist for the funky, funny, indie rock-and-rollish The Bright Light Social Hour. “After that, when you’ve earned your chops, you should try a lot of things out. Follow your musical taste. At some point, you are going to find yourself back at your roots – those life-long influences that got you interested in music in the first place. Oh yeah, and have some fun. It’s important not to forget the fun.”

 

 

That advice and a little luck paid off in big ways for BLSH, formed five years ago by O’Brien and guitarist Curtis Roush. Strong on rhythm, hook and strange humor with the musicianship genius to put their money where their mouth is, the band won the 2009 Dell Sound and Jury Contest last September, beating out 1,500 other bands from around the world to earn a performance at ACL.

“Their Dell Stage performance didn’t disappoint,” Tim Basham of Paste Magazine wrote of the show. “They are a blast to watch, and I can’t get their songs out of my head.”

BLSH didn’t slow down much after their break-out performance at ACL. They went on to perform at SXSW, earning the Austin Chronicle’s 2009-10 Best Indie Band nod and, most recently, Rare Magazine’s 2010 Best New Band.

Roush and O’Brien formed BLSH while undergraduates at Southwestern University in Georgetown. Together with 2005 WHS graduate and keyboardist A.J. Vincent and drummer Joseph Mirasole, they are wrapping up production on the band’s second album – their first full-length – heading for an October Texas release date. The CD will feature songs the band has been perfecting for the last two years.

While O’Brien and Roush agree there is no quick ticket to success that can bypass hard work and the sweat of serious practice, they have learned a few things about how to survive and grow as a small artistic brotherhood.

“Being in a band is always a process of finding the common ground,” Roush said. “You have to learn how to communicate and stand up for yourself. Everybody likes different music. It takes a while to find that sweet spot – that place where everyone is happy.”

“You have to trust the other people in your band,” O’Brien added. “Really trust them. It takes time to learn to put your ego aside like that.”

BLSH’s strength comes from the democratic way it produces music, O’Brien and Roush said. That process – creating, exposing that creation to others, getting feedback, honing and moving ahead – gives the band a strength that no member could rely on individually.

“You stumble upon something good, work on it, and then, after a while, you start to have doubts whether or not it is really any good after all,” Roush said. “Here, we have three other people that go, ‘No, actually, that’s good.’ ”

The new album, produced by Austin-based Danny Reisch, is in the mixing stage. It is equal parts roadhouse blues, classic rock and disco funk, Reisch said.

Band members have budgeted their recording expenses well, and are now fundraising to earn the bucks needed to produce CDs. A testament to their brand of humor, O’Brien’s mustache, an entity in its own right, has been put in charge of bringing in the greenbacks. Check out their website, brightlightsocialhour.com.

“It’s a very weird time for us,” O’Brien said. “The band has become a full-time job; it’s been getting 50-60 hours a week out of us for quite a while. It funds itself, but we still have to find other jobs to support ourselves. We’ve got a great record here, but we still have to get it out.”

Poised on the cusp of what seems almost like inevitable major success, band founders O’Brien and Roush looked back on the five-year road that led them here. Would they do it again? Oh yeah.

“We’re all hopeless music geeks,” said Rousch, who has an undergraduate degree in political science and a master’s in media studies. “Music has been an inexorable part of our lives. We were always going to be in a band in some way or another, no choice really. It took us a bit of time to figure out that we were going to make a career of it.”

So, in the end, what words of wisdom do these guys have for new bands tentatively sticking their toes in the Austin music waters?

“Learn as much about music as you possibly can – producing, recording, mixing, whatever you can learn,” Roush said. “The more you know, the more empowered you are. You will always make mistakes, but you’ll make fewer mistakes, and they’ll hurt less.”

“Have fun with it, but understand that success comes with a lot of patience and hard work,” O’Brien said. “Music is made to help you forget your worries, let your hair down, let your mustache grow. Never lose the fun – that’s the best part.”