My good buddy and top Atlanta music blogger, Allison from RadioPotato, was visiting Charlotte and was keen to visit The Evening Muse, my absolute favorite venue in town.  It didn’t matter who was playing, she said, so off we went to see Shearwater – a band I knew nothing about. But hey, they’re from Austin, they have to be promising, right?

This is a band of musical dudes. Originally started a few years ago by two members of the critically acclaimed indie band Okkervil River, and now fronted by one of those fellas, Jonathan Meiburg, the band has an interesting mix of operatic vocals, soothing melodies, strategically used on stage mixing, and a driving rhythms. I adored Danny (Reisch?  I’m not sure if this is right) who was playing drums for them – insanely fantastic – but apparently, he is filling in for their full-time drummer on this tour and on this newest record.  And Lucas Oswald, the little guy that could play everything – guitar, keys, drums, mixing board…flat out fabulous, and obviously just a little talented.

As a gal who loves a happy pop song, this was definitely outside my box, but I found myself really digging some of their tunes.  “Animal Life,” off their new album Animal Joy, is unbelievably catchy and it’s been stuck in my head for the last two days…so it’s definitely worthy of Friday Awesomeness.  So worthy, in fact, that I’m posting it 5.5 hours before Friday.  It’s that good!

I encourage you to check out their other tunes, especially the song “Breaking the Yearlings” a dark, cacophonous, pounding ditty full of metaphor.  A writer’s dream, really, which might be why I like it so much.

More on Shearwater:  Web | Facebook | Twitter | Animal Joy on iTunes or Amazon