Ethnography Results - Week 5

This week, Joe, Shena, and I went to downtown Bryan on Friday night to the Lonely Hunter release party. Additionally, since it was First Friday, we walked around and examined some of the music events going on in the area.

First, we looked around and examined the music going on in the area for First Friday. Two music events were going on outside the concert. There was a TAMU drum group going on, which ended soon after we arrived, unfortunately. However, next to a wine bar in the area was a small jazzy group whose name we didn't get. They had a group of about 50 people who were much older than all of the concerts we had been at so far. I would guess that the average age was about 35-40 years old.



Then, we made our way to Stafford Main Street, where the release party was being held. Stafford Main Street is a renovated theater turned into a bar which hosts live music weekly. The bar is kind of hard to find, with only a small sign next to the door that I almost walked straight by.

We walked during the end of Bobby Pearson's performance. They were an acoustic rock band of some sort, but we were unable to get a good idea of their style before they finished their set. There were about 65 people in the bar, but most of them were at the back and didn't seem interested in the performance.







Next, at 9:50, Mike Mains and the Branches came on. They had a more traditional rock feel, and also did some really bizarre gestures during the performance. The crowd didn't grow much if at all during the performance, but they seemed much more focused on the act than earlier.








At 10:40, Gaitlin Elms came on, and they were a softer rock band compared to the others we had heard so far. The crowd had swelled to about 80 at this point, and a great majority were at the front with the band.









The final band we watched, Lonely Hunter, came on at 11:30. They had the most developed sound of the groups, and were the ones putting out their new CD. At this point, the bar was packed at the front, with some room at the back.




We probably won't be going back to this bar again for our studies. As you can probably see in the shots, the bar has bad ventilation and due to the fact that smoking indoors is legal in Bryan the bar was extremely smoky.

Some of the conclusions I have come by after this week are that release parties seem to bring in more bands as well as bigger bands than normal nights. Half of the bands were selling CDs and shirts, and most of them were actually from out of town, as opposed to the local bands we have seen lately who were not.