Kids today have other priorities. "No matter what happens, it's never gonna be like pre-Internet days again, for touring or CD sales," says Brennan of Sound Exchange. "Music is now one notch of importance below where it was, especially for kids. My 14-year-old niece has to have a cell phone so she can text-message; she has to have a MySpace account. If you look back, kids were the number one demographic for buying music and going out for decades and decades, and I think now it's number four for sales."
Brennan confesses to a case of scene fatigue. "I'm kinda getting tired of going to the same places and seeing the same things. The bar scene is great for the social aspects, but not so much for the music."
Maybe the future lies in big events like Eric "Ceeplus" Castillo's Mixed Media series on one end and in more intimate and inexpensive house parties on the other. Or in other nontraditional venues: in Houston, NiaMoves, a yoga studio in the Heights, is hosting a Houston offshoot of Dallas's The Bend Studio series, offering up-close-and-personal evenings with Americana artists in an environment much more serene than a bar.
Houston abounds with odd places. Brennan thinks we should use them. "I went and saw that band Extra Golden at the Orange Show," Brennan says. "It's always great to be at the Orange Show, but it is just being in a different place, around people who are just there for the music, not to hang out and drink; it was so enjoyable."
Special places for special shows in a city that is, perhaps, "special" in the euphemistic sense of the word.
"Yeah, a little bit!" laughs Chavez. "[Houston is] the special child that, when they do something that's especially smart, you're like, 'Oh wow! Look at you!'"