The Austin Lounge Lizards
Larry McMurtry once noted, “Being a writer and a Texan is an amusing fate,
one that gets funnier as one’s sense of humor darkens. In times like these,
it borders on the macabre.”
McMurtry wrote those words in the late Sixties, but he could have been speaking for the Austin Lounge Lizards decades later. Based in Austin, Texas, the Lizards have delighted audiences from California to Canada to the United Kingdom with their original style of satirical folk, country and bluegrass. Trademarks of a Lizards song are highly literate, sharply pointed lyrics that poke fun at politics, love, religion and the culture in general. Combined with precise four-part vocal harmonies and instrumental mastery, the band’s songs are melodically infectious and inventive.
Given their eclecticism and natural irreverence, it’s no surprise that the group counts among its influences Frank Zappa, George Jones, Spike Jones (no relation), Flatt & Scruggs, Tom Lehrer and Steve Goodman. Album, song, and DVD titles such as “Creatures from the Black Saloon,” “Paint Me on Velvet,” “Teenage Immigrant Welfare Mothers On Drugs,” “Jesus Loves Me (But He Can’t Stand You)” and “Thirty Years of Lost Luggage” illustrate the Lizards’ love of wordplay and social commentary.
The Lizards got their start in 1976, when Hank Card and Conrad Deisler, both history majors at Princeton University, started writing songs together. After graduating from Princeton both Hank, an Oklahoman, and Conrad, a Texan-Californian-Connecticutian-Venezuelan, ended up in Austin, where they met up in 1980 with banjo and dobro player Tom Pittman, who had the right academic credentials (a degree in philosophy from the University of Georgia).
With a series of talented fellow players and writers, the band began playing Austin and Texas dates. Before long the Lizards had built a large and devoted fan base. As early as 1987 they began appearing at festivals and concerts in North American and Europe, a schedule that continues today. Their festival appearances include, among others, America’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, Tucson Folk, Grey Fox and Riverhawk Festivals, Canada’s Edmonton, Vancouver and Regina Folk Festivals and Summerfolk, and England ’s Iron Bridge and Americana Festivals. They are regular performers at the Kerrville Folk Festival in Kerrville, Texas.
After 31 years, Tom retired in 2011 to Asheville , North Carolina. The band now consists of Hank and Conrad, Darcie Deaville (fiddle, mandolin and vocals) and Bruce Jones (electric bass and vocals).
Darcie joined the group in 2008, bringing a fresh, female perspective to the formerly all-male ensemble. “There’s not another boy band out there that would have welcomed girls into its posse with the appreciation like the founding Lizards (and even the band’s fans),” she says. “The Lizards’ songs and their take on the human condition has given me new insight on how important it is to laugh at ourselves and life’s absurdities.”
Bruce came into the band in December, 2009. "I'm just jazzed about being on the show," he says.
The Austin Lounge Lizards are five-time award winners at the prestigious Austin Music Awards. Their version of Irving Berlin’s “C-U-B-A” was used in the Michael Moore film Sicko. The band has been featured on NPR’s “Morning Edition” and on the radio programs “Mountain Stage” and “E-Town.” “The Drugs I Need” is the Lizards’ 10th album and most recent; it’s their second on the Houston-based Blue Corn Music label.
