The Posies/Brendan Benson at La Zona Rosa [Show Preview]

Image from La Zona Rosa

The Posies/Brendan Benson @ La Zona Rosa
Friday, November, 23
La Zona Rosa (612 W. 4th Street)
$18, doors at 7:00
[info] | [tickets]

For fans of '90s power pop, this Posies/Brendan Benson co-headlining trek is a dream. The Posies came bursting out of Seattle in the late '80s just as grunge was dominating the alternative rock world. The janglecrunchy, harmony-loving quartet didn’t fit in with the wave of distortion overflowing the Pacific Northwest, but released several solid, often spectacular albums anyway. Records like Amazing Disgrace, Dear 23 and Frosting on the Beater (which boasts “Dream All Day” and “Solar Sister,” the band’s biggest “hits”) remain beloved to this day. The band broke up in the late '90s (sort of - sonic architects Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow continued to play together, both as an acoustic duo and as half of the reconstituted Big Star), but reunited in the early ‘aughts to the delight of their devoted fanbase. The band is coming to Austin in support of its second post-reunion LP Blood/Candy, the group’s most highly-acclaimed record since its early '90s heyday.

But the Posies are not coming alone. Brendan Benson is best known as half of the creative brain trust behind the Raconteurs, a band that will always be branded as Jack White’s side project. But the Detroit-bred Benson has a sterling guitar pop career going back to 1996, when he released the delightful One Mississippi on Virgin at the ripe old age of 22. A lack of popular success meant more sporadic releases, but his talent and craft brought him to the attention of his Motor City homeboy White, and the Raconteurs, with the attendant Grammy nominations and bigger record sales, were born. With the band’s success as a springboard, Benson relaunched his solo career with the excellent My Old, Familiar Friend, which displays the influence of his Nashville home without being in any way a country record. Benson rocked the Independent in support of the album earlier this year, but this pairing of like minds (including Seattle popsters Aqueduct) should be something special.

The Posies rock their classic “Solar Sister” at their 20th anniversary show here. Brendan Benson performs “A Whole Lot Better” from his latest LP for LuxuryWafers here.