Lite + Brite: 24 Abominable Austin Events 1/23
Hello, what’s up, and welcome to the Lite + Brite newsletter.
A lot of this weekend’s events are getting cancelled due to weather. While we always value going out and supporting event programmers, please don’t endanger yourself to do so. Driving is likely to be a challenge this weekend. If you need to use a car to get about, maybe instead watch Snowpiercer or John Carpenter’s The Thing while snugly at home. Given this forecast, we’ve decided to postpone the Lite + Brite reader meetup to February 15. As for the other events that we’ve listed below, we believe they are all still on, but obviously you should double-check for any last-minute cancellations, particularly on Saturday and Sunday.
If everything goes on as planned, the coming days will bring a celebration of 50 years of Austin’s feminist bookstore and 10 years of Austin’s most avant garde music night; a funeral for MTV (which is weird because I just googled it and in fact MTV is totally fine? But obviously we’ll still list any party that references Daria in its promotional copy); a “late-night queer cabaret and puppet show”; a clothes shopping bonanza, a Middle Earth costume contest; historically accurate sword-fighting ($$ to compete but free to spectate!) and archery; and plenty more.
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Let’s do fun stuff!
—Leila + Brian
liteandbriteatx.com
WHAT WE’VE BEEN UP TO
This week, we went to a production of Improvised Shakespeare while it was in town. It was stunningly impressive. They delivered many of their Shakespearean-style lines in rhyming couplets and made a ton of silly Texas references (including a character named “the Duke of Corpus Christi”). I (Leila) did improv comedy for years and this show blew me away. We also went to the 13th Floor with the intention of seeing soul DJ Jonathan Toubin… who unfortunately had to cancel at the last minute! Still, we got to dance to some Little Richard and some Human Beinz, so we made the best of the situation.
We’re bummed not to hold the Lite + Brite meetup this weekend, but given the latest from Avery Tomasco, it seems wisest not to encourage anyone out onto the roads. We will instead be hosting our reader meetup on Sunday, February 15, and we hope you can join!
Brian got productive on No Humans Allowed this week, with a show full of efficient nu italo, electropop, + drum and bass tunes to listen to while hitting peak efficiency. Listen to the show on the Kpiss archives here while you knock some things off your to-do list.
EVENTS WE’RE EYEING
Friday 1/23
- RIP MTV at Mohawk
Say bye to MTV’s 24-hour era w/TRL photobooth, music vids, TV clips - Rara Avis at the Long Center
Modern dance performances of lauded new choreographic works - Eldritch Abomination Night at Tiny Minotaur
Dress in your cosmic horror finest + tip your bulbous hat to Cthulhu - Body Mechanics at 4211 Todd Ln.
DJs happily blurring the lines between a dance party + a fetish party - Futch Fetish at Elysium
“Lesbian drag show” feeds its nostalgia for 2016’s simpler times - Lady Puffmuffin + The Failed Marriage at the Vortex
Zany cabaret show dares to ask “wanna see some gay puppets?” - WEIRD Open at Austin Sports Academy
Fight historically at “Adult Sleep Away Sword Camp” - (weekly thru 2/7) The Wolf You Feed at the Vortex
Watch a Wild Things-inspired play about punk wolves
Saturday 1/24
- BookWoman 50th Anniversary Party at Cheer Up Charlie’s
“Rock & read” to celebrate feminist bookstore bday w/DJ + live music - DJ Disinfect + DJ Lucee in Furs at Tweedy’s
Vinyl DJs spinning French punk, new wave, synth pop, + electro - Debut at AFS
Watch an experimental film about true crime, art forgery, + fourth walls - Lady Puffmuffin + The Failed Marriage at the Vortex
Zany cabaret show dares to ask “wanna see some gay puppets?” - Le Garage Sale at the Palmer Events Center
Fashion shopping bonanza with an eye for gallic naming - WEIRD Open at Austin Sports Academy
Fight historically at “Adult Sleep Away Sword Camp” - (weekly thru 2/7) Frontera Fest Best of the Week at Hyde Park Theater
“Alternative, offbeat, new, and just plain off-the-wall fringe theatre” - (weekly thru 1/31) Escape the Box at Fareground
Escape the box only there’s no box, there is Austin fun + time travel - (weekly thru 2/7) The Wolf You Feed at the Vortex
Watch a Wild Things-inspired play about punk wolves
Sunday 1/25
- Lord of the Rings Day at BookPeople
Cultivate your inner hobbit w/costume contest, trivia, + scav hunt - Debut at AFS
Watch an experimental film about true crime, art forgery, + fourth walls - Le Garage Sale at the Palmer Events Center
Fashion shopping bonanza with an eye for gallic naming - WEIRD Open at Austin Sports Academy
Fight historically at “Adult Sleep Away Sword Camp” - (weekly thru 1/31) Escape the Box at Fareground
Escape the box only there’s no box, there is Austin fun + time travel - (weekly thru 2/7) The Wolf You Feed at the Vortex
Watch a Wild Things-inspired play about punk wolves
Monday 1/26
- Me Mer Mo 10 Year Anniversary at dadaLab
10th anniversary of party dedicated to experimental live music + visuals
Wednesday 1/28
- Magical Mind Mysteries at the Vortex
Alliterative magic show for adults w/Magical Mystical Michael - Boyz of Austin at Elysium
Drag performers “glitch the cistem” w/free reign - Trad-ATX at Factory on 5th
Social club for shooting arrows, especially for the “archery-curious”
Thursday 1/29
- U-Haul Hoedown at Elysium
“Southern sapphic night” w/linedance lessons, drag, + vendors - Nerd Nite at Barrel O’ Fun
Hear nerdy high-caliber talks about fermentation + opera - Shelter Building Workshop at Buzz Mill Coffee
Learn how to build an emergency shelter in the wilderness - Karaoke Underground at Cheer Up Charlie’s
Sing karaoke to your favorite punk, indie + alt classics - (weekly thru 2/7) The Wolf You Feed at the Vortex
Watch a Wild Things-inspired play about punk wolves
NHA267
Bespoke Programming
This week we will delve into bespoke programming with some tunes to inspire your inner artisanal coder-person. Beam yourself into the future and become a whirlwind of productivity in our custom suite of sleek, efficient nu italo, deep house, + drum n bass.
Tracklist
Squarepusher – Squarepusher Theme
Pizza Hotline – Mrs Hotline
The Smile – Eyes & Mouth
Furor Exótica – Fractal (Kayroy & Greetings Remix)
CRYYS – By My Side
Cassius – Hey Babe
Count Bass-E – So Fine (Cap’ Edit)
Decius – Queen of 14th St
Mala Ika – Die Party Ist Vorbei (Amacord Remix)
Donald’s House – The Final Front Ear
COEO – Meet Me at the Cascades
Pacific Coliseum & Ruf Dug – City Living
DJ Kaos – Kosmicher Rückwind (Elitechnique Remix)
No Humans Allowed is Brian Blackout’s award-winning, weekly robots-themed radio show on internet station KPISS.fm. Machine vibes 4 machines. Songs for robots, androids, mandroids, cyborgs, AIs, cylons, skinjobs, roombas, wifi routers, smart devices, anything colored Bondi blue, and virtual assistants. Humans not required. Broadcasts live every Wednesday at 6pm CT on kpiss.fm, with over 200 episodes now streamable in the archives on topics like and Beach Simulations, Roomba dance parties, undersea adventures + Cyber Texas.
PATREON THANKS
A huge thank-you to our Patreon subscribers Liz, Melissa Dunn, Kat, James Gray, Emily Heddleson, Andrew Creswell, Robert B., Roman Gonzalez, Nick Ivons, Molly Fonseca, Lilly Ettinger, Michael Sales, Zach, Gino Scaramuzza, Erica Speegle, Thomas Refferson, Bones Malones, Katie Green, Christina Jue, Colleen MB, Alexander Freed, Kristen Backor, and Timon A. We’re deeply grateful for your support, which allows us to do things like “pay our Mailchimp fee” and “spend hours researching Austin events when technically we should be working.”
If you’d like to support us on Patreon and get access to exclusive member-only benefits, you may do so here.
SOCIALS
Recent weeks found us attending a dance party in a storage unit, marching in a Greek mythology-themed Halloween parade thrown by a bat crew and a rat crew, and watching a troupe of gigantic leftist puppets from New England. Follow Lite + Brite on Instagram to keep up with our adventures. We’re now on Bluesky too. Yay federation! And come chat with us and the rest of the L+B community on our Discord server (where we sometimes post stuff early too).
ABOUT US
How do we choose which events to feature?
Honestly, it’s pretty random. We might include anything in Austin that we, personally, would conceivably want to go to, generally excluding normal concerts, comedy shows, and movie showtimes because there are many other good resources for finding those. (We especially recommend Showlist for live music, The Darker Side of Austin for goth and metal stuff, Concept Animals’ ATX Art for You for gallery openings + artist talks, ATX Theatre for plays, and the 60+ Weirdest Things in Austin for exactly what it sounds like). This list is by no means exhaustive; it’s just stuff that caught our eye this week. If you have an event that you want us to consider including, send it over.
Who are we?
We are Leila + Brian. We make this newsletter. We do our own events, most often No Lights No Lycra, + also BYOT, a party where we share very good YouTubes (here’s a playlist from the last one). We go very hard seeing bands at SxSW (here are playlists of our favorites from 2025). We once got called “local Austin couple” by KXAN. We do some other stuff here and there. We love going out to creative events in Austin, and we want you to join us. Visit us at liteandbriteatx.com, and support us on Patreon if you like what we do.