Richard Weiss Releases COUNTER CULTURE Single with STARKITECT
The power-pop track marks Weiss's return to music after a 17-year hiatus, with an album release show planned at The Still Austin Quarter.
Austin architect Richard Weiss knows a thing or two about building things. The longtime Austin architect has spent decades creating spaces for culture, music and entertainment, and now he's building something even louder. His band Starkitect has announced the release date for their new single 'Counter Culture,' dropping Sept. 25 from the forthcoming album 'Post Peak Power Pop!' The song sets the tone for the band's debut album, which comes out on Friday, Oct. 23 and delivers an early taste of its punchy, power-pop sound.
Starkitect will be hosting their album release show and musical premiere on Thursday, Oct. 22 at The Still Austin Quarter, a new music venue designed by Weiss Architecture. The single will be available for streaming on Spotify and Apple Music in addition to a dozen main streaming channels.
Weiss has spent nearly three decades shaping Austin's entertainment landscape through his firm Weiss Architecture, with work spanning Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas, Kerbey Lane Cafe, Midnight Cowboy, and the Collings Guitar factory, alongside music venues, restaurants and performance spaces across the country. His national work includes the Music Box Theater (Chicago), Metro Private Cinema (Manhattan) and The Flying Guillotine in partnership with Alamo Drafthouse and RZA (Staten Island).
But music came first. After moving from Miami Beach to Texas in order to study architecture at Rice University, Weiss officially moved to Austin in 1993 and formed power-pop band Mr. Rocket Baby (Austin Music Award 'Best Pop Band' 1994-95). He played SXSW four times, held a Thursday night residency at the legendary Steamboat 1874, and toured for three years across the United States. Weiss hung up his cape in 1997 to focus on building his architecture practice and a family, but after a 17-year musical hiatus, he saw 'Hedwig and the Angry Inch' on Broadway in 2014 and immediately founded a fully immersive tribute band called The Sideways Grimace. Now, three decades after his last record, Weiss returns to his musical roots with Starkitect, bringing the restless creative instinct behind his architecture to a different kind of creation: three-minute pop songs.
'We are living in the dystopian future that 1980s cinema predicted. We are rapidly approaching 2029, when Skynet sends a Terminator to 1984 to kill the resistance. To quote Orwell's '1984,' 'War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength,'' said Weiss.
'To paraphrase Bonnie Tyler in 1984, we need a hero.'
The album's first single 'Counter Culture' is a pop-rock track where Weiss explores the maddening fact that change is a constant, and over time the familiar often becomes unrecognizable. As an Austin resident for more than 30 years, the new single and the album follow Weiss's alter-ego on a journey through Austin's devolving musical landscape, while he battles forces like AI, billionaire regressive oligarchs (BROs) and the rapid growth and change threatening our authentic culture. The track also notes that we continue to make choices that may lead us toward our own destruction, despite knowing the danger that lies ahead. The single release coincides with the grand re-opening of Weiss Architecture's latest project Counter Culture, a vegan diner located at 5812 Berkman Drive, Austin, TX.
''Counter Culture' frames where we are in the plot of our lives. The reins have been handed over to AI, social media is a manipulative cesspool, and the only thing we can control are our own actions. But if enough of us act together, the tide may turn,' said Weiss.
Starkitect the band features Weiss on lead vocals and guitar, Chris Nine (vocals/keys), Phil McJunkins (guitar/pedal steel), punk legend Chepo Pena (bass), and drummer/vocalist Matt Patterson. 'Post Peak Power Pop!' is the band's debut album which was recorded over 10 days at the historic Arlyn Studios. It was produced, engineered and mixed by four-time GRAMMY award winner Jacob Sciba (Gary Clark Jr., Willie Nelson, Lucinda Williams) and mastered by Howie Weinberg (Nirvana, Jeff Buckley, the Beastie Boys). For more information on Starkitect, visit their website.
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