The Continental Cult of Toni Price
From 1992- 2017, "Hippie Hour" was the most happening residency in town
Austin has had popular musical residencies since Kenneth Threadgill’s tavern/fillin’ station on North Lamar hosted Wednesday’s “hootenannies” in the late ‘40’s. Who needed club listings when you had Tex Thomas and the Dangling Wranglers at Hut’s on Sundays, Bad Livers at Saxon Pub on Mondays, Erik Hokkanen at Flipnotics on Tuesdays, Jon Dee Graham at the Continental on Wednesday, Cornell Hurd at Jovita’s on Thursdays and so on?
Musicians love the weekly gig because it keeps them going the other six days. It’s a sliver of stability, a paycheck, and a motivation to write new songs for the same friendly faces week after week. Work out that new material, Eric Burton and Adrian Quesada every Thursday at C-Boy’s, and you just might have something.
There’s a rich history here of calendar tattoos, but nobody’s ever owned a day like Toni Price did Tuesdays at the Continental Club. “Hippie Hour started in 1992 and wrapped up in 2017, with a break from 2007-2009 when Toni tried San Diego. There was no cover for years, but when they started charging $5, none of Toni’s maronies complained. Five bucks for an emotional musical journey? Here’s a twenty for me and the next three people in line.
The phone calls started in the early afternoon, when Linda Cox came home from her part-time job selling supplements. ”Are you going to Toni?'' her friend Leigh asked. A few minutes later, it was Rafael on the phone. “We missed you last week. See you tonight?'' Then, her apartment manager called to see if she needed a ride to the show. All over Austin on Tuesday afternoon the daydreams danced in anticipation of those three hours of crazy magic at the Continental Club.
”There's just nothing in the world like it,'' Cox said. “It's good knowing that on a weeknight, there's a place you can go to hear real music and hang out with real people and just zone out in another dimension.'' Though she rarely missed a Tuesday with Toni, Linda considered herself only a minor zealot. “There are some people who just get totally into it. Toni is their goddess: she rules their world.''
The hardcore fans started coming in between 5 and 6 p.m., during Doak Short's opening set, and staked out their usual spots up front. Toni Price and her trio of acoustic guitarists -- Scrappy Jud Newcomb, Casper Rawls and Champ Hood in 1999 -- took their chairs onstage at around 7. By about 7:15, the “sold out'' sign went up, as just over 200 people were practically molded around the stage, aching to be touched by their bluesy angel.
Some were uncomfortably moved, like Pentecostal potheads, and you wondered how Price could keep building the spell. ”I don't like religion because it comes with rules,'' Price told me before a set. “But I'm a spiritual person and I definitely feel the spirit on Tuesdays. We're all trying to get healed, all trying to feel the spirit of community.''
“Hippie Hour” was like visiting a world you'd only heard about from folks who lived here in the '70s. Every Tuesday, the ghosts of Freda and the Firedogs at the Split Rail and the Lotions at Liberty Lunch, converged on South Congress and merriment ensues like everyone was still paying $115 a month for rent. It's impossible to describe what happened every Tuesday at the Continental without using the word “vibe.''
During the infamous 8 o'clock break, the entire audience went out the back door to smoke dope, as Toni went around handing out Hershey's kisses. “You can have these back,'' said one guy in a leather jacket, “and give me the real thing.'' And the singer, who carries herself with the graceful defiance of Susan Sarandon's best characters, kissed him full on the lips. As Toni twirled away, Mr. Leather held his heart and staggered in jest, as if he's about to have the big one.
The appeal's not just Toni: Very few diehards followed her to the Caucus Club on those Tuesdays last summer when she sang jazz standards with the Will Taylor Trio. Also, her infrequent non-Tuesday gigs just don't have the same, um, vibe. It's not just the Continental: the club has hosted tons of empty, boring happy hour shows. It's not just the buzz: You can get that at home.
Put them all together, however, and what you get is a rare and precious dose of old Austin soul. Remember how you felt when you first fell in love with the local music scene? Price and her sitdown troubadours have bottled that euphoria: They drink it up and pass it around.
Price first came to Austin in ‘89 with then-manager Cameron Randle, who was able to squeeze her onto a SXSW bill at Antone's. She found paradise in the crowd's understanding of what she was doing musically. “I felt like I had landed in the most wonderful city in the world and sometimes it still feels that way,'' she said.
Randle got busy managing the Texas Tornados and running the Arista Austin label, which had hoped to bridge the gap between the Anglo and Latino worlds, but just ended up giving short-lived major label status to Abra Moore, Robert Earl Keen and Sister 7. Toni didn’t need a manager. She had Tuesdays.
When “Hippie Hour” was free, Toni’s tip jar was a collection plate, as she was one of the few artists who inspired tithing amongst her fans. Especially generous were the members of Club Chiwawa, a loosely-formed party gang which didn’t have to rent a band for their weekly soirees, so they’d each throw in at least a ten, sometimes a hundred.
Toni and her band were able to live off the kindness of their musical family. If Toni mentioned off-handedly, that her refrigerator just died, you can be sure she'd have a new one within a week. She was unable to afford a car in the early going, but then there was always someone willing to take her on errands, with her precocious daughter Della.
”When I took three months off to have Della, folks were just so unbelievable with their generosity,” Price said. “Do you need a crib?' `Can we get you anything?' It was like that almost every day.'' The band, calling itself Priceless, kept the gig going and gave the new mother a full share each week.
Toni, who grew up in Nashville as Luiese Price, wasn’t an instant sensation in her new home town, which was filthy with blues singers in 1989. That was fine with her. She knew there was a place for her in the scene and that it would just take time.
Price’s 1993 debut album Swim Away (Antone’s), with “Just to Hear Your Voice” (written by Monte Warden) in heavy rotation on KGSR, made her a local star. Hey in 1995 and Sol Power two years later were strong followups. Price’s first three LPs are on the Waterloo Records list of its 100 best sellers all time.
”I do want to be successful,'' she said, “but there's nothing less appealing to me than clawing your way to the top.'' She didn't court the press, preferring to get the message out with her charmingly primitive “Dishrag” newsletter.
“I don’t know why I’m doing this interview,” she told me. “But you know you can’t write about what happens out back during the break, right?”
OK, that was a problem. I was a reporter, not a publicist, and we argued on the phone about what to leave out. Toni’s intense. “Everybody knows what’s going on, but they leave us alone,” she said of the authorities. “You putting it in the newspaper is just rubbing their noses in it.” I saw a paddy wagon I wanted no part of, and took out one of the most interesting parts of the story.
It was another Tuesday afternoon and Linda was wondering whether or not to go to the Continental. Sometimes the revelry was just too much. “It's not exactly a healthy scene, with everybody smoking, downing shots of tequila, drinking beer,” she said. “A lot of old hippies have died of lung cancer or gotten straight or moved away, but the people at Toni's shows are still partying. It's hard not to get swept up in that.''
The fear of having too much fun threatened to keep Linda home reading this one Tuesday night. But then she saw that she had seven phone messages. “Hey, Linda,'' said the first caller, a guy who started singing “Baby, I Love You,'' the Aretha Franklin song that's a T.P. crowd-pleaser. “It's gonna be great tonight! I can feel it.'' Beep. “Need a ride to Toni?'' Beep. “Are you ready to party?'' Beep.
It didn’t look good for the book.
The Toni Price “Hippie Hour” ended in October 2017 with no fanfare. The club and its star were apparently burnt out on each other. Twenty-five years is a long time to do anything. Toni tried to bring the spirit of “Hippie Hour” to the Little Darlin’ in 2018, but it wasn’t the same. How could it be?
Toni Price plays the first Wednesday of every month at the Devil’s Backbone Tavern in Fischer.
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Toni was one of our waitresses at the original La Zona Rosa. Interesting (in a Chinese sort of way) to work with. I managed the Texas Tornadoes shoot of Who Were You Thinking Of? Video at LZR and my memories of Toni and Freddy are unforgettable, as was the shoot itself. LZR was a hell of a venue and place to work. A piece of work, that Toni. Thanks for your take on her.
Beautifully written, Michael. It’s wonderful to read your carefully preserved interviews and observations from so many years ago. You must have had a pretty thick Toni Price file in your cabinet. Thank you for your stewardship. I was never a regular at any on musician’s gig as I had too many stops to make to keep up with my work, and yet at Toni’s gigs I always felt like family. I remain an ardent fan of your life’s work.