AUSTIN, Texas – The Martinets rip through a blistering set Saturday
night at the Lava Lounge, led by animated singer-guitarist Eamonn
Bowles. Sporting black jeans and a puffy white shirt with pink frills,
the 49-year-old Mr. Bowles whips out a few Pete Townshend guitar
windmills, drops to a knee and engages his three bandmates in playful
banter about who has the most garish clothes. He seems happy to be at
SXSW.
DMN
|
Happy, and very busy. You see, Mr. Bowles – veteran of the '70s New York
punk scene, front man for a respected indie band – is also president of
Texas-based Magnolia Pictures. He pulled double duty at South by
Southwest this year, as a film executive with a hot documentary (
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room) and as a caustic rocker who
attracts a particularly movie-savvy crowd, including Magnolia CEO Bill
Banowsky.
"I like Bill," says Patti Travis, Magnolia's vice president of finance,
waiting for the Martinets' set to start. "But Eamonn's cooler, because
he's in a band." Mr. Banowsky laughs and shakes his head.
The members of the Martinets are old friends who formed their band six
years ago, and they rarely play outside of New York. "One of the great
things about this band is that we're not going to do anything we don't
want to do," says Mr. Bowles in his rapid-fire New York mumble the day
before his show in Austin. "It's purely for fun, although we have
developed some sort of following."
But they're not just a few Joe Blows who decided to form a band on a
lark.
Bassist Dave Rick used to play for indie icon band Yo La Tengo (he also
played last week with Guided by Voices). Guitarist Daniel Rey produced a
little punk band called the Ramones. These are just two of the bands
that influenced the Martinets' hard-driving sound. "It's definitely a
New York City, 1979 kind of thing," says Mr. Bowles.
Mr. Bowles has been juggling his passions for music and film since the
'70s, when he was a twentysomething soaking in the punk atmosphere at
the historic Bowery bar CBGB. He saw the first U.S. shows by the Clash
and Elvis Costello. He saw the Ramones more times than he can remember.
"I don't know how I used to do it," he says. "I'd be out four nights a
week until all hours."
Sounds a lot like SXSW.
During the same period, Mr. Bowles was also a self-described movie
freak, haunting New York's myriad art houses. In 1981, he landed a job
as a print shipper for the long-defunct Libra Films. Subsequent years
saw him toiling for Samuel Goldwyn as head of distribution, and at
Miramax, where he set up an in-house company to distribute the
controversial film Kids. He created the Shooting Gallery Film
Series, which brought Croupier and Clive Owen to a mass audience,
then moved on to Magnolia.
"He's been doing this at the highest level for more than 20 years," says
Mr. Banowsky. "What really sets him apart is his passion and integrity.
Whether it's throwing himself into a film's release or rocking with the
Martinets, he gives it his all, exactly how he believes it should be
done. Hey, the guy's a rock star."
Make that a married rock star with three kids, including twin
14-year-old daughters. "The twins are very embarrassed that I'm in a
band," he says. "They're 14-year-old girls. Everything embarrasses them."
The family life means Mr. Bowles doesn't travel as much as he once did.
But his SXSW schedule is still taxing. Several hours of e-mail film
business every morning. Four screenings a day (He particularly liked
Mutual Appreciation, which he describes as a slacker version of an
Eric Rohmer film). A panel discussion on making the jump from script to
screen.
After all that, a Martinets gig is like a vacation.
"The set was a lot of fun for us," Mr. Bowles says after the Saturday
gig. "And we played pretty well considering we hadn't been in the same
room together since the first week of January."
Ah, the life of a multimedia renaissance man.
Securitas