The 1997 Dallas Observer Music Awards

--Howard Wen

Marchel Ivery
Nominated for: Jazz
Tenor saxophonist Marchel Ivery has always been touted for his lengthy stint with pianist Red Garland, and for gigs with other jazz greats (Art Blakey, Cedar Walton, Bud Powell, Wynton Marsalis). It's like no one wants you to know he also played behind Jimmy Reed, Lowell Fulson, and Al "TNT" Braggs. But it's with these blues-R&B acts that Ivery developed his famously huge, lowing tone. Couple it with a technical prowess that puts the whole of bebop at his command, and you have a forceful inheritor of the vaunted Texas tenor tradition. Tireless improvisational skills and a deep-dish soul are his other hallmarks. His debut album, Marchel's Mode, came out on the local Leaning House label in 1994. He is Dallas' foremost vector of genuine jazz.

--Tim Schuller

Kim Lenz and her Jaguars
Nominated for: New Act; Best Female Vocalist (Kim Lenz)
Red-haired rockabilly filly Kim Lenz is a fairly rare amalgam of determination and devotion, aimed not at commercial success, but at honoring the music she loves. Although she toes the stylistic line--she's seldom seen out of poodle-skirt-ponytail uniform and toodles around town in a '62 Thunderbird--she manages to imbue such ritual with a sense of fun that escapes many fans of "cat music."

She and her Jaguars debuted a year ago. Even then, Lenz showed a remarkable facility for all the characters--the drag-strip kitten, the snarling reform-school girl, the broken heart of gold--while avoiding contrivance. As the band matured, working out on covers so obscure that many mistook them for originals, they built up the kind of momentum that often leads to major-label attention.

That's not much concern to Lenz. "I don't care nearly as much about some record deal as I do about doing justice to the music that I love," she says. Many bands push their limits, finally rising past the edge of their competence and falling on their faces. Lenz--sure of what she wants and what she loves--is concentrating her abilities and cultivating her skill. She might just end up completely inhabiting a spot of her own choosing, from which she can do exactly what she wants. It may not be the big time, but it's the place from which most good music comes.

--Matt Weitz

Light Bright Highway
Nominated for: Avant-Garde/Experimental
On the surface, Light Bright Highway sounds cold and dark. Their "songs" take whole sides of cassettes, and they can play two-hour long shows that seem like exercises in stasis. Band members seldom look at the audience, much less go near the mike. Light Bright Highway captures the essence of inertia--the ambivalence that precedes movement. They play ultra-ambient music that happens to be loud. Like true ambient, it is not meant to suggest anything or induce any kind of mood. Rather, it gives you time to think, as the sound engulfs you in its slow dirge, until latent emotions start to surface. It may sound self-indulgent, but it is actually user-friendly--non-specific and open to countless interpretations, giving you the choice of mood. Repetitive and as effective as a mantra, their pieces go through peaks and valleys--mostly valleys--with sweeping guitar washes, glum bass lines, and busy drumming, coalescing in a seductive wall of sound that encloses you in a meditative haze--a wall painted with the shapes and colors of your choice.

--Philip Chrissopoulos

Mad Flava
Nominated for: Rap/Hip-Hop
"Feel the Flava," taken from the Priority Records release From the Ground Unda, was an understated and overlooked little gem that established Mad Flava as the most promising traditional hip-hop act in these parts. An organic piece of music that reeked of reefer and good intentions, "Feel the Flava" almost overshadowed the rest of the album. Full of wholesome, vibrating beats and cool raps, it fell short of tickling the fancy of major markets. Too bad. Even worse, local sales were not exactly phenomenal. Local rap fans perhaps found the music a little too euphoric, lacking the sheen and cinematic appeal of hyperbole-laden acts like Cypress Hill or Ice Cube.

Mad Flava and other local hip-hop acts point the finger at the media, but it takes two to tango; the buzz usually goes from the street to the media. After all, Mad Flava possesses enough raw talent to prick the ears of any that are willing to listen.

--Philip Chrissopoulos

Mazinga Phaser
Nominated for: Avant-Garde/Experimental
"Completely different," says Wanz Dover of space rock and electronica. The guitarist for Mazinga Phaser adds, "We subscribe to neither. I think they're fads, but in the end, those who've been doing it for years are still going to be around after the hype's dead."

Leading a roster that includes two people for "multimedia and visual interpretation," Dover and Mazinga Phaser walk the fine line between rock band and performance art-light show. "A lot of people categorize us as 'record-collector rock,'" Dover admits. "There's really not a tag for it."

Whatever Mazinga Phaser does was worth mentioning favorably in Rolling Stone last year. Before a month-long tour in July, the band will record a third album; the second is being finished up.