Larry Seaman

“The years have given his music a rich patina, imbuing it with grace and truth while keeping the edge and quirk ever present.”

 –Margaret Moser, Austin Chronicle

“Retaining aural edginess, a one-time rebel matures –singing with sweet clarity about small and beautiful things with Hemingway succinctness.” 

–Kim Longacre, Musician

Flak Recording artist, Larry Seaman is an Austin based singer-songwriter, guitarist and assemblage artist. He is the founder of Standing Waves, a seminal force in Austin’s punk/new wave scene at Raul’s, Duke’s, Club Foot, and the Armadillo World Headquarters. His musical style is guitar-driven, melodic rock that is a product of Austin and Texas. It’s American music, with obvious British and New York influences, and ranges from psychedelic rock to gentle ballads to catchy pop songs. Larry released his new album Death Takes a Holiday, on Flak Records, a rocking follow-up to last year’s Resurrectionist.

Death Takes a Holiday, was produced with Ron Flynt, and the album features 11 new original songs ranging from tough to tender. The catchy lead single, “Levitate,” previously released features Jon Dee Graham on lap steel and Whit Williams on lead guitar. “Have You Seen My Bride,” written with longtime friend Walt Wilkins, is a poignant remembrance of their parent’s final years

Larry grew up in Abilene, and the biggest influences were radio, church, the West Texas Fair, and family that loved music. His younger uncles played in bands in the sixties, covering the Beatles, the Beach Boys, and the Animals. “They’d set-up in the living room when we’d visit them in Sherman. My grandfather would pound on the mantle and yell “Beat it out!” while my sister was coerced into dancing along in her white go-go boots. That was big for me, seeing people I knew playing, rocking out. I realized, “I could do that.”

When Larry was 13, his family moved to Austin and he began to explore art, music, and poetry. He studied English, Art, and Philosophy at Texas State University. Seaman dropped out after forming Standing Waves. The Waves released a few records, toured, opened for Blondie, U2, Psychedelic Furs, and the Pretenders, and eventually moved to New York City. Seaman returned to Austin in the late '80s, completing his degree in English, then teaching for 10 years. During that time, he began making assemblages, explorations into the spirit of things. His work has been featured at Davis Gallery and YardDog (Austin,) on the East Austin Studio Tour, and at Luanem (Albuquerque.) He continues to write, perform, and explore.d

Larry is inspired by “nature and the realm of the senses, music, art, books, film, science, the Surrealists and the Beats, Love and Death. I appreciate curiosity, profound insight, and a clever turn of phrase.” Some of his favorite writers and musicians include George Saunders,  Russell Banks, William Gibson, and Raymond Chandler; The Beatles, The Velvet Underground, Neil Young, Radiohead, David Bowie, Brian Eno, XTC, and 70s New York new wave/punk rock. 

What We're Listening to Right Now - “Tanya Grew Tired of Talking”

Larry Seaman, the main Standing Wave in another lifetime, drops his stab at a "21st century Fifties death ballad" for this Día de los Muertos-timed release. Remember those creepy teen rock-a-ballads of auld – oh-so-earnest weepers like Mark Dinning's "Teen Angel" or "Last Kiss" by J. Frank Wilson & the Cavaliers? Over throbbing, circular tremolo guitar arpeggios, Seaman plaintively croons a suicide tale that may initially scan parodic. That's only the surface: The song was actually inspired by his mother's 20-year struggle with Alzheimer's. This record's aching beauty and roots-deep lack of irony is quite arresting. –Tim Stegall, The Austin Chronicle

Reviews for Death Takes a Holiday:

“Title taken from a 1934 Fredric March film about the Grim Reaper falling in love in Italy, Death Takes a Holiday masks its dark subject matter. Six songs into the second solo album by ATX New Wave pillar Larry Seaman of the Standing Waves, "A Lighthouse in Your Eyes" has a sunny Seventies, Laurel Canyon, country-rock feel as it rides on a cushion of massed acoustic guitars and harmonized slide guitar hooks from Jon Sanchez. Then you hear the lyrics: "Longing and despair, I pretend that I don't care/ Dot my I's and keep the chaos all at bay." He warbles with enough pathos and ennui to make Morrissey sound like he fronted the Archies. It's merely the tip of a bright, shiny, yet ultimately mordant LP, which of course fits 2020 like narrowly cut silk trousers. Features sympathetic backing from other Austin A-listers like Jon Dee Graham.” – Tim Stegall, The Austin Chronicle

“If Seaman’s guitar-based songcraft feels almost like a lost art in an increasingly wide-open Austin music scene, that just makes what he’s doing all the more significant in keeping alive a vital part of the city’s creative legacy.” Peter Blackstock, The Austin American Statesman 

Reviews for Resurrectionist (2019):

“Schoolteacher, singer-songwriter/guitarist, assemblage artist Larry Seaman announced his local entry into music via the Farfisa-flavored Standing Waves, the most definitively New Wave of all the Raul's-era acts. His edgy sensibility has sharpened over time through a series of bands (Last Straw, Violet Crown, Seaman's Quartet), leading to this solo work. Varying shades of guitar rock range from Tom Petty fronting Television ("Gravedigger") to the menacing and bluesy ("Strings Attached"), and that's just the first two tunes! There's also echoes of solo George Harrison ("Coming Around," "Spring Comes") and a cover of Lou Reed's "Venus in Furs," which somehow makes the Velvet Underground chestnut sound like the Left Banke's baroque pop. "Only Memories," a co-write with ex-Standing Waves member Bruce Henderson somehow left undone since 1982, hurtles along like an early R.E.M. outtake. Resurrectionist bursts with flavor and quality songwriting.”

-Tim Stegall, Austin Chronicle

Larry Seaman, Resurrectionist. For four decades, a welcome constant in Austin music has been that Seaman will always have quality new songs at the ready. Frontman for proto-new-wavers Standing Waves circa 1980, he’s fronted various bands since then (Last Straw, Violet Crown, Seaman’s Quartet), some leaning more toward edgy rock, others more acoustic in nature. Resurrectionist covers the full run between those bases, bound together by consistently brilliant songwriting. “Long Slow Fade” and “Coming Around” are emotionally powerful, guitar-driven panoramas that anchor the middle of the record, while “Things Shouldn’t Be This Way” and the closing “Spring Comes” connect with a lighter touch. A revealing cover of Lou Reed’s “Venus in Furs” is the lone non-original here, but the most welcome inclusion is “Only Memories,” an instantly memorable pop gem written with Standing Waves bandmate Bruce Henderson that dates back to 1982 but somehow had never seen the light of day before this. 

–Peter Blackstock, Austin American-Statesman

LINKS:

Listen to “Levitate”: https://soundcloud.com/user-500653859/levitate-radio-edit#t=3:20:00

Video: “Levitate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRN5OkPOIu4&feature=youtu.be

Website: http://www.larryseamanartmusic.com