SOUTH AUSTIN JUG BAND

The strange and fascinating evolution of American music is largely a hybridization process. Musicians cherry pick from folk, country, alt-country, bluegrass, newgrass, blues, rock and dozens of other genres and subgenres that make up what we call, for lack of a better term, Americana music. Given the sheer numbers of Americana bands out there, few distinguish themselves beyond the local bar band level.

What makes the South Austin Jug Band — a quintet of young Austin-based players that entered the bursting-at-the-seams "Americana" ranks a little over three years ago — interesting is not so much that their fiddle- and mandolin-heavy music is unique. It's more that, for such a young band, they play it so well.

There's actually no "jug" in the band (their name comes from the Muppets movie Emmett Otter's Jug-Band Christmas), but they do hail from Austin, an Americana music mecca. Their acoustic-based roots stew, an eclectic mix of originals and covers (from traditional instrumentals to countrified Hendrix tunes), isn't exactly bluegrass (no banjo, you see), nor is it country or folk.

"We're an acoustic roots band," says upright bassist-vocalist Will Dupuy, clearly struggling to come up with his own definition of the band's sound. "We play bluegrass, some blues, some country. We play the music that we have the instruments for, you know, whatever comes out."

"It's an organized campfire acoustic jam session with a few of the rough edges knocked off," adds mandolin player Matt Slusher.

Regardless of how difficult it is to classify, the band's enthusiastic, down-home sound has carried them a very long way in a very short period of time. They started out playing to small local audiences; now they're regularly booked at the nation's biggest festivals: Yosemite, High Sierra, Strawberry and the Austin City Limits Festival among them.

"We've had good karma," says Dupuy. "We're road dogs. We play four or five times a week, so that helps." The band, in fact, has picked and fiddled its way across 130,000 miles in two years. Their endless road trip brings them to White Rock at 7 pm this evening, July 16, for a free outdoor concert.

The group initially came together in 2000 when singer-songwriter and guitarist James Hyland, whose band at the time was falling apart, was desperate for a rhythm section. He asked Dupuy and Slusher to join him, guitarist Willie Pipkin and fiddler Warren Hood ( son of well-known Austin fiddler Champ Hood) for a gig. That led to more gigs, more jamming, and a natural group inclination to dig deeper into bluegrass, string band and swing influences.

In no time the band had landed a weekly gig at Momo's in Austin, building a strong local following and releasing the self-produced live album Pickin' & Grinnin', a high-energy collection of traditionals, originals, and covers that tapped into the songbooks of Walter Hyatt, Bob Wills, Jerry Garcia, Ernest Tubb and Townes Van Zandt.

Hood eventually left the band and was replaced by fiddler Dennis Ludiker, who arrived just in time to hit the road with a band that had outgrown its local constraints. Soon thereafter SAJB won the new band contest at the Telluride Bluegrass Festival in addition to Ludiker taking top honors at the prestigious Winfield fiddle competition. That good fortune led to an opening slot on some Lyle Lovett shows.

That same year, 2002, the band recorded its self-titled debut. It was produced by the legendary producer Lloyd Maines (Dixie Chicks, Robert Earl Keen, Ray Wylie Hubbard),whose daughter Natalie, of Dixie Chicks fame, had seen the band open for Lovett and recommended them to her dad. In addition to producing, Maines played dobro on the record. "He's a really laid back old dude who reminds you of a really cool old uncle," says Dupuy in his typical ain't this cool manner. "He makes you feel so relaxed in the studio."

The band is currently writing songs for a new record, which Dupuy says will include more originals as well as an all-round tighter sound based on so much experience together on the road. In addition to playing their respective instruments, all the band members write and sing. Dupuy is also working on a solo record.

"Riding around in a car with the same six guys all the time changes the sound of a band," he says. "We've matured in the songwriting and grown as a band.... We've been trying to hone our sound, we're always tinkering with ideas. It's great."