Hometown Hero

Ready for Confetti, Robert Earl Keen looks forward to singing for a hometownHouston crowd

Robert Earl Keen
Robert Earl Keen in concert
Photo by Susan Darrow
House of Blues

Yes, it’s true: For Robert Earl Keen, the road actually does go on forever. And the party never really ends. Indeed, if you just take a gander at the website of this eclectically inclined country-rocker, you’ll see what a relentlessly touring entertainer he is.

On Wednesday, the road takes Keen back to Houston, for a gig at one of his very favorite venues, The House of Blues. The Sharpstown High grad is looking forward to playing for a hometown crowd, because he knows what to expect from a boisterous audience of H-Town hearty-partiers.

And since Wednesday still counts as part of the Christmas season, he knows pretty much what the audience expects as well.

CultureMap: This time of year, I would imagine your fans are demanding to hear “Merry Christmas from the Family” [Keen’s signature tune about a drunken holiday gathering] even more than “The Road Goes On Forever,” right?

Robert Earl Keen: Absolutely. I think whenever I come around to this time of year, every year, I tell myself, “OK, I’m gonna see if I can just go out there and stand out there for an hour, and then play that song and just walk off, and see if that works.” I don’t know – I guess it’s kind of a funny, smart-ass fantasy.

"And I know there are people who don’t like Houston, or have a hard time defending it, because it’s sprawled out or whatever. But for me, personally – I guess it’s because I grew up there, I don’t know. But I always feel totally at peace in Houston."

But, yeah, there is a definite feeling that no matter what we’re playing, how good we’re doing, how many people are screaming “Robert Earl Keen! Robert Earl Keen! Robert Earl Keen!” – they’re still just waiting for this one song. I know that’s happening, I know there’s no way I’m going to get out of the building alive without playing it. So it’s a matter of, OK, let’s have enough anticipation to let everybody be excited about it – but not too much for them to get pissed off.

CM: Is there a special vibe you get from playing for a hometown audience?

REK: First off, the answer would be yes. And then I would have to say that, as long as I’ve been away, I always immediately feel at peace whenever I go back to Houston. Even when I’m on the freeway, I’m at peace. Houston has a certain vibe that no other place has. And I know there are people who don’t like Houston, or have a hard time defending it, because it’s sprawled out or whatever. But for me, personally – I guess it’s because I grew up there, I don’t know. But I always feel totally at peace in Houston.

CM: Ready for Confetti is the title of your latest… well, wait a minute. I guess they don’t call them albums anymore.

REK: No, they still call them albums. Or CDs. Projects. Episodes. [Laughs] Tragedies. Mistakes.

CM: Well, OK then. Like all of your albums, it’s a crazy-quilt mix of musical styles, ranging pure country to folk to country rock to Americana and on and on. And there’s diversity within individual songs -- like “I Gotta Go,” which sounds bouncy and cheery only until you really listen to the lyrics, and you realize it’s a pretty dang dark account of a guy who’s been spending his life racing toward his death.

REK: [Laughs] You’re right, it does have kind of a dark thing going. But it’s not near as dark as I’ve been in the past.

CM: But does this diversity ever work against you in terms of building an audience? Because, really, it’s not like I can give somebody who’s never heard your music a copy of Ready for Confetti – or any one of your albums, really – and tell them, “All right, this is typical Robert Earl Keen.”

REK: Well, because this is the way I am, I have to feel like my diversity is my strength. And the reason why I’ve been able to have a career that’s gone on now for nearly 30 years. As far as fans go, it’s like I always say: I’m like a Milton Bradley game, good for folks 8 to 80. When people come to hear me perform – unless they just don’t like me, they’re going to find something they like in the show.

CM: You are a true Texas cowboy, in that you actually maintain a ranch near your home in Kerrville. What’s a typical day at the ranch like for you?

REK: Oh, I kind of clean up a few things. Fix up the tack room. I’ve got three horses, so I’ve got to feed them. And I’ve got an old Dodge Dart – a ’63 Dodge Dart that my grandmother gave me. I start it up every time I go to the ranch, just to keep it running.

And occasionally I take people out hunting. There’s a pool there, so in the summertime I hang out by the pool. And when I write, I have this shack I call the Scriptorium where I write. I have about a half-dozen guitars up there, and about a thousand cowboy books. So I play my guitars, read these books – and build a campfire outside the door and eat deer sausage.

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Movie Review

Onslaught's brutal mix of horror, action, comedy can't find its footing

Photo courtesy of A24

Adria Arjona in Onslaught.

The most important thing for any movie to establish early on is its tone. No matter the genre, a film needs to make its audience understand how they should feel as the story unfolds so that they’re willing to go along with whatever transpires on screen. A film that doesn't do that, such as the new Onslaught, runs the risk of failing to connect with viewers even if it has some interesting or fun elements to offer.

One of the biggest issues for the movie is that it fails to fully invest in its main character, Celeste (Adriana Arjona). She’s a military veteran who now lives in and manages a desert trailer park, which is filled with a motley crew of offbeat people. She also has a contentious relationship with her ex, who unexpectedly drops off their daughter, Daisy (Blake Kennedy), soon after the film begins.

Celeste has a stash of high-powered weapons, showing she hasn’t left her former career fully behind. Her expertise comes in handy when something goes wrong at a nearby military contractor facility run by Hans Kemmler (Dan Stevens), and a trio of super soldiers escapes into the wild. Trained to kill everyone in their path, it’s not long before they set their glowing eyes on the trailer park.

Directed by Adam Wingard and written by Simon Barrett, the film has elements of horror, action, and comedy, but the filmmakers struggle in finding the right combination of the three. Wingard and Barrett divide the film’s focus between the trailer park and the military facility for a long time at the beginning of the film, and the quirkiness of people at the former mixed with the bold weirdness of the people at the latter keep viewers off balance in a bad way.

Once they finally settle into the main part of the story where the super soldiers go on a rampage, the filmmakers overpromise and underdeliver. The showdown between a seemingly unstoppable group and an angry woman and her band of misfits seems destined to be highly entertaining, but comes off as underwhelming. The sequence is filled with brutality with no meaning and heroics that feel more accidental than purposeful.

The ham-fisted way in which the story plays out is disappointing since the film has a bunch of characters who could have been great if used properly. The trauma of Celeste’s military career and personal life are hinted at, but don’t come into play as much as expected. Hans and his wife Hanna (Rebecca Hall) are completely off-the-wall, but their eccentricities seem to be apropos of nothing. The super soldiers are initially intimidating, but the climactic sequence undercuts them significantly.

Arjona has yet to fully break out despite some good roles in Hit Man and the Disney+ show Andor. She makes for a good lead here, embodying the toughness of a military veteran while still being relatable. Stevens and Hall go all in with their bonkers characters, but the story doesn’t serve them well. Comic relief comes in the form of Reginald VelJohnson and Eric Wareheim, and they do a great job in smaller roles.

A movie like Onslaught is typically one where the audience just turns off their brains and enjoys the carnage. But Wingard and Barrett try a little too hard by throwing in oddball characters that don’t add much to the story, forgetting to pay enough attention to the mechanics of the plot in the process.

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Onslaught opens in theaters on September 4.

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