Fun Fest is done and dusted but that’s no reason to stay home this weekend. On Friday, The Story Of celebrates the release of its new album at the River Revolution Party in a cabin on the banks of the Colorado River -- Until the Autumn was recorded at this cabin located at 7601 Shelton Lane (78725) in East Austin. Experience a full night of live music and DJ sets courtesy of local talent such as The Bright Light Social Hour, The Morakestra, DJ Thibault, and DJ Gmau. The Story Of is expected to take the stage around 11 p.m.; the agenda also includes a performance by The Heligoats from Illinois. A shuttle ($8 per person) will run from Progress Coffee to the cabin every hour on the hour starting at 9 p.m. (Enjoy the Progress November Residency series while you wait!) The event is free, biking is encouraged, parking for automobiles is $12 per vehicle, and overnight camping is an option as well -- full details here....

We recently enjoyed another ACL Fest and this year’s Fun Fun Fun Fest is a few days away but there is another music festival in Tejas this weekend -- the 2008 SPI Music Fest kicks off in South Padre today, with performances by the likes of Willie Nelson, Ghostland Observatory, Blue Öyster Cult, Alejandro Escovedo and Grupo Fantasma included at this imminent three day party. However, if you have no intention of leaving Austin, fret not, for our city is a nice little oasis of music this weekend as well -- carefully examine the “Halloween Special” Austinist Weekend Music Preview Slideshow above for details on many events in town over the course of Halloween weekend. Follow the jump to learn more about some of our choice picks but before you do, fill out the form below for a chance to win two tickets to see The Australian Pink Floyd Show at Austin Music Hall on Friday night....

Room 710 hosts a benefit show this Friday for Eliya Zay Herwick Nicol, a two year old Texan suffering from NEHI (Cell Hyperplasia Of Infancy), FTT (Failure To Thrive), and GERD (Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease). Eliya Zay is being treated at the Houston Children’s Medical Center; the various bills along with the cost of the commute from their home in McAllen have caused a monetary crunch for the family. Help them out with a donation ranging from $5 to $10 at Room 710 on Friday -- Cher UK, The Meat Purveyors, Monkeytown, and The Sanguinistas are all scheduled to perform. The benefit kicks off at 9 p.m....

Girls Rock Camp Austin offers up education, instruction, and inspiration at its Ladies Rock Camp this weekend. As per the website, “Girls Rock Camp Austin is a nonprofit dedicated to empowering girls and women of all backgrounds and abilities through musical education and performance.” Ladies Rock Camp (for women ages 19 and up -- no prior experience required) takes place at The Griffin School and Sri Atmananda Memorial School over the course of the weekend. The cost is $350 and includes various workshops as well as meals, with proceeds benefiting Girls Rock Camp Austin. It all leads up to the “Ladies Rock Camp Showcase” this Sunday at Creekside Lounge where new material, penned and rehearsed at the camp, will be presented to the public by budding musicians. Follow That Bird! and The Dreadful Sorrys are also scheduled to perform; the event kicks off at 7 p.m....

Local post-rock connoisseurs My Education bring expansive walls of sound to the comforts of Emo’s Lounge this Saturday. The band expertly constructs stirring atmospheric rock, patiently adding appropriate layers and a textured ambiance to their cinematic compositions via a plethora of instruments including the pedal steel guitar, piano, violin, and vibraphone. Fittingly, My Education have performed at the Alamo Drafthouse in the past, scoring films ranging from (Mamoru Oshii’s) Angel’s Egg to (F.W. Warnau’s) Sunrise, a true testament to their talent. The Dead Science headline with spastic spurts of experimental rock that seem disjointed on first listen but are impressively coherent when you indulge the somewhat eerie concoctions. The diverse instrumentation and the varying standards create quite the avant-garde ruckus; it should all make for a raucous live show. The Seattle band released their third full-length Villainaire earlier this year....

Since you probably spent a reasonable amount of money at the 2008 Austin City Limits Music Festival, we offer up two giveaways to encourage you catch some more live music this weekend. In fact, opportunities to see shows for free dominate this Austinist Weekend Music Preview....

The 2008 Austin City Limits Music Festival is finally here! We hope you’ve been enjoying our various stage previews. Even if you’re not attending the day time revelry at Zilker Park, there are plenty of options to choose from during the evening hours. (Read our ACL Fest after-shows roundup here.) Most weekend live music activities will probably revolve around the plethora of acts in town for the fest but there’s so much more going on; a couple of shows definitely merit a quick mention....

Sera Cahoone’s musical career began in Colorado and gained momentum in Washington where she played drums for Carissa’s Wierd, a project that included future Band of Horses members Ben Bridwell and Mat Brooke. Cahoone also contributed to Band of Horses recordings in the past but stepped out on her own in 2005 with her self-titled debut full-length....

Kick off your weekend with an in-store performance at 5 p.m. by Electric Touch at Waterloo Records on Friday. Frank Smith continue as the headliners at Progress Coffee’s Residency series on Friday evening, and if you’re a fan of pure pop melodies, you surely must attend the Wild Weekend Power Pop Festival at The Mohawk on both Friday and Saturday. Emo’s offers up Oh No! Oh My! inside and Toko-Ri Get High at the Lounge. Beerland is stacked with a stellar lineup as well on Friday -- a bill consisting of Dixie Witch, Amplified Heat, and The Golden Boys should make for a fantastic psychedelic rock show....

With four albums under its belt, veteran Austin outfit Grand Champeen continues to chug away, churning out accessible melodies and catchy hooks aplenty via their Texas tinted powerpop tunes. Rolling Stone gave the band’s third record, The One That Brought You, three stars and Grand Champeen’s fourth full-length was released last year on In Music We Trust Records. The band formed in the late 90’s and the current line-up was consolidated in March of 2000....

If you can't view the Flash slideshow above, an alternate version appears after the jump....

After releasing a couple of stellar EPs, Wild Sweet Orange dropped its debut full-length We Have Cause To Be Uneasy late last month on Canvasback Music. The band recently performed on the Late Show with David Letterman on CBS while you can hear their thoughts on Fox’s American Idol series here. The Alabama outfit rolls into town this Sunday (Tickets) to wrap up our weekend with poignant ditties that highlight Preston Lovinggood’s songwriting skills, and crunching compositions that emphasize the group’s inherent talent. A couple of local bands, Electric Touch and Jets Under Fire, get things going at this inside show at Stubb’s; doors at 8 p.m. The Hush Sound headlines Antone’s on Sunday in support of its March ‘08 release Goodbye Blues....

If you’re not driving to The Backyard to see Snoop Dogg live in concert twice this weekend, fear not, because you have plenty of alternatives to choose from on both Saturday and Sunday. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves....

Austinist Indieroke upstairs in The Green Room at The Mohawk is naturally our number one recommendation for a Friday night out on town but we cannot ignore the other quality shows in our fine city on the same evening. Beloved indie-rock outfit Wolf Parade hits the stage at La Zona Rosa nice and early in the evening so as to allow you to make the timely trek across downtown to The Mohawk for Indieroke after their set. The Canadian act is touring in support of their second full-length, At Mount Zoomer, released last month on Sub Pop Records....

The Warlocks’ bring their psychedelic rock variety to Emo’s (Lounge) on Friday night in support of last year’s Heavy Deavy Skull Lover. (Buy it here.) Singer and guitarist Bobby Hecksher’s brainchild, the California act’s music has morphed within the (broad) confines of psychedelia throughout the course of its career, with inherent melody, plentiful reverb, and Hecksher’s distinct vocal contributions tying it all together expertly. The Warlocks’ line-up has adjusted over time as well and the band is no longer the eight-piece creature it once massacred live audiences as. Instead, the band currently pillages on with fewer members and has just recently wrapped up a tour with Austin’s The Black Angels. Tonight, New York outfit The Vandelles and local space-rockers The Boxing Lesson get things rolling at Emo’s Lounge as a part of 101X FM's Next Big Thing series. The rest of Emo’s stays busy this evening as well, with RX Bandits and Portugal The Man on the outside main stage and Marked Men and The Hex Dispensers inside....

On Friday evening, The Austin Music Electronic GRID presents a two stage showcase at Karma Lounge featuring live electronic music and a number of DJs such as EXCEED, Happy PANJOMA, Shuttle Debris, riTch N, and Daetron Vargas. It all kicks off at 10 p.m. with a dance contest a midnight to boot! The winner receives $100 in cash but the contest is limited to 20 people -- sign-up is on a first-come, first-served basis. Contestants will have 30 seconds to impress a panel of judges, go-go girls (who will also dance through the course of the evening in various spots at the venue including a “human aquarium” saturated by black lights), and professional dancers. The prize money will be awarded to the winner at the end of the contest. Thirty seconds of fame with the possibility of hundred quid as well -- sounds like a win-win situation! Also on Friday, Within Chaos and The Destro metal up Red 7 -- both bands are scheduled to play OZZFEST 2008 in Dallas next month!...

As the beloved 4th of July weekend approaches, so does a mass quantity of live music to pick and choose from. Head to The Peacock on Thursday and check out local power-pop act Tribella. Comprised of former members of the Sarah Glynn Band and Echoset, the trio is working on their debut EP, due in August of this year....

Japanese outfit Boris derives its name from the opening track on the 1991 Melvins record Bullhead and much of its down-tempo drone-rock shares a musical border with the legendary Washington area act. Boris has released a number of stellar records since forming in the 90’s; their full-length studio album count per our math currently stands at 14. Their debut, Absolutego, originally consisted of one 60 minute title-track, but the U. S. release by Southern Lord Records a few years later featured an even longer version of Absolutego and included a bonus song. Highly experimental, extremely sludgy, sometimes psychedelic, and full of scorching riffs, the band has walked the fine line between different genres over the course of its career and employed an array of noise generating devices over time, resulting in a sometimes deranged, often convoluted sound that could be the soundtrack to many a scary movie or just your everyday angst. We are licking are chops already in anticipation of a belligerent performance this Saturday at The Mohawk. Torche and Clouds open with their respective brands of raucous rock. (Buy your tickets here.)...

If you didn’t get a chance to commemorate Hole in the Wall’s 34th Anniversary this past weekend, then you best show some love to two redoubtable local venues on Red River St. this coming weekend. Room 710 celebrates eight years of existence with a flurry of shows starting on Thursday all the way until their actual Anniversary day on Monday the 23rd. Beerland's 7th Anniversary bash is on Saturday. (Details after the jump.)...

The concept of the residency, so successful sometimes, so listless if you don’t get it right. Progress Coffee (500 San Marcos, Studio 105, 78702) presents its own version with a very simple mission statement -- “1 month, 2 bands, 3 bucks.” In June, Nic Armstrong (IV Thieves) headlines the residency with Shapes Have Fangs and Loxsly alternating as the opening bands. Shapes Have Fangs kick things off on this Friday (and on the 27th of this month) while Loxsly does the honors on the 20th. Each Friday, the music starts at 9 p.m. and lasts until midnight. July’s line-up boasts three excellent acts (in some combination) as well -- Brazos, {{{ SUNSET }}}, and Canopy. That’s equates roughly to 6 bands for $6 multiplied by 4 times a month minus 1 band each Friday over 2 months = badass. Or something awesome like that. And while you’re at it, why not grub a Fruit Cup or PB+J Panini -- Progress Coffee Menu....

Sure, there’s a dance party almost every weekend at Beauty Bar, but this Saturday’s line-up is something special. A trio of Texas based turntablists -- DJ Jester The Filipino Fist, Ernest Gonzales, and Bad Knives Dead Art (formerly known as Ceeplus Bad Knives and a.k.a Eric Castillo) should keep you on the dance floor all night long. We witnessed DJ Jester in all his glory a couple of months ago at The Mohawk and we can attest that a wide variety of genres and grooves can be expected. (Read our recent interview with DJ Jester here -- the Boca Burger Mobile story never gets old!) Gonzales has been lighting up San Antonio’s night life with his invigorating remixes and has also put out various releases, some under the Theory of Everything moniker although 2007’s While on Saturn’s Rings record was released under his given name, and demonstrated his versatility as a musician and producer. As for Castillo, he has been putting on cutting edge dance events in Houston, and has supplied the beats at past Austinist events to boot. Per the Bad Knives MySpace page, “Currently Cee's sought after, open minded dj sets involve creatively mixing, live editing, re-mixing, scratching and blending the diverse sounds of underground disco not disco, electro, indie rock, pop, fun hiphop, punk-post punk, no wave, rare groove funk/soul, and more.” Phew! Time to Get Busy then....