"We are actually Being Dead," they say in unison. She and Dosier look at each other and take a deep breath. "We want to come clean," Keller tells me as I sit down at a picnic table outside Epoch Coffee on North Loop for a scheduled interview with Zero Percent APR. The room explodes into laughter and applause. Hairs on the back of all our necks stand up until the bar's pregnant hush is broken by the heckler. "Why don't you write your own fuckin' music?" the loud voice in the back deadpans.Īt the peak of the show, Keller kneels in front of the stage, spreading flower pedals over the warped floorboards and singing the motherly "Moon Silver," which intones a quality akin to medieval Mazzy Star. Later they cover "I Like the Christian Life" by another magical close-harmony duo: Fifties country gospel Kane-and-Abel the Louvin Brothers.
Together they flex a harmonic cohesion that can feel eerily psychedelic. Keller's voice is sharply melodic and keen to complementary notes. With loads of character, Dosier effortlessly oscillates between a childlike upper register and an exceptionally low range that sounds like slowed-down tape. While they can come off instrumentally primitive, the vocals of Being Dead – or Zero Percent APR – are unassailable. Dosier, with his trademark He-Man haircut, is singing about " blood and gore and families burned" before their voices unite in a cartoonishly mousy octave for the hook: " Dragons come at midnight!" Onstage, with Dosier on a baritone guitar and Keller on a child-size drum kit (both sing and they frequently trade instruments), Zero Percent APR play a song from their recently released medieval-themed album Gilgamesh II. "We didn't give you up!" they say, cheers-ing beers. After another patron comes in to diffuse the situation and the man walks away, the heckler and soccer fans share a laugh. When the group stiffly denies it, he orders them to "point out who was yelling at the band." They refuse to narc out the man sitting in the table directly next to them, stifling a smile as he looks down at his phone. The volunteer politeness-enforcer explains that it's the venue's 10 year anniversary and that they're being rude by heckling the band. Except it's the entirely wrong table: a group of rowdy soccer fans in for a post match drink. A physically imposing fellow in overalls who's been doing some sort of interpretive dance in front of the stage charges to the back of the room to confront the heckler. The schtick's obvious enough to most of the three dozen people hanging out at the eclectic Eastside music shack, but for those who don't get it, things are getting heated. It's the kind of routine Andy Kaufman employed in the Seventies, when his writing partner Bob Zmuda would sit amongst the crowd saying his punchlines to drive the comedian into an apparent rage. He's a plant – a showbiz term for an associate of the performer working undercover in the audience. Being Dead Light" – the final three words worked into a graphic resembling a can of Busch Light. The loudmouth giving Keller and Dosier shit is wearing a gray T-shirt that reads "Zero Percent APR Is Just.
"Let the other Cody play guitar!" he bellows, after someone in the crowd announces that he's also named Cody. Where Being Dead has fans, Zero Percent APR has an enemy. Instead, they've booked the show as their mysterious alter-ego, Zero Percent APR, which has released two lo-fi concept records in the last seven months. Juli Keller and Cody Dosier are onstage, but not under their usual banner of Being Dead – the lovably strange art-pop garage band that's become a modest attraction in Austin over the last four years. It's an early October night at the Sahara Lounge. There, at a cocktail table, a man sits alone except for the two cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon keeping him company. The voice – booming and deliberate – comes from the back of the bar. The band hasn't even finished sound checking and they're already being heckled.