This summer, chances are you’ll never be too far away from a music festival. For every dog day weekend of the high summer months, there’s an outdoor festival to match in every stretch of the country, of every genre, and of every shape and size. From the behemoth veteran multi-day festivals like Coachella, Bonnaroo, and Lollapalooza to backyard one-offs, inner-city park stages, and burgeoning neo-Woodstock imitators popping up around every corner, the dawn of the 21^st century has breathed a vigorous new life into the music festival concept.

The Royalty is a hard band to pin down. At times they sound like Vampire Weekend, or else like Marilyn Monroe. They can go from channeling Beach House to the Crystals without taking a breath. They sound like a band straight out of the ‘60s or ‘70s that built a time machine and started listening to St. Vincent and Weezer (two of the band’s major influences). Royalty’s front-lady, Nicole Boudreau, recently spoke with Highbrow Magazine.

This is not in California, but springtime off Burnett Road in Austin, Texas.  No cowboys in sight, people arrive to this particular site -- one of the many farmers’ markets that dot the city -- on bicycles and in hybrids to fill their cloth bags with fresh, local produce.  Progressive-minded Austinites embrace their uniqueness just as fiercely as the rest of the state does the cowboy myth, guns and religion.  After all, the city’s unofficial motto, “Keep Austin Weird,” can be seen in graffiti, and on T-shirts and coffee mugs.