Asylum Street Spankers

The Asylum Street Spankers, formed in Austin, Texas in 1994, is an American swing, jazz, and dirty-blues band. Their tone is raucous and irreverant, and their material often concerns illicit drug references and sexual connotations. Their un

The Asylum Street Spankers, formed in Austin, Texas in 1994, is an American swing, jazz, and dirty-blues band. Their tone is raucous and irreverant, and their material often concerns illicit drug references and sexual connotations. Their unique sound is due, in part, to the fact that they play nearly all their show acoustically, without any type of amplification at all.

The band derived its name from an Austin street where they would often busk that was nicknamed Asylum Street, now named Guadalupe Street, and the term "spanker" which is an old musician's term for "one who plays his instrument well". It was along Guadalupe that the group played a number of early shows; Asylum Street led to a state asylum.