#david moss

It appears that Tesla CEO Elon Musk may have once again duped his fans and investors — which, these days, is an increasingly meaningless distinction.

Last week, Musk made huge waves when he announced that the automaker’s Robotaxi service would finally be giving rides in Austin, Texas, without a human “safety monitor” in the car — something he promised would’ve been the case since day one.

What Musk left out of that announcement, however, was that the human supervisors were moved to another car that followed the robotaxi instead, a workaround that was as dishonest as it was impractical.

Now, the EV blog Electrek reports another bit of Musk subterfuge. Based on what the service’s customers are saying, it appears that, at this moment, none of the Robotaxi rides that Tesla has been giving are “unsupervised.”

Brother Brothers Launch Fundraiser as David Moss Faces “Long Road of Recovery”

The Brother Brothers launched a GoFundMe campaign to assist David Moss with what’s described as a “long road of recovery.”

The band of twin brothers was touring Australia when Moss nearly drowned after losing consciousness in the ocean. The tour was nixed and after three weeks of hospitalization, Moss was diagnosed with a benign cyst in his brain and two blood clots in his lungs.

David and Adam Moss are hoping to raise $30,000 help defray “a multitude of past bills and future expenses and long-term care,” Adam Moss said.

“Although it is important that we celebrate his recovery and discharge from the hospital, we are still looking at a long road of recovery and treatment that involves many lifestyle changes, loss of touring income, as well as the many debts accrued while here in Australia seeking the help we needed,” Adam Moss said.

The campaign had raised more than $6,000 as Sound Bites went to press.

Read the blog’s review of the Brothers’ Jan. 10 gig in Ohio here.

The Brother Brothers Suspend Australian Tour after David Moss Falls Ill in Water and Almost Drowns

The Brother Brothers canceled the remaining dates on their Australian tour after David Moss passed out in the ocean and “nearly drowned,” David’s twin and bandmate, Adam Moss, said in a statement.

The duo scrubbed seven festival and headlining dates scheduled through March 30. David Moss, meanwhile, is hospitalized but “stable and back to his old self” as doctors try to determine the cause of his health crisis.

“I’ll also note that the Australian health care system is a shining beacon to be admired and striven toward, and we can’t thank them enough for all their loving care and excellence in their fields so far,” Adam Moss said.

The announcement was accompanied by a video of David, playing guitar, and Adam, masked at his brother’s bedside, singing “On the Road Again.”

The Brother Brothers are next scheduled to perform April 17 in Utah.

Read Sound Bites’ review of the Brothers’ Jan. 10 gig in Ohio here.

The Brother Brothers at King Arts Complex, Columbus, Ohio, Jan. 10, 2025

David Moss and his identical twin, Adam, known musically as the Brother Brothers, are playing acoustic guitar and fiddle, respectively, and singing one of their typically dour refrains on “Colorado:”

Boy, you’re gonna break her heart.

It was a snowy Jan. 10 in Columbus, Ohio, when the Mosses graced the King Arts Complex not only with a song of “Colorado,” but of their birthplace on “Illinois River Song;” their band’s Brooklyn origins on “Frankie;” the Texas frontier on “Lonesome;” and West Virginia on “Morgantown.” The musical map-hopping caused Adam to crack wise about NYC, which he called “as beautiful as the Grand Canyon except opposite.”

Witty between songs and (mostly) downcast within them, the Brother Brothers are harmony-rich and overflowing with melody. They’re like the Milk Carton Kids with a classical-and-bluegrass bent; Simon & Garfunkel with the benefit of blood-kin voices; and the Everly Brothers in the context of 21st-century folk and Americana.

Watching the Brother Brothers from the audience is like watching a split screen. Adam in white, on fiddle on guitar, his brown beard slightly less manicured than David’s. The latter is in blue, on semi-acoustic guitar - an instrument he shared with Adam and opener Elise Leavy - and cello.

The duo were at their most innovative on their version of “I Will.” Performed without bows on strummed violin and plucked cello, the song was translated from “the White Album” to the covered-in-white Midwest and resulted in the rare Beatles redo that matched - in some ways exceeded - the original for musical ingenuity and sublime vocal clarity.

The 80-minute show was culled from a master list of songs spanning 2018’s Some People I Know (Peter Rowan’s “Angel Island”); 2021’s Calla Lily (the BB original “On the Road Again”); ’22’s Cover to Cover (James Taylor’s “You Can Close Your Eyes”); and the January Album, released in April 2024.

The hopping fiddle-cello bluegrass of “Brown Dog” represented the latter, a rare whimsical Brother Brothers song about David’s pandemic-era canine acquisition that almost broke up the band, Adam said, because David named her Yoko.

The on-the-fly nature of the proceedings - the Mosses could be heard discussing songs off-mic - led to a couple of false starts and missed cues. These only made the performance more authentic - a genuine one-time-only event for the Brothers’ debut at Columbus’ long-running Six String Concerts series.

It won’t be their last.

Leavy, too, is likely to return as her well-received, 30-minute opening set - delayed momentarily as she fetched the aforementioned axe from the Brothers - featured nimble fingerpicking, complex composition and a vocal style obviously inspired by Joni Mitchell on songs about COVID isolation (“Something Real”) and love and loss on “I’m Still Learning.”

Grade card: The Brother Brothers at King Arts Complex - 1/10/25 - A