SXSW

So, a couple of weeks ago I took some much-needed time off from work and headed down to Austin for the South by Southwest (SXSW) music festival. My friend Christine flew down from Seattle and met me there.

Being the music fan that I am, I can't believe I'd never heard of this festival before. It's HUGE, the biggest one in the country by far. Five days, over 1,400 bands, and so many venues I can only guess at the number--around 60, maybe? I've never been to Mardi Gras, but I have to think this thing was very similar, with more music and fewer beads. It was awesome.

(I regret that I don't have any photos to share--I didn't take a single one. Neither did Chris. Not sure what we were thinking, there. For my part, I've become acutely aware lately that I seem to be the only person on the planet--or at least, in the continental U.S.--who does not have a digital camera and still uses the little crappy disposable things. It's kind of embarassing.)

Anyhoo, the festival takes place in downtown Austin and surrounds. If you've never been to Austin, you need to check it out--very cool town. There are tons of venues concentrated in about a 10-block radius, and then even more outlying places that you can easily reach by taxi. And from 11:00 a.m. until about 2:00 in the morning, you couldn't escape the music if you wanted to--it was everywhere. It actually set the stage for our "schedule," such as it was--we basically slept in every morning until the music at the bar closest to our hotel started at 11:00, and that would be our cue to get up.

I'll try to recap the highlights here, but please understand--the usual modus operandi for Chris and me would be to get up with the music, chug some water and coffee, and then start in immediately on the vodka & cranberries . . . followed by beer and lunch . . . followed by more vodka & cranberries. So my memory of the whole thing is hazy at times. I think I can summon up the basics, though.

WEDNESDAY
I arrived on Wednesday morning around 11:00, and Chris wasn't due until early evening, so I ventured out on my own to check out some bands, or rather, one band in particular--The Brokedown. I'd never heard of them prior to our pre-SXSW research, but Chris had sent me some of their stuff, and I really liked it. Turns out, they're even better in person. I loved the first show, even though I only caught the last half--and keep in mind we're talking about sets that are only about an hour long. (So many bands, so little time . . . .) So, I followed them to their next venue, and saw them again. After their set, I was feeling the effects of about two bottles of liquid courage (a.k.a. Heineken), so I decided to introduce myself to the lead singer/guitarist. Turns out, his name is Ross and he's a total sweetheart. Very down-to-earth, unpretentious, and just a genuinely nice guy. Here he is doing his thing. (He's the one on the right.)

In case it's not obvious, yes, I had a bit of a crush.

At this point, I was at a bar called Red 7, and I should mention that before The Brokedown's set, I incidentally got to hear an amazing singer/songwriter named Dawn Landes. I met her as well, and she was great--I wound up buying one of her CDs. (Well worth the $10.) I started to realize immediately what the greatest thing about this festival was--you could stumble onto some amazing music, actually meet the artists, and then hang out with them during the next set. It was a real grass-roots experience for music lovers. I can't recommend it enough.

After The Brokedown's set, I headed back to the hotel to meet up with Christine. I won't go into details about the rest of the night. We spent some time finally acquiring wristbands, which are expensive and for which you need connections to get--they're supposed to get you into shows you otherwise wouldn't be able to get into. (Keep in mind, there were about 20,000 attendees at this festival--some of the bigger-name acts were almost impossible to gain access to.) The reality of what the wristbands accomplished for us is dubious--I don't think we got back in value what we paid for them--but, live and learn. Next year we'll know better. Anyway, we still managed to have a great night--bopped around to various venues, caught some shows (no one you've heard of), and managed to stagger back to our hotel, exhausted, around 2:00 a.m. (Would have been sooner if we hadn't gotten lost numerous times, but hey, that's part of the adventure. It was the first night, after all--takes a while to absorb the lay of the land.)

THURSDAY

Most of Thursday was an exercise in learning the difficulties of logistical planning at SXSW. The thing is, it's almost impossible to really plan anything well. You can look at the (massively complex) schedule and try to figure out where you should go, but in the end, a lot of what happens is serendipitous. There are all these bands you'd like to see, but they might be playing at venues far apart from each other, and their sets might be overlapping, and then, there's always a big question mark about whether or not you'll actually get in if it's a popular show. I'll spare you the details of the endless scrutinizing of the schedule and discussion of what the best plan might be, and just lay out what actually went down.

Most of the day on Thursday consisted of a drawn-out excursion to see Eef Barzelay of the group Clem_Snide, whom I learned about from my brother Scott and whom Christine also loves. (Clem Snide, not Scott, although she is very fond of my brother also.) Anyway, Eef is really the heart of the group--he is to Clem Snide what Jeff Tweedy is to Wilco--and both Chris and I wanted to see him, and we determined that we would see him, no matter what.

Unfortunately, he was playing at one of the more obscure and far-away venues . . . but no matter. After an hour's walk, a brief discussion with some locals, a bus-schedule consultation, a 20-minute wait for a bus, and then, finally, a ride on Austin's finest public transportation, we made it to the venue. (Please don't ask me to recall the name of said venue.) And it was all worth it. This was a day show that started around 1:00, so we got in easily, and we were right next to the stage. And the show was amazing. We were so close that had Eef worked up a sweat and shook his head vigorously, it would have landed on us. (None of this happened, but I'm just saying--we were close.) He has a fantastic stage presence, and the music was perfect for a small, intimate venue. It was one of the best shows we saw.

I'll gloss over some of the details here of what happened after the show--waiting two hours in vain for food, making our way back downtown, finally eating, gettting back to the hotel, heading back out, etc.

In fact, I'm going to have to gloss over a lot here, or I'm never going to finish this post. Let's just stick to highlights now:

Thursday night: A lot of this night was wasted in waiting for a supposed "surprise" show by the Flaming Lips that never happened. We were at another bar catching Aberfeldy, and I met a guy named Pierre (his real name??) who was supposedly an insider who had gotten word the Lips were playing at this other bar, so we went there (sans Pierre--don't know what happened to him), and waited . . . and waited . . . but no Lips. We met some other people and hung out with them, and finally wound up at another venue to catch one of Christine's favorites, Damien Jurado, who was fantastic. It was just one of those nights when plans didn't pan out, but you've got to expect that, and it all worked out anyway.

Friday: Spent most of this day at an outdoor party featuring Camera_Obscura, Robert Pollard of Guided_by_Voices, and free beer. It was a total blast. A beautiful day outside with great music, lots of people to meet . . . and I mentioned the beer, right? Pollard's set was awesome. Once again, I was able to get right up by the stage and--well, you know, the sweat thing and all. I've never been a huge Guided by Voices fan . . . their music is a little too weird for me. But his solo stuff was very accessible, and he's got a great stage presence. He's also (in)famous for drinking and partying during shows . . . and at the end of his set, he opened up a bottle of tequila, took a huge swig, and passed it out into the crowd, and when it got to me, I just couldn't pass up the chance to add to indie-rock festival history. (I actually hate tequila, though--my swig was very small.) Just a great day all around.

Friday night: The highlight of this night for me was getting to see Centro-matic, another band my brother turned me on to. I love this band, and I thought the show was great--once again, we were right up by the stage. The only bummer was that Chris and I were practically dead on our feet when they came on at 1:00 a.m.--we'd been at the venue for hours (got there early to make sure we wouldn't miss it), and it had been a long day, what with the outdoor party and free beer and tequila and all. While at this venue earlier, though, we saw a couple of other pretty cool bands, and I got to meet two musicians from the Drive-By Truckers, another group I love. (I'm listening to them right now, in fact.) There were a couple of minor flaws with the show, the main one being that the guitar was too heavy and the lead singer's voice (which is amazing) was kind of drowned out. But no matter--still a good show.

Saturday and Saturday night: Writing this post is eerily reflective of the SXSW experience: I'm getting more and more tired as it drags on and on. So, I'm going to wrap up with a really quick summary:

* Saw The Brokedown again Saturday afternoon; talked to Ross, promised to come to their final show that night.

*Went to see a no-name band of which we'd met some members the previous night at the Centromatic show. They pretty much sucked.

*Managed to get into a pretty crowded venue to see Superchunk. They rocked.

*Went to The Brokedown's last show to finish out the night. Had a great time. Talked to Ross for quite a while after the show. Exchanged information--it was great to meet you, if you're ever in Los Angeles/Columbus look me up, blah blah blah. (Don't worry, I know this was all lip-service. I harbor no delusions about musicians who live in California.) Gave Ross a (very tame) kiss good-bye and left.

Well. You can imagine how exhausted a couple of late-30s/early-40s women were at this point. I won't even go into my 10-hour weather delay at the Dallas airport the next day, or how I basically sleep-walked through the next week. It was all worth it!

Chris--you know we should start booking for next year . . .