The warm musical embrace of SXSW 2010

I was walking alone down Sixth Street on Friday night around 1am, listening to the music pouring out through every open window and door into the warm night air. My boots clacked on the asphalt as I tucked away a BBQ sandwich from a street cart to drown some of the Shiner Bock. Everyone I walked past had a smile and sometimes a nice word or even a hug. I felt so in my element, so alive.

I had the pleasure of attending the 2010 South by Southwest Music Festival this year with a sailor who informed me in detail that when reading a compass, south-by-southwest is technically a direction that doesn’t exist. I’d try to recreate the explanation but it’s sailor talk. In any case, I remember thinking how I enjoy that the only place SxSW exists is in a mythical land in Austin. It’s fitting.

A thousand people could go to Austin and have a thousand different experiences, and I love that about the crowded, sweaty, jubilant mess. No one I talked to saw (and loved) the same bands. The endless options for every time slot is simultaneously fantastic and heartbreaking. I surely missed more bands I wanted to see than those I made it to, but I made it to some marvelous shows that invigorated me and reminded me why I do this, why I love music.

Here’s what made this year’s festival for me:

LISSIE

Lissie was everywhere, delightfully. This girl from Rock Island, Illinois has a voice that is even more potent and chill-inducing in person; it’s as if she has the force of a complete gospel choir of large black women lying in her belly waiting to explode through songs like “Little Lovin’” and “Everywhere I Go.” When she sang the latter at a nighttime show in St David’s Church, I actually got tears in my eyes from the lugubrious power of that sparse song. Later on that weekend I heard her cover Metallica from downstairs in Stubbs while I shook Bill Murray’s hand. Go figure.

Little Lovin – Lissie
[SXSW VIDEO: Here Before]

J RODDY WALSTON & THE BUSINESS

J Roddy Walston & The Business felt like Jerry Lee Lewis meets Soundgarden, and in a completely insane way, it worked. I wrote about them a long time ago and said I absolutely wanted to see them live, so when they played the Little Radio party, I was there in the front row. I was speechless. All I could do was look at my friends with a glowing smile; “So bizarrely awesome,” Bethany replied. The bass player stood wide-stanced, thrashing his long locks around with a force I’ve not seen since junior high dances and headbanging to Metallica, while J Roddy pounded the piano and kicked over his chair. Whew.

Rock and Roll II – J Roddy Walston & The Business
[SXSW VIDEO]

ANDY CLOCKWISE

Andy Clockwise from Australia also led me to use breathless descriptors of two artists I would never think of pairing together: Nick Cave and the Eels. Clockwise has 1,000-megawatt star magnetism, all swagger and quirky dance moves that I loved, and his music explodes into a supernova live — so much so that I went to see him twice. The fact that he came down in the audience, danced on the bar, handed me a Lone Star, and knelt and buried his face in my belly while we danced might have also helped things (I’m only human). Holy crap go see him live (and his fantastic band featuring my new favorite drummer, Stella) if you ever have the chance.

Sorry for the sometimes-shady video, but you get the fabulous idea — and know you wanted to be here:

THESE UNITED STATES
And speaking of superb live moments, These United States covered Violent Femmes! I was walking up Trinity Street immediately upon arrival to Austin when I heard this ridiculously catchy drumbeat cascading down from a window above. For some reason my brain flashed to thinking, “I wonder when that day party with These United States is?” After checking the schedule, I was thrilled that I had recognized them from their drummer warming up, and we jostled up the stairs to start our fest right. I saw them two more times at SXSW, their rambunctious, heartfelt country-tinged tunes are right at home in that environment, and I was delighted when they covered this (after some previous discussion on the matter):

JENNIFER KNAPP

Jennifer Knapp – an artist I had no idea would be at the festival (there are always dozens of such pleasant surprises at SXSW, it seems) but one I loved a lifetime ago and made a point to see. She was a young Christian artist when I was in high school and early college, a warm alto voice full of Melissa-Etheridge-like power and conviction, fierce on the guitar. I knew she’d vanished for years and years and was now resurrecting her art apart from the church, as far as I can tell. Her new work belies years of struggle that I can relate to, and a grasping at what she can still hold. I was completely blown away, one of the top shows for both myself (as an old fan) and the sailor (as a newly-converted one). This song was towards the end, as she played to a riveted and packed St David’s Church, and she said it conjured up her “Bob Dylan side.” Her album Letting Go is out May 11. [SXSW VIDEO]

STREAM: Stone To The River – Jennifer Knapp

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JBM

The music of JBM (Jesse Marchant) is completely entrancing, with his intricate guitar fingerpicking and pink moon stylings. Walking into the dark quiet of his show felt like a respite from the storm outside. The church hall was rapt and silent, and for good reason. He played this song using loops for the slide guitar part, and something in the timbre of his voice just breaks me. A friend told me a story of seeing Ryan Adams at SXSW ten years ago and if there’s any justice in the world, I feel like JBM could be an artist we look back on to this year and remember when.

From Me To You And You To Me – JBM

FYFE DANGERFIELD

Guillemots frontman Fyfe Dangerfield was tipped by Mojo Magazine as one of Four To Watch at SXSW (alongside the XX, who I totally failed at seeing despite my best line-waiting efforts) so his 10pm showcase at Lambert’s was quite packed. And for good reason – his new album Fly Yellow Moon has my favorite single of the last forever [SXSW VIDEO], but also is laced through with these heartbreaking piano ballads and tunes like this one that can’t help but make your heart jump on up and cartwheel, if just for a moment:

She Needs Me (Monarchy remix) – Fyfe Dangerfield
(“I am yours, you can do what you like with me…”)

FRIGHTENED RABBIT

Frightened Rabbit’s sweltering daytime set at the Paste party was rife with technical difficulties from the start. Keyboards didn’t work at all, monitors went in and out, and finally the band decided on a minimalistic, stripped-down approach. “But you know,” Scott Hutchison said from the stage, “This the way it should be, isn’t it”? I completely agree. I liked hearing the visceral gut punch of the songs from their new album Winter of Mixed Drinks acoustic, and was only sad I missed a live performance of “The Loneliness and the Scream,” my favorite track on there. But since I was actively trying to avoid crying at the festival this year, perhaps that was for the best.

SXSW VIDEO: Keep Yourself Warm

JOE PUG

Chicago songwriter Joe Pug played a day party where people were chatty in the big bar, so he took the refreshing tack of asking the first three rows of us who were sitting down listening closely to join him by the stage. He came in front of the microphone and sang one of the most powerful songs on his new record (“Won’t you bury me far from my uniform, so that God will remember my face?”) with nothing between us to obscure things.

ELECTRIC PRESIDENT

The final show I saw at SXSW this year was the Electric President set in the wee small hours of Saturday night/Sunday morning, at a little venue on the far side of town. It was their first show in three years, and worth walking to in the cold Saturday night air. Their new album The Violent Blue has been on non-stop repeat around here for months. I was so dead beat from the festival that I remember this show as if through a haze, but I was deeply content to hear their intimate songs recreated live. Ben Cooper’s voice is, as he self-effacingly joked, “that of a twelve year old girl,” despite his brawny man appearance, and their songs simply shimmered in the loose, congenial midnight atmosphere.

A few other show impressions:

–I adored seeing The Damnwells live again and hearing a bunch of fresh material, including an announcement of a new album they are working on recording. Alex Dezen walked into the center of the tipsy midnight Paradise crowd to sing “Golden Days,” and for that song it felt so so right.

–Jukebox The Ghost brought pleasingly nerdy piano-based rock to the WXPN dayparty, both classic and charmingly awkward.

–The Scissor Sisters were highly hyped and I so wanted to enjoy them but I was not turned on by their set at all. Maybe it’s because I was freeeeezing all Saturday, and by their outdoor set at Stubbs I just wanted a hot tub and a hot toddy and other hot things. It felt stilted and not at all fabulous.

–Matt Pond PA’s Galaxy Room showcase set was one of the hardest things to get into all weekend. I hope that means word of his absolutely marvelous new album is spreading. He is a hardworking artist of the best kind, with literate songs that make all my insides happy. (new tour announced!)

…And a few final favorite moments of SXSW 2010:

–Eating a fantastic Sunday brunch at Moonshine, which I am still full from, carrying on my favorite tradition started in 2009.

–Admiring the Hall & Oates coloring contest at Home Slice Pizza, and then participating in an “Only At South-By” restaurant singalong of “Hey Jude” in the very best possible way, everyone in full voice, with their whole hearts, sitting at their tables.

–Taking a ride from an elderly Austin native named Howard who drove a VW Rabbit with a handicapped placard. Go go renegade taxi services when you need one!

–Riding home on the airplane seated next to Creed Bratton from The Office and the epic ’60s band The Grass Roots. He’s my new favorite flight companion; we cracked each other up the whole two hours.

I missed seeing Hole at the SPIN party, and Warpaint who everyone raved about, and Local Natives, and the XX, and …and …and … but I did have a momentously marvelous time, drenched in the music. Anyone who doesn’t have a good time at SXSW might have their music-thingie irretrievably broken.

See you next year, Austin.

ALL MY SXSW VIDEOS
ALL MY SXSW PICTURES: On the Fuel/Friends Facebook Fan Page

The Fuel/Friends SXSW Experience

As I start writing this post, I am blazing up I-25 somewhere just outside of El Paso. We’re taking the long way home from Austin, and enjoying the time to let the SXSW experience percolate and settle between the yellow divider lines that flick past on the road in an endless stream. Cracker’s “Eurotrash Girl” is playing in the radio, and the windows are down as we try and sing along. Life is still really good.

We all stayed in Marfa, Texas last night at the modernistic Thunderbird Hotel, and I highly recommend it if you ever find yourself out thisaway. Pedaling rented cruiser bikes, we stopped at the charmingly-painted El Cheapo Liquor Store (really) and then rode out to an inky black field off Pinto Canyon Road to watch for the famed Marfa lights after midnight. We saw them, holy mackerel. Natural phenomenon or hoax or something in between, it was otherworldy spooky last night. As we rode home in the aching silence of the mid-desert (ok, punctuated often by our laughter), it occurred to me that I don’t know when the last time was I’d seen such a brilliantly sparkling number of stars.

These last few days I’ve been processing the absolute whirlwind of SXSW. I meant to write each day of the festival but somehow that never happened. From the time I stepped foot into those festive, loud streets, I feel like I was sucked into something that was simultaneously thrilling (because I mean really, that much music all in one place?!) and crushingly exhausting at the end of each day. I was too busy to stop and write about it, despite my best of intentions.

Let’s start with the bands that knocked my socks off.

#1 tops: Mumford and Sons on Maggie Mae’s Rooftop
One thing I loved and envied about Austin were the number of great open air venues built specifically for live music. You can’t beat the earthiness of the fresh humid air against your skin and the scent of the breeze while listening to amazing music, instead of the (mostly) indoor sweaty air I’m used to. Mumford and Sons completely blew us all away in a setting like this, their impassioned sweet harmonies rising perfectly out into the night. Their young faces and world-worn lyrics carry a strong current of hope, all banjos and stomping foot percussion.

This was one of my most anticipated shows and they didn’t disappoint. They opened with that new song “Sigh No More” that I posted last week and it absolutely slayed me. The chorus sings of “love will not betray you, dismay or enslave you, it will set you free — be more like the man you were made to be.” I felt more like me, only better, when their set spun off at full tilt. Jawdroppingly pure.

Pretty & Nice at Beauty Bar
My SXSW experience started at Beauty Bar (amidst the sparkly pink paint and old-fashioned hairdryer chairs) to the carbonated punk of Boston’s Pretty & Nice. Their angular rock keeled off-kilter, in the vein of Guided By Voices, and they looked like they were having a hell of a lot of fun:

The Damnwells at Threadgills
I have loved this band for a few years now, but never seen them live. One time I (briefly) considered driving to Phoenix to catch them at a film festival for their excellent documentary Golden Days, but that plan fizzled. So before my first night got rolling in Austin, I set off walking (and walking) over the river to Threadgills to see them play on an outdoor stage as the sun set. Alex Dezen’s voice is even more gorgeous and stirring in real life, and the material off their new album was solid. Here they are doing “Bastard of Midnight“:

Starfucker @ Radio Room (MOKB)
You’d have to be dead not to have fun at this band’s live show. All clad in the headbands/neon sunglasses/running shorts look, Portland’s Starfucker blew the roof off Dodge’s MOKB Showcase on Wednesday night. Explaining it to a friend who hadn’t heard them, I described their sound as Eighties sheen with real classic pop-song construction underpinning. An intensely fun 45 minutes, and a band I would love to see again.

Elvis Perkins In Dearland @ The Central Presbyterian Church
Midnight redemption.

BLK JKS @ Radio Room
Victim to the same thief that got to MSTRKRFT, South Africa’s BLK JKS (”Black Jacks”) lost all their vowels and then played the NPR SXSW party. Despite that somewhat humorous confluence of abbreviations, their set was electrifying and elemental and sounded completely fresh — an “unmistakable otherness.” Their debut EP is out on the excellent Secretly Canadian label, and their set went like this:

Oh! And in a brilliant apex of total surrealism, I watched this show with Roy from The Office. Jerk to Pam that he is.

Other memorable shows were Voxtrot at Emo’s (pretty sure I caught some new stuff in there that sounds very exciting, totally different), the bright swing and soul of Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears at the Paste Party, and Superdrag closing my festival out with a scorching set of new material at the SPIN Afterparty. Less good was Third Eye Blind. Don’t even ask, please. Sometimes you do things that make you feel dirty at SXSW.

Irish-fronted Minneapolis country band Romantica (who once recorded that soul-gasping duet “The Dark” with Ryan Adams) was an early afternoon treat Friday, in a dark and tiny bar across the highway. Australian band The Grates at Vaya Con Tacos were an acrobatic whirl of girl rock and swirling ribbons, and King Khan exploded the Rolling Stone party as expected.

The Mile Hi Fidelity Party fairly packed out The Jackalope with great Denver bands, and as an occasional hot freak myself I was pleased to spend a large chunk of my hours on both Friday and Saturday at the Hot Freaks party, listening to absolutely ravaging bands like Henry Clay People (and some confusingly fun ones like Peelander Z). All the blog showcases I attended were quality.

Oh, and Lady Sovereign looks like the cool difficult girl from junior high that totally lit that one guy’s locker on fire and then cut Saturday school.

On a personal music experience level, my favorite moments of the festival came when I saw The Hold Steady twice in one damn day. I was half a foot away from their afternoon show in a little white tent at the Hot Freaks party at the Club de Ville, with a setlist that would make grown THS fans cry. They blew out that tent, and I almost got smacked in the face a few times with their instruments. That one looked and felt like this:

At the end of the night, at the midnight Noise Pop party, I got to see them again next door at the Mohawk, also outdoors with all of us packed in close around the small stage in the warm Texas night. The crowd was appropriately rowdier and the BAC was higher, well, all around. It was like a line from one of their songs: “Let’s clutch and kiss and sing and shake…. Tonight, let’s try to levitate.”

I’ve seen THS shows several times before but never with a friend who loved them every fervent bit as much as I do, so from the opening notes the two of us screamed out the lyrics at the top of our lungs as the whole crowd became one roiling, pressing, pogoing, diving mass. Everyone had their arms around each other and for about 90 minutes I felt no pain. That was one of the best concert moments of my life. Let this be my annual reminder that we can all be something bigger.

As I stuffed clothes back into my suitcase before checking out of the hotel, I thought about the post-festival depression I always feel when the last notes of music die away, and how much more acute it was after a week of this magnitude. I am overwhelmed with the sheer number of bands I wanted to see and didn’t. I keep remembering new ones, too. Ack.

But I am so grateful for the experiences I had, both musical and non, and cannot wait to come back next year. Holy heck.

MY SXSW PHOTOS:
Day One
Day Two
Day Three
Day Four

SXSW 2009: Scott Avett has rambling fever

A fair rogue Avett covers Merle Haggard on the tour bus at SXSW.

Also — listen to their set at Stubbs here.

[via Crackerfarm]

New Thao Nguyen song at SXSW

Thao Nguyen and the Get Down Stay Down played several kickass shows in Austin this year. Her set on Friday night at Momo’s was one of the most packed that I personally attended, with a huge line outside left unsatisfied. I squeezed my way in nimbly up to the front and wow — that woman is ferocious and fearless in her music and her stage presence. She knows how to wield a guitar and craft a song with all the right balances.

Thao played a brand new song to the packed house (there’s one blurb of scratchy audio but then my camera gets on the ball):

A new album is expected from Thao this year.

SXSW: My ears and heart are full

This festival has been amazing and overwhelming, in a very good way. I’m barely alive (among other things the Hold Steady nearly killed me last night, two shows from them in one day) so what I can offer right now is a look through my lens these last three days.

Words to follow when I find my voice again, after all the singing along.

[click any image to see it full-size]

Mile-Hi Fidelity party today!

Please come by and say hello!!

Elvis Perkins, midnight church, and redemption

Elvis Perkins just restored in my faith in the hot-blooded beating heart of music, in a cavernous church sanctuary in the middle of Austin tonight.

Playing a midnight set with his impassioned band Dearland, he left me reeling in the front pew as he wailed and pounded and jangled through his heartbreaking song catalog. I had never seen Perkins before and even though my feet are aching and holy mackerel have I seen a lot of music these past two days, Perkins stripped away all the jaded varnish on my ears with one of the most real, brilliant shows I have ever seen.

The whole set sounded incredible, reverberating off the arched walls and stained glass windows, but the last two songs knocked me flat. “While You Were Sleeping” is one of the most beautifully honest and aching songs I’ve ever heard, and when he sang the lines about “while you were sleeping the babies grew, the stars shined and the shadows moved….time flew, the phone rang, there was a silence when the kitchen sang…,” I started crying pretty embarrassingly honestly in the front row. But by the time he moved on to the next and final song, “Doomsday,” it was like redemption. All eight or so of the musicians, the brass section and the giant marching-band drum guy, all poured off the stage into the front of the church, dancing and kicking and hollering and raising their instruments to the arches. People were dancing in the aisles to the thump of the giant bass drum and I swear I’ve not felt like that in a long time.

Perkins comes to Denver May 8th and a bunch of other places in the coming months. Please go.

NPR’s Morning Edition yesterday (thank you Bob!)

[my camera....well, I might have dropped it in the bathroom, and my good lens just might be in four pieces. I don't want to talk about it. I resorted to flash + daytime lens. Sigh]

Ryan Adams at SXSW in 2001

In early 2001, Ryan Adams was riding high on the critical acclaim of his debut solo album Heartbreaker (Sept 2000), while simultaneously letting off some punk steam through the recording of the excellent Pink Hearts sessions (starting in December of that year).

The set that he played at South by Southwest that year was heavy on Pink Hearts selections, some of my favorite unreleased songs by him. In my book, the 1-2-3 punch in this set of “Candy Doll,” “Gimme A Sign” and “Mega-Superior Gold” would be one that I’d pay good cash to see again. I love those songs.

RYAN ADAMS at SXSW
March 16, 2001
Introduction
Candy Doll
Gimme A Sign
Enemy Fire
I Don’t Wanna Work
Starting To Hurt
Mega-Superior Gold
Red Red Red Red Wine
Testy, Testy
Charmed

ZIP: RYAN ADAMS AT SXSW 2001

[stream it here, thanks to the original taper]

Travel notes from D.C.: Saw Raconteurs last night at the 930 Club; more on that super-loud awesomeness later. And hey, you know what’s really nice? Waking up East-Coast early in a hotel room and crawling a few inches from the bed over into one of these things. Yeah. That’s what I’m talkin about.

The “Yeah, I’m Not in Austin” sulk club

Yes, I’ll just come right out and say it: Hello my name is Heather. I am a blogger, and I am not at SXSW this week.

If you are like me find yourself constrained by money, or work, or life (or a combination of the three) and are not partaking in the musical bacchanalia on the streets of Austin right now, let’s find something to salve our wounds, shall we?

The good people over at Austin Sound have put together a quality 21-song sampler of local Austin talent that will be playing shows in pubs and clubs and parking lots at SXSW. I’ve had an enjoyable afternoon listening to these tunes — here are a few that caught my ear:

Power To Change – The Black and White Years (MySpace)
They were invited by former Talking Head/Modern Lover Jerry Harrison to record their debut full length at his California studio. You can hear why.

Mary Jo – The Brazos (MySpace)
The Brazos just want to hold you in their arms and sing to you over jangly ethereal guitars in a lovely, warbly voice about how they came to you singing sad songs when the evening called. The Cure meets Explosions In The Sky?

Gunpowder – Black Joe Lewis (MySpace)
Where did this young guy come from?! Apparently he’s been hiding in a cryogenic tank in the Stax vaults since 1966, and has emerged to start work on an album with Spoon’s Jim Eno. Go figure.

Darksided Computer Mouth – White Denim (MySpace)
I missed these guys at NoisePop the night I got in, but this is frenetic and relentless from the get-go, and I feel disoriented. I like it.

Muzzleloading Evangelicals – The Archibalds
A modern fusion of the warmer, countrified Beck tunes and an expansive ’70s country rock feel. Breezy and plucky, and I’m sure would sound good with some BBQ in my hand.

DOWNLOAD: The entire Sound Advice Vol II: The Latest Toughs (An Austin Sound Compilation) or snag individual tracks over here.

And maybe I’ll see you in Austin next year.