The Felice Brothers

The Felice Brothers

Celebration, Florida

2011

In an alternate universe, bizarro Stephen King sits at his typewriter in 1977, feverishly pounding out what may be his masterpiece set in an abandoned high school in Beacon, NY. The caretakers are a band from the Catskills and set about recording an album in the haunted hallways and anxious auditoriums, eerie stairwells and disturbed cafeterias. The surreal setting places the band at unease, removes their comfort zone, prods them to creativity and the loss of abandon and the joy of exuberant discovery. The creation process achieves the movie-dream vision of standing in the midst of dozens of holographic projections, manipulating them with the swipe of a hand through the air, instantly willing the slightest lark to appear and dance in a Fantasia-like manner. It is exactly this impression that The Felice Brothers give on their album Celebration, Florida.

The album begins with Fire At The Pageant, a rousing march of movement that sets the tone for the record, swirling in and out of chaos. Percussive beats, claps and slams of field recordings anchored with bass and sprinkled with anything from horns to piano, acoustic guitar, sirens and accordions in plunked out melodies combine with a dark and gloomy children’s chorus shouted for a mixture of anxiety and agitation. Call it melancholy and the infinite danceness, call it kids in a candy store, this is an album of songs that flow from sparse to frenetic, moments of aching beauty in between the songs that make your shoulders and hips move like some kind of spooky rock dj’s.

Released on Fat Possum Records (The Black Keys, Andrew Bird, R.L. Burnside, Paul Westerberg, Band of Horses), there is a feel of capturing the joy of creation in freedom, with twists and turns like kids through a Wonka factory, frequently surprised by clever girl veliciraptors. The album has a sense of songs written and deconstructed, smacked up, flipped and rubbed down (oh no!) and reimagined with tons of space, allowing a feel of Woody Guthrie, Michael Penn and Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot era. One imagines a producer on the floor with reels and reels of audio tape and a razor blade, splicing and sweating and smoking, assembling and constructing takes that invoke an amphetaminized^© Dylan or inebriated Paul Moeller.

The setting was real, sans poltergeist, and the band really recorded in an abandoned school, and the empty isolation comes through on the album. Songs like Honda Civic and Ponzi are immediately accessible and complement the bare arrangements of Oliver Stone and Best I Ever Had. And to make sure you’re listening, they don’t mind invoking a few Queen Mothers, just to keep two songs off the radio. With welcome departures from the norm and time-shifting rhythms that fold instantly and enhance the work, it’s an album that feels chaotic and cohesive at the same time. Embracing the whole Music Is Fun mentality, The Felice Brothers embody the idea that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Brian S. Meurer

Warp Factor Nine

After a leave of absence, I return. After finishing the last review in August, I closed on a house. Renovations proceeded continuously through Halloween weekend, settling in and holidays brought us through to the new year, but hey, we're all busy. Now, with the Austin trip behind us, the writing continues at www.theweeklyfeed.org, looking forward through Waterfront concerts and Derby festivities. I'll leave you with the immortal words of the Hold Steady: We're gonna build something this summer.
b

SXSW 2011

SXSW 2011

03.15.11

Day Zero

The annual South by Southwest Music Festival in Austin, TX encompasses two thousand bands over five days in every building in the downtown area that has an electrical outlet and a toilet (toilet optional). Representing a wide strata of artists, from the do-it-yourself crowd to the multi-platinum established label types, it is possible to see non-stop music from the crusty-eyed morning to the bleary-eyed extra late evening (morning).

Celebrating its 25^th Anniversary this year, the festival, (known as SXSW), is anchored by the official convention: showcasing speakers, panels, discussions, open floor trade show, select musical acts. It also hosts sites away from the convention center, events that are purely band driven. All around these official showcases, there are countless unofficial ones, sponsored by labels, magazines, and agencies of all stripes that run bands from early until it’s almost early again.

This was the first year that we were able to arrive the day before the official music portion of the festival begins. Credentials obtained, we reacquainted ourselves with Austin, roaming the streets, visiting Guero’s and the Driskill and S. Congress and 6^th Ave. There is an overwhelming feeling of the 1926 Hemingway novel The Sun Also Rises, as they spend some time in sleepy Pamplona before the Festival of Fermin begins with the running of the bulls. There’s a drastic change about to happen, and it’s like static in the air, potential energy that is about to burst into kinetic.

03.16.11

Day One

If South by Southwest in Austin parallels The Sun Also Rises, then Wednesday officially starts of the music portion of the festival with fireworks as people pour into the frenetic streets, chasing and being chased by the running of the bands, including the incidental trampled bystander. It comes with the territory, it’s part of the deal, dodging the loading and unloading of countless and tireless bands, their wheeled amplifiers and overloaded shoulder bags and tightly gripped instrument cases. There’s no denying the grueling efforts of bands here, most playing anywhere north of four times throughout the festival.

Wednesday began at the Convention Center with James Vincent McMorrow near the press lounge. It also saw the advent of the Jawa. A small plush toy for children, tis true, but also an interview accessory that seemed appropriate and grew to be a mandatory post-interview picture. From there we checked in to the Paste Magazine party on 6th with The Civil Wars, offering a stunningly beautiful set in the early afternoon for a deathly quiet audience rapt with attention, no small feat in the distracted, sweaty and overcrowded Austin streets. One of twelve shows over the next few days, they’re making quite the impression. Trampled by Turtles took to the stage afterward to a packed house as we made our way to our next scheduled interview with the enigmatic J. Mascis, a suprisingly low-key individual compared with my idea of the prime mover of Dinosaur Jr.

After dinner and walking around downtown for a bit, I settled in at Stubb’s on Red River, one of the prime venues in town. It’s a large outdoor amphitheater behind a BBQ restaurant and known for it’s musical selection, sound and capacity. First up tonight were Smith Westerns, a young band out of Chicago that has a lot of buzz going for them right now, as they made a lot of must-see lists around the country, enough apparently to snag a prime slot at Stubb’s. It seems their youth pulls them in many musical directions, making their description something like a Ramones/Cure/Dream Pop/Lynrd Skynrd/Wyld Stallynz hybrid, or it could be said that they knew enough of the Ramones to be dangerous, but filtered through enough In Utero to fall short. In the end, the live show of these 19-year-olds was lackluster, embodying the notion that youth is wasted on the young.

In one of the most dramatically contrasting set changes I’ve ever seen, Raphael Saadiq exploded on stage with a high energy performance, backed by one of the hottest, tightest, and dynamically minded bands around. Saadiq took these two-thousand plus people here at Stubb’s to church, engaged the crowd and launched into Sure Hope You Mean It, riding that roller coaster through the highs and lows for all it’s worth, taking it way down dynamically, challenging the audience to some yeah yeah yeahs, and winning.

03.17.11

Day Two

Day two in Austin at South by Southwest began with the word sluggish. However, late nights and early mornings and on your feet in between define the festival. First interview of the day was TV on the Radio, followed by checking out the Seedy Seeds at the Buzzgrinder day party. We made time for the sets on the Radio Stage at the convention center of both Josh Ritter and Emmylou Harris in an appropriately hushed environment. It was quite early in the day to be getting chills from music, a powerful reminder of why an event like this exists: music is meaningful and makes life meaningful and shakes us into awareness. This would be an important thought as the day went on and detours occurred. Our schedules do not always align with artists in the music industry. One of the interviews I was most looking forward to, Raphael Saadiq, had to be nixed when he was delayed by more than an hour and a half. However, in his absence we picked up an interview with Cults.

That delay pushed our schedule up against a Cold War Kids interview, from which they were coincidentally not present due to some other form of typical SXSW chaos. Off we went east of the expressway, an area to which we had never ventured, only to find, unsurprisingly, dozens of more clubs, tents, throbbing music and huddled masses, yearning to breathe free. And there we found Moby. In a sparse, nondescript, graphic design studio nonetheless, as one might expect to find someone like Moby. Quite the surprising and willing conversationalist, he made for a great interview.

We found ourselves traveling down south Congress, over the river and past the shops the area is known for, stopping at HomeSlice pizza for, well, you know, and then on to the showcase at St. Vincent DePaul with American Aquarium, an excellent band from Raleigh NC. This festive set put us in the mood for Antone’s and a killer bill: Band of Heathens, Abigail Washburn, Kelly Willis & Bruce Robison, Emmylou Harris and the Old 97’s. Losing the ability to tell how many days you have been immersed in South by Southwest is characteristic of the event, and if you are having trouble calculating by day two, it’s clearly time to fall like a bag of sand into bed.

03.18.11

Day Three

No rest for the weary, we were up and out the door and walking through town, seemingly not long after many were trickling into bed. A full schedule of interviews began at the Four Seasons Hotel in their amazingly comfortable lobby, complete with balconies overlooking the lawn gently spilling into the Colorado River. Fresh from an early downstairs showcase, the first interview of the day was G. Love, still animated and full of caffeine and dragging us all with him.  Up next was a mere block away, on a balcony overlooking 2^nd and San Jacinto we set up for a great interview with two of the fine members of The Head and The Heart, representing themselves well with a full slate of performances this week.

We had a quick brunch and intelligent discussion with Chris Walla of Death Cab fame at the comfortable Manuel’s on Congress. He was here in support of some of his production projects like Telekinesis and Lonely Forest, as well as in advance of a new Death Cab album. Through constant stop-bys and introductions, we talked about projects and OMD, sounds and influences and inspirations. It was surprisingly one of the more laidback and interesting discussions of our week.

Stepping into the bright Texas sun, we made our way to the next interview, now with Ellie Goulding on the 22^nd floor of the Hilton. With one of the more impressive views of the city, Goulding and her crew held this suite for interviews. She turned out to be surprisingly personable and relaxed in the interaction, showing a bit of her fun side.

After a bit of rest in the press suite in the convention center, we grabbed an interview with Lohio, followed by Cheyenne Marie Mize. After this full day, we caught sets by Surfer Blood at the Cedar Street Courtyard, Theophilus London at the W Hotel for the Nylon party, and headed to Antone’s for the Head and the Heart. Theirs was a great, energetic, powerful set, made all the better by the knowledge that they were good people.

Our final stop of the night was at the Driskill Hotel, a landmark in Austin if ever there were one. Grand and opulent, it is also a pivotal anchor of SXSW, connecting the main arteries of 6^th St. and Congress. Their Victorian Room  was housing an ASCAP party, and we were able to catch a couple of sets, the first of which was Dan Wilson. He of Semisonic and Closing Time fame, these days he does a lot of co-writing, including Josh Groban, Adele, and the Dixie Chicks, with whom he won Album of the Year and Song of the Year at the Grammy’s in 2007.  Songs from his solo album were the set on this night, featuring Tracy Bonham, the Dixie Chicks Martie Maguire, and Jeremy Messersmith. Tuneful, well constructed songs, this was a very enjoyable set. He was followed by the Nashville band the Civil Wars, consisting of Joy Williams and John Paul White, featuring their amazing voices, his acoustic, and some kind of cosmic interconnectedness that was chilling to hear. It was like a science experiment running a current of electricity through the room. This was their final of 12 shows, and they appeared neither weary nor any less than ecstatic to be on stage, going all Nikola Tesla on the crowd, who absorbed with utter attention what was happening on stage, bursting with applause at the end of an incredible set at the end of an incredible day near the end of an incredible week.

03.19.11

Day Four

Our final day of fun in Austin at SXSW found us settling into the groove of interviews, the sequence of set up for cables and lighting and cameras and audio moving with the fluid efficiency of the industrial revolution. Our first location was a church by the capitol putting on the AOL party. While waiting on the Dodos to finish their sound check, we happened to be stationed near a T-Mobile sponsored ice cream sandwich truck: choose your dream cookie (chocolate chip, snickerdoodle, etc.), choose your dream ice cream (vanilla bean, mint chocolate chip, etc.) and they will literally hand your dreams over to you! If only all dreary waiting spaces (hospitals, government offices, traffic jams) had these guys, the world would be a better place.

After the Dodos interview, we paid a final visit to the convention center for one last plundering of the press room followed by the interview with Afie Jurvanen from Bahamas, who is also the guitar player for Feist. A genuinely affable guy, he made for a great, laidback and informative interview.

Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel with two more left, we girded ourselves for one more trek to the other side of the expressway, to what was known as the Fader Fort, a fenced in absolutely huge area that felt more Mad Max meets refugee camp. Sponsored by Fiat, this stage ran for days and had a lot of notable acts. Our interview was with Jamie from the English indie pop band the XX. Falling on the reclusive and less than comfortable end of the spectrum, we finished and took a quick loop through the rest of the Fader Fort and left humming California Love.

Our final interview of SXSW was at the Central Presbyterian Church, at 8^th and Brazos. We met Sharon Van Etten there in a fun and free flowing interview in the courtyard before she prepared for the Red Ryder showcase that evening. We talked with her and her band for a bit and walked back to the hotel for a brief rest before heading out to absorb one final night of the festival.

We stopped by the capitol for a recap video on the way back to 6th. We popped into a few places there, being the main drag and the most accessible to the largest number of options. Maggie Mae’s rooftop is usually a good option, and we caught the set of Wolf & Cub at the Aussie BBQ party before dropping by the Hilton to hear a few songs by Kim Taylor in a quiet, quiet room. Not far from here we heard the Dead Milkmen play Punk Rock Girl, sending me straight to seventh grade and all that comes with that. We dropped into Stubb’s for a bit, unfortunately hearing a band called Electric Touch, who managed to combine the worst of the Killers and Poison in 1986 and injected it with what Freud might have called the Pomp Ego. Fortunately, Tres Mountains provided the palette cleanser of aggression, combining Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament and Mike McCready with King’s X’s Dug Pinnick on vocals. We took off after this and went back to the Central Presbyterian Church to catch some of the sets by Rural Alberta Advantage, Jukebox the Ghost and Great Lake Swimmers. We bounced around the town the rest of the night, ending up at the Parish for Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, running in to friends as well as Michael Stipe. It’s just one of the weird things about Austin, you never know when you’re having dinner next to Jack White, giving directions to Michael Ian Black, walking next to Aziz Ansari or having routine occurrences next to people you’ve listened to and laughed with halfway across the country for years.

It was refreshing that most of these artists we interviewed were down to earth people, usually not difficult or awkward socially or arrogant. Of course, there’s nothing like being surrounded by two thousand other bands to shatter the illusion that what you do is completely unique, that since you pluck a string or open your vocal chords that you belong amongst the elite and are in a class of your own. It’s kind of like how when you get married, it’s this beautiful thing because the other person finds you special and unique and you feel the unconditional acceptance of being yourself. Experiencing South by Southwest in a band is more like the exact opposite of getting married.

The Sunday that ends the week in Austin is one of the strangest experiences there, the emptiness contrasted with the pandemonium of the previous nights. In many ways, it is exactly as Hemingway describes Pamplona after the Festival of San Fermin, after the crowds have gone, after the noise has gone, after the charge that runs through the streets like electricity has dissipated. South by Southwest may be grueling for bands and the search for success more akin to buying dollar scratch-off tabs, but I really love that optimism. I think that each of us chooses music to be the soundtrack to our lives. We live deeply, we hurt deeply, we experience great joy, and that music is forevermore attached to those experiences, is there to amplify the joy and soothe the hurt. To those who create, this is the meaning and the reward; from the rest of us, thank you.

Brian S. Meurer

The Decemberists - The King Is Dead 2011

The Decemberists

The King Is Dead

2011

The latest album by The Decemberists achieves something that few records do these days; as soon as I hear it, I instantly feel the impulse to scan the room in search of an acoustic guitar. The King is Dead is ten songs and forty minutes of reaching for the elation of feeling, projecting songs that could be sung in the open prairie around a fire with your closest friends under the stars on a warm evening. It tugs at the strings of what only exists in the listener’s mind, that mythical place of nostalgia for the way it used to be, a kind of static momentum that is all feeling of motion without the need to actually move.

When we last left The Decemberists, they had released their exquisite album The Hazards of Love, and subsequently taken more than a few critical hits over the height of its ambition. That album was all about the grandiose, complex narrative of a prog-rock opera, and obviously not everyone’s cup of tea. The King Is Dead strips away extraneous flourish and boils each song down to its essentials; it’s as straightforward an album as the previous album was elaborate, less Corinthian and more Doric.

A lot of fuss has been made drawing parallels between REM’s Document/Eponymous days and The King is Dead. And yes, there’s quite a feel of that here, with its jangles and backbeats, and Peter Buck even appearing on three songs. But I think that there is a lot more to pull apart here, and you don’t have to go further than the title to see the Smiths/Morrissey nod. But it’s a gentler, kinder Morrissey that Colin Meloy channels, the kind of Morrissey that you take home to meet your mom, the kind of Morrissey that is your next door neighbor and bakes apple pies for you. With different teeth and a boost in the surly, This Is Why We Fight could have fit easily and perfectly on Are The Quarry.

Make no mistake, there is no prog-rock opera here; this is an album of songs. It reminds me of the idea of the first Counting Crows album, that breath of fresh air that showed a song well constructed could stand on its own without an electric guitar. These stellar, crisp acoustic guitars really do sound amazing. It says a lot about the engineering of sound when the quality makes you want to reach for the nearest instrument. Don’t Carry It All opens the album with a boom-boom-whack and a harmonica that sets the tone for this collection of homespun rock of the folkiest kind.

Somehow, The Decemberists are consistently able to pump out instantly singable melodies that feel like déjà vu, like you sang these songs everyday in a past life. Background vocals and harmonies are able and hauntingly handled by Gillian Welch at just the right hair-raising places. Colin Meloy does these melodies that are in higher end of his range while having the female harmony singer with a naturally higher voice do the lower harmony part. It’s the blend that etches directly into your hippoampus. Case in point: Rox In The Box- “And it’s One Two Three on the wrong side of the lee”, just try not to sing along the second time you hear it. It’s almost like a common human genetic trend that identifies and reverberates melodies, resonating in the deep recesses of the brain.

Sometimes it doesn’t matter what the influences are as long as it feels right, and this album has a great feel. Don’t Carry It All shows that this album is about the elements; Calamity Song is a great example of that Athens Backbeat, Down By The Water falls on the laidback side of The Smiths, they all fall together like shuffling a deck of cards. Despite whether you find this album to hearken to the early days of REM or fall in line with Moz, just make sure that you find it. Your Spring and Summer will thank you.

Brian S. Meurer

The National

The National

High Violet

2010

Standing out as one of the best albums of 2010 is High Violet, the fifth and newest album by the National.  It’s a set of eleven stirring songs that smolder and ignite, held together by eddies and riptides that provide a rare sense of cohesiveness.  It might be fair to say that this is an album that is absorbed rather than listened to.              

Falling somewhere between a crooning Sinatra and Robert Smith, between a late and subtle Morrison & early Presley, singer Matt Berninger’s voice is a trippy barritone, with lower register melodies intense, clipped and dour enough to make Depeche Mode smile.  Heart wrenching lyrics celebrate & embrace the pain and discomfort of sadness, staring headlong into that abyss, unflinching and willingly.  It takes an ocean not to break, indeed.

You can chart the growth and success of this Brooklyn (by way of Cincinnati) band over the course of their ten-ish year existence, from music charts to reviews to copies sold. And High Violet is not the exception.  The ability of the drummer to shake a slower, off time song, get mathy with it and subtly launch it into high gear provides a crackle and sizzle that doesn’t go unnoticed.  Neither does the understatedly scraped fuzz and hum of an echoing electric guitar part, for that matter.  The album is extremely evocative, a guy who has lost it all, at the end of his rope.  The ability of the band to impeccably express this is impressive, particularly for a semi self produced record (Peter Katis assisted a bit).

A word I used earlier is smoldering, and I can’t find a more succinct description.  There is utter beauty in these songs that build in dynamic layers, mixed from on high with a view of the song as a whole, pulsing through the push and pull of sixteenth note muted acoustic guitar string echoes, amplifying the hi-hat strikes, highlighting tension with the quarter notes of a piano melody.  At any given moment, there is always a doom part, an instrument or sound that seems intent on raising the hairs on your arm, like a signal in a horror movie.  There aren’t so much harmonies as hauntings, otherworldly breathings, uneasy whispers that combine with bass flutes and harmoniums and French horns that are arranged and mixed so well you have no choice but to absorb it.

There are too many highlights on this album to list here; the first single was Bloodbuzz Ohio, the second Anyone’s Ghost.  I need to point out that the track Runaway was originally titled Karamazov, referencing Dostoevsky’s 800 plus page tome, immediately increasing the level of interest in the exegesis of the lyrics.  This only serves to enhance that which is already on many levels a stellar album.  It feels like it connects to so much more than music.  High Violet compels you to follow the band into that darker part of human experience, that sadness that we can’t fix in others or ourselves, where paradoxically the only way to shake it is to fully experience it.

b

Forecastle 2010 Day Three

Forecastle 2010 Day Three

The final day of Forecastle 2010 felt like the final day of a music festival: bleary eyed, sunburned, spent, fatigued, dehydrated, malodorous and worn down. Pushing through that by any means necessary in the pursuit of auditory rapture, and early Sunday had a lot to choose from: Vandaveer, Dar Williams, Sara Watkins, Minus the Bear, the Commonwealth, the Fervor. Crowds grew as the day got going, all leading up to the evening sets, beginning with the West Stage at 7:00 with She & Him, that combination of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward. Releasing two albums over the past couple of years, the band is set perfectly as a breath of fresh air with those sweet vocals drenched in reverb and that Brian Wilson-like production. It sets everyone at ease, caters to those exposed nerves that need soothing. Into the first song, the crowd is politely chill, and in Louisville, we are nothing if not polite. As though shaking off the funk, excitement breaks through the mere absorption of the band and the people make their appreciation known. A lot of what She and Him do is very 50’s, like what all the radios play at a classic car show, or a late night commercial advertising a compilation of cruisin’ classics, sponsored by Quaker State. But man, that voice is pure beauty, heavenly, otherworldly. The band is in great form and dynamic: they shuffle, gallop, follow the cues of the bandleaders. She loves her tambourine and the crowd loves her. A two-song encore ends with an amazingly soulful version of “I put a spell on you” with just her and M. Ward and a few thousand of their closest and newest fans.

I ventured over to the East Stage to see Company of Thieves, a band that has recently had a surge of popularity in this city. In the midst of a new recording period, they took a break for a flight to Louisville to play Forecastle and didn’t disappoint. Opening with “Oscar Wilde” and taking most of the crowd by surprise, the band was clearly enjoying the moment and focused on its continuing trajectory. Genevieve is always amazing to watch, to physically see such a huge voice come out of such a tiny body, her animated movements and sparkley dresses engaging the crowd. The band sounded great and the vocalist also treated us with appropriate use of the tambourine. There was a great element of that elusive groove running through their songs and kept the people in front of them moving.

The last time I saw Spoon was in Austin on their riverfront, Auditorium Shores, so it seems fitting to see them again on ours. The band opened with one of the most perfect opening songs, “The Beast & Dragon Adored”, much to the pleasure of the onlookers feeling the teeth of the guitar and resonating boom of each intricately placed drum hit. But the crowd is more mesmerized by this display than hyped; a hip begins to move, followed by the leg bounce, and now a head nods in rhythm, and I can see shoulders begin to connect with the axis of the hips and they glide and move. Spoon is a monsoon, a tidal wave demanding crowd submission with sheer ferocity and tenacity. Those guitars cut in just the right place, bass is perfectly distorted, piano notes hit exactly where they are supposed to and nowhere else. The second song, “Got Nuffin’”, is exceptionally longer than their normal songs, but the straight strums and eighth-note repeating attack of the bass throb has placed the crowd firmly in their palm. A six piece brass section of saxes and trombones, from Louisville nonetheless, backs up the band on a few songs, further endearing the crowd to their hearts. By the fifth song, “You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb”, there’s not a person not gyrating in some fashion or another. And if they aren’t, it’s because they’re dead inside. At one point, Britt Daniel, the vocalist/guitarist, dons a bass and jumps into a drawn out, sparse throbbing intro, feeling for all intents and purposes like a techno song, and right when it would normally go the typical “oom-siss-oom-siss” techno part, the drummer does some crazy fills and the song ends. The band rolls through “Is Love Forever”, “Don’t You Evah”, “Fitted Shirt”, “I Summon You”, “Written In Reverse”, “I Turn My Camera On”, “The Underdog”, and “My Mathematical Mind”, closing the night with “Black Like Me”. I realize that Spoon always makes me want to get a telecaster. This is also one of the last thoughts I have for the evening. I took off after the Spoon set, and rightfully so, have a nice pang of regret every time someone describes the Flaming Lips show to me. Next year, maybe I’ll personally get sponsored by Red Bull.

Forecastle 2010 Day Two

Forecastle 2010 Day Two

Saturday began for me at 3pm at the East Stage, where a band known as Mucca Pazza was set to begin. Twenty to thirty people enter the stage, all in non-matching marching band uniforms. Guitar, accordion, trombones, saxophones, bass drums, toms, sousaphone and pompoms come together in what can only be described, by themselves nonetheless, as a circus punk marching band. It sounds like the soundtrack to a Tarrantino directed James Bond movie filed in the 1920’s. All instrumental, it’s one of the most entertaining shows I’ve seen yet, and it’s possible that the most fun was had on stage. Maybe they were the ones in High School marching band that got kicked out because they were too weird. All the better for us. It’s a great and inspiring set and almost makes me forget that I’m already sunburned.

Over on the West Stage, Grace Potter & the Nocturnals took the stage to a sizeable crowd and performed an eclectic, genre spanning set that made it difficult to pin down. Her voice definitely has aspects of Dolly Parton and Sheryl Crow, but depending on the song could be classified as country rock, jam band, and southern folk pop. The sound was good, guitars had great tones and a B-3 filled all the right spaces like a good organ should. Her songs cover all the bases to meet your multi-genre needs.

By 5:30, the crowd really begins to thicken as the showtime for Cake grows close. There are many Cake t-shirts down front, and as I have learned through extraneous chatter, there are a lot of fans of the band in this town, and that excitement can be felt. They take the stage and leap immediately into the one two punch of Comfort Eagle and Frank Sinatra, ensuring that the tide of the crowd is with them. Vocalist John McCrea is bent on two things today: crowd interaction and his vibraslap. Both are featured prominently in the set. A melodica appears, as well as a guiro, that wooden Latin percussion instrument with cylindrical grooves that you rake a stick across. Cake seems to be in top form, both tightly professional and energetically enjoying what they are doing. The hardcore fans are up front, but there are also a lot of softcore fans, with a cursory familiarity of the band (as the guy five people behind me who keeps shouting “Run The Race!!!” repeatedly, apparently wanting to hear the song whose actual title is “The Distance”), or those who have no idea who the band is, as evident in the couple behind me. She says she likes them because they are rock and roll like the Rolling Stones. When the band did their version of “War Pigs”, I’ll quote her now saying, “Now that’s what I like, when all the new bands like Cake (!) play the old songs. This was worth it, there’s my seventy bucks right there.” Personally, I had forgotten how good cake was, and truly enjoyed the show. And as the lady behind me nonsensically pointed out, “Looks like they want to have their CAKE and eat it too!”

Both unfortunately and fortunately, I missed the first half of Devo’s set due to filming Kyle’s interview with Cake. By the time I made it back out, it was a fully involved Devo show, with their silver grey uniforms that come in handy if you are shooting a film and need a stuntman to be protected while being lit on fire. Their sparse stage was as welcoming to the crowd as their message when “Whip It” came out in 1980 and said “Hey, not only is it ok to be geeky and different, it is awesomely preferable to be geeky and different!” Their set was upbeat and really enjoyable and the crowd was with them all the way. Are we not men? We are DEVO!

On Saturday night, after Devo, it’s pretty safe to say that the hyped up crowd was quite ready for the Smashing Pumpkins. Not so fast! Collect yourself, pace yourself, savor your anticipation. Apparently situations such as this call for a DJ. You might be resting in the media tent recovering from the creeping signs of exhaustion, nursing your purchase from the taco truck, when you notice the rhythmic ripples pulsing at the top of your water cup, Jurassic Park-like. Then come the crushing, interior organ shaking, oxygen destroying bass hits. It might remind you of high school parking lots and rumors of cruising, metallic rattling, the grinding apart of joints meant to remain joined. Hypothetically. The act on the main stage, after Devo and before the Pumpkins, is known as Bassnectar, a DJ, or electronic music artist, out of San Francisco. His appearance has an Andrew WK vibe, with his long hair and white t-shirt, but most comparisons stop there. The set is an amazingly integrated audiovisual presentation, with a full movie sized screen blending colors and images and flashes to accompany his blend of beats with the occasional pixies, nine inch nails, beatles and white zombie thrown in. It’s coreshaking, and the glowstick kids are happy. Waves of people were jumping in rhythm excitedly and ratcheting themselves up for the headliner soon to come.

I headed over to the East Stage to catch the set from Edinburgh’s own We Were Promised Jetpacks. Signed to Fat Cat Records and label mates with Frightened Rabbit and Sigur Ros, I expected a lot from them. One minute into the eight minute opener, I knew I wouldn’t be disappointed; a rousing, explosive, tight and passionate study in the absurd musical equation whereby the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. An early sound issue that looked to be a dysfunctional cord only served to stir some of that Scottish anger, make them push to release and overcome. It was clear by the second song that this is exactly what happened. This is one of the most aggressive sets I’ve seen; a band with something to prove, intent on blistering. And it was really loud, too.

Back at the West Stage, the crowd continues to thicken as the LCD lightshow from Bassnectar is dismantled and the drums and guitars are checked. It’s the closest quarters it has been all day and begins to feel like the Great Lawn might implode. Planning perfectly the end of the previous set and the ensuing mass exodus to the lavatories, I find myself quite close to the stage with thousands of people at my back. Lights are tested, microphones are tested and anticipation builds. And builds. The Smashing Pumpkins take the stage, pick up their instruments and open up with Today, followed by Astral Planes, Ava Adore, and Hummer. As one of the bands that graduated from the school of Alternative Rock, they proudly wear their seriousness and disinterest on both sleeves, apart from the few times that smiles were flashed in recognitions of a fan’s excitement. Mr. Corgan told the story at one point about being escorted around town and asking his driver what they make here; the response, “Bourbon, baseball bats, horses, and hot Kentucky women” elicited much goodwill from the crowd, who were held with rapt attention for the majority of the show. And honestly, considering a lot of the stories I’ve heard regarding a Pumpkins show, I think Forecastle came away with one of the better ones.

Forecastle 2010 Day One

Forecastle Festival 2010

The ninth edition of Forecastle found itself occupying 75 acres of Waterfront Park in downtown Louisville, bringing its blend of music, art and activism to an expected thirty thousand people this weekend. Three main music stages showcased a stellar lineup, including the Flaming Lips, Spoon, Smashing Pumpkins, Devo, Cake, Widespread Panic, Lucero, Drive By Truckers, She & Him, Modern English, Arnett Hollow, We Were Promised Jetpacks, Vandaveer, Sara Watkins, Against Me and Company of Thieves. One electronica/dj stage, one circus stage, one sustainable living roadshow area and one outdoor extreme sports showcase rounded out the lineup of scheduled events.

Stretching from the Wharf to the Upland Meadow, the main stages hovered near the water to the north, while the dozens of food and merchandise tents were located along the southern edge, near and under the I-64 overpass. Everything from gyros to gumbo, burgers to pommes frites, tacos to a NY slice could be found along with ample serving locations and selections from the BBC. Merch tents were stocked with an assortment of shirts, beads, purses, hand painted clothes, rope sandals, flowy blouses, jewelry, hammocks, reusable water bottles, hats, screenprints, frisbees and other miscellaneous environmentally friendly items. A string of tents along this theme included EcoZone, Toss Out Fuel, Up a Creek and Eco-opolis.

Friday was a get-to-know-you day, a familiarization with the layout, scheduling and crowd flow details that inform stage and band choices, along with the navigation and logistics that requires. Manchester Orchestra shredded, blistered and chopped their way into the crowd’s spleen. Arnett Hollow offered their brand of Sunday-back-porch-good-time-having social occasion, their tight playing skillfully running the line between bluegrass & jam. After a short presentation of fireworks, Widespread Panic took the main stage, setting the crowd in a harmonious state, and the people twirled blissfully.

I made it a point to catch the Lucero set, headlining the East Stage. Setting up with vocals, electric, drums, bass, keys and lap steel, they brought a high energy punch to the night that electrified the crowd. With a gravelly, Marlboro voice that feels like Tom Waits if he were a tenor and raised in east Tennessee instead of LA, vocalist Ben Nichols leads this punk roots band through songs that can only be described as rollicking. Lucero seems to be trying to redefine what Southern Band means. I’m imagining a kind of one-upmanship battle between them and Lynyrd Skynyrd, a la LL Cool J and Kool Mo Dee. They look every part the working class Southern rockers they portray, as though an east Tennessee bartender bet that the six guys on the stools at his bar couldn’t form a band. And with lines like “She asked me if I loved her and I showed her the tattoo”, it’s clear that they win the bet in my hypothetical band-origin-scenario. There’s also a lot of liquid and cups being thrown at the stage, putting a nice spin on the Blues Brothers chicken wire bar scene, but in this case it’s the band that needs the Gallagher style protective plastic sheet.

Jónsi

Jónsi

Go

2010

After fifteen years and five albums with Sigur Rós, vocalist slash guitarist Jónsi Birgisson steps out with his first solo work, an expansive Icelandic post-rock-new-age-marching-band of an album. It fully embraces the dualities of the songbird nature of its vocals and isolation in it's use of space, spattering kick drums and breakbeats between flutes and dulcimers and butterflies. And puppy dogs. And cute little baby kittens.

Collaborating with Nico Muhly, the classical composer (The Reader, Grizzly Bear, Bonny ‘Prince’ Billy, Bjork), and co-producing with Peter Katis (Interpol, Frightened Rabbit, Fanfarlo) and Alex Somers (Jónsi & Alex), the album seems a producer’s dream. Sung in both English and Icelandic, these sweet and gentle melodies could just as easily been set against an acoustic guitar, and I think that’s one of the most impressive aspects to this album. The vocal delivery is slanted from a non-English orientation, emphasizing the melody itself rather than the meter of the words, coming out sounding like pure beauty. It expresses such emotion, has that certain je ne sais quoi that if you let that jaded rock you call a heart to crack a little, like some epiphany-stricken grinch, your triple sized heart will break the x-ray machine with a golden twang.

But if this doesn’t happen, if you can’t dream that dream with Jónsi, if you can’t get to that place, then this won’t sound like hope. It’ll sound like the sickeningly sweet optimism of the vocals and lyrics has found a way to make the Polyponic Spree look melancholy. It’ll sound like a falsetto backbeat Jethro Tull, like the Diva Dance from the Fifth Element, like some original Zeusian Olympic soundtrack or hearken a mid-80’s Enyan hit.

The album is immediately intriguing, but not necessarily immediate. It’s accessible in a non-threatening ethereal way, or rather, not accessible in a direct and instantly engaging way. It’s at a disadvantage when perusing the landscape of our current, instant, socially networkable oversharing culture. But some things, most things, that require more from us are ultimately more rewarding if we invest ourselves, if we defy stagnation and set ourselves to stretch and grow. And this is the command of Jónsi, urging us, pleading with us to motion: Go.

bsm

Frightened Rabbit

Frightened Rabbit

The Winter of Mixed Drinks

2010

Not since William Wallace was declared Guardian of the Kingdom of Scotland has something so notable come out of Selkirk. Frightened Rabbit, the crux of which are the brothers Scott and Grant Hutchison, has released their fantastically titled album The Winter of Mixed Drinks, a deceptively solid effort that shines while masking its intricacies. It’s full of atmospheric texture and understatedly intense rhythmic streams coming from all directions; a sonic washing and rhythmic jolt of an album that manages to scratch the surface of optimism at the very bottom when everything has gone wrong and there’s nowhere to go but up. The closer you look at one specific aspect of the album, i.e., harmony, percussion, rhythm, even in the reverberating echoes, the more complexity you find there.

One unique thread that runs throughout this album is that it paradoxically has a subdued high intensity, as often in a bass part as guitar or percussion. This feeling lends itself to the neurotically palpable sense of isolation and disconnectedness. The industrious tinkerings of soft counter-melodies on keys, the eighth note pounding of strings or delay, the hummable melodies that repeat in your head for days combine with the emotive vocal work to make for a fantastic album. Produced by Peter Katis of Guster, Spoon, Interpol, Fanfarlo, and Jonsi Birgisson fame, it’s masterfully done.

Signed to Fat Cat Records out of London and accompanying an impressive slate of artists including Animal Collective, Sigur Ros, We Were Promised Jetpacks and Jonsi, Frightened Rabbit stands in the top tier and carries their own weight. Concise and intelligent songwriting allow the distinctly Irish vocals to flourish, even if that accent can never fully escape the shadow of Echo & the Bunnymen, Kaiser Chiefs and the Pogues. After touring in 2008 with Death Cab for Cutie and 2009 with Gomez and Modest Mouse, the band’s tour schedule remains in North America for the next few months before returning overseas.

“Swim Until You Can’t See Land” is the first single and really encapsulates the theme of the album in one song. It’s the songwriting, the production, the theme of being burned and at the bottom and testing yourself to the limit in lines like “Are you a man or are you a bag of sand?” and the numbness of “All I am is a body adrift in water, salt and sky.” It is exactly this allusion to water that reveals a catharsis in water and a helplessness to the vastness and currents of the ocean. When peering into the textures of the album, it’s like opening the lid of a shining grand piano, sleek and stunning, to see the incredible tension wires and hammers, deciphering how it operates. It also has the ability to be missed if you aren't paying attention, like code words between potential spies looking to verify a contact. As for Scotland, the most recent thing to come out of Selkirk is no longer the ancestors of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

bsm

SXSW 2010 Day Four

March 20, 2010 Saturday

I once heard Chris Thile say that South by Southwest is kind of like a reverse meet and greet, where instead of people going to see a band at a concert, bands come to see Austin and its people, star-struck with the beautiful city and the buzz of maddening crowds. Despite this harsh analysis, watching the frenetic pushing of guitar amps, cases and drums through the city streets reveals a great deal of accuracy in the statement.

Our final day at SXSW began in difficulty, facing high winds, a drop in temperature, a lack of parking and long lines. To avoid the bitter wind and chilly gloom, we bunkered down at the Red Eyed Fly with the WXPN party. The inside stage was tiny with a small sound system and had the feeling of a dark and seedy dive bar. It showcased smaller, singer songwriter type acts. Nicole Adkins was first up, just her and her acoustic playing some sweet songs in a sultry baritone. The underpowered inside sound was problematic, as it was completely overwhelmed by competing band volume outside. The rear outside stage was in a large enclosed patio area and had fantastic sound. First up on the outside stage was Dawes, a band from LA and a perfect example of the reason you come to Austin to experience SXSW. Dawes made an immediate impression with their live show and shot immediately to the top of the Bands To Check Out Post SXSW list. In support of their debut cd North Hills, the band plowed through some great songs in the gritty pop and Southern harmonies vein, reminiscent of Springsteen, Wilco, Van Morrison and a dash of the pure pop perfection of Weezer. Intelligent lyrics abound, like “I need a graceful and proud way to accept all the things you don’t know” from Love Is All I Am, as well as an offering from “That Western Skyline”: “All my dreams did not come true, they only fell apart.” I can only hope all of their eight Austin shows this week have been this good.

The next few acts rotated between inside and out, mostly falling short of the intensity and quality of other acts we had seen, including Lissie on the small inside stage. This was her 9^th show in the 4 days of SXSW, with just her on electric guitar as singer songwriter with a drummer/bass player. Outside was Jukebox the Ghost, a kind of dance rock band, but the vocals and melodies were a bit too flip for my unhipster tastes. Most of this time was in anticipation of the Freelance Whales, one of the few bands on my must see list. The odds were definitely stacked against them, being in the small room with a loud band outside and an underpowered system, but there was no reason to worry about a subpar performance. Ten minutes after their scheduled start time, they were still not at the club and got bumped. It turned out that their previous show was in a lineup that was very behind schedule and threw the whole thing off. Leaving the club, we made our way to the Billboard.com Bungalow party with the Carolina Chocolate Drops. This is a three piece banjo, harmonica, jug, fiddle, steel guitar playing band encompassing delta, blues, ragtime and having success on the bluegrass & Americana charts. It was a fun set that included “Cornbread & Butterbeans”, as well as the recognizable “Hit ‘Em Up Style” from 2001, reimagined w southern strings.

South by Southwest can be overwhelming. There are so many bands and venues and sponsored events and underground word-of-mouth attention-getters that it’s hard to choose your direction. But that also makes it easy, if you let it. You’re bound to stumble into things that you could have never planned for, even things that would normally fall outside of your preconceived notions of what you like. Being open to the diversity of bands is one of the greatest aspects of SXSW. Even more fascinating is the diversity of the people, the differing styles, clothes and ages that beg questions of backgrounds and common threads. The answer of which, obviously, is Music, with a capitol M. It seems that when it comes to age, Music keeps the old young and makes the young reach into the depths. It challenges the old to break cycles, habits and comforts, and stretch to find the New. It makes the young project cocksure hypotheses about the future that can only be answered years later, if ever. Regardless of age and identity, South by Southwest is a celebration of the passion music stirs in all of us, and an event truly about finding unexpected discoveries and holding on with all your might.

Brian S. Meurer

SXSW 2010 Day Three

March 19, 2010 Friday

It has been a couple of days of beautiful weather, seventy degrees and sunny. My slightly sunburned face and throbbing feet are urging me to adopt a slightly less grueling pace than roughly fifteen bands we saw yesterday. I tend to agree with myself. Especially when I’m hungry. Which begins our day at Club Deville on Red River St. for the Brooklyn Vegan/ Magic Hat party and their delicious offerings of vegan breakfast tacos and Hail Mary Granola. Although the lineup included Princeton, Twin Sister, Nicole Atkins & Lucero, we were running short on time to make it down the street to Emo’s to catch a set from the Local Natives, an LA band making some waves. Emo’s was easy to find because of the line out the door and down the street waiting to get in. Through a bit of scouting and reconnaissance, we discovered an alternate and slightly hidden rear entrance to their outdoor patio area, packed with the buzz of a large audience in search of buzz. The band had really tight live harmonies, a fantastic Gretch, mandolin, bass, drums, and an auxillary drummer/programmer, all of which added up to their propulsive rhythms and textured melodies. This was their fourth of nine shows at SXSW, making the most of their time there in support of their debut Gorilla Manor. Despite their Ultra LA hipster high and tight pants with 70’s mustaches, their sound was very appealing, leaning to the rock side of indie, especially the last two songs Airplane and Sun Hands, making the Bands To Check Out Post SXSW list.

We took a long walk down Congress to the WOXY studios and for a tour with Mike & Joe. This is a station that was once based in Cincinnati, uprooted from its terrestrial roots in 2004 to lead the internet in radio and moved physically to Austin in 2009. The building was at one time an old theater, converted to a tv studio, from which live bands have been in and out all week. We were there during the recording of a set by the Besnard Lakes, a band from Montreal and the same one that was ending their big set at Stubb’s last night when we stopped by. They had a great rock sound, but odd in terms of ethereal textures, sounding like an unfrozen haunting in the ionosphere, ending with the songs Albatross and Progress. Our tour of the facilities continued up to the roof, revealing an amazing panorama of the city. Regrettably, after spending so much time and money setting up the new station, a few days after our visit all of their funding was pulled and the team that had just relocated across the country is currently left high and dry. We wish them well and hope they fall into new jobs quickly.

Heading north toward the Capitol on Congress, we made our way to the Paste Vanguard party, catching the very end of the Watson Twins and deciding that it was time for Guero’s, that famed restaurant of idyllic stature that is required on any trips I take to Austin. It’s that refreshing Avalon, the reward of Elysium, the assortment of salsas and margaritas that make a man seriously contemplate living in Texas. It’s in a quaint area full of boutiques and boots, giving you visions of lazy Saturdays and strolls by the mighty Colorado River.

We decided to make one main event our final stop for the evening, the Dickies Sounds Party held at the Lustre Pearl. This was another outdoor stage, and the line to get in here was pandemonium. It had a fantastic line up as the evening wore on, including Here We Go Magic, She & Him, Broken Bells and Surfer Blood. It had some issues as well, enough to put a damper on the evening. First up was Here We Go Magic, and there’s not a way to delicately say this, but they did not sound good. The good news is that might have actually been the sound, as either the engineer or the underpowered system itself was severely lacking. It was as if someone two doors down from you was having a house party or band practice. We had high hopes that it was a fluke, or the band, and that it would get better as the night went on. Up next was She & Him, mainly the project of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward, bringing a large 60’s southwestern surf style that would fit in any Tarantino film. It actually might be more apropos if the project were named Cult of Zooey, as any observer of their audiences can attest. Her voice has a breathy angeic quality and the crowd is in love. There’s lots of bouncy tambourine, even some country and western in there too. M. Ward capably handles guitar and some vocals and is accompanied by two female backup singers, drums and bass. Their sound wasn’t great either, and writing it off on the soundman, we decided that was not the way we’d like to see Broken Bells or Surfer Blood. We decided that they would have to be our priority tomorrow, as we made our way back down Red River, mingling with the crowd exiting Stubb’s, whose main event of the evening was Courtney Love’s reignition of Hole and Muse. It looked as though a good time was had by all. I bet the sound was stellar.

Brian S. Meurer

SXSW 2010 Day Two

March 18, 2010 Thursday

Garbage removal. It’s the first thing that I notice as we arrive 10-ish in the morning. Last night, with the St. Pat’s day revelry and all, this place was trashed. Literally. Very close to the condition of the Paddock at Churchill Downs circa 7:30 pm Derby night. Amazingly, the streets are utterly devoid of the cans, wrappers, bottles, bags, paper plates and flyers from the previous day. Much respect for Austin for making that happen.

First on the Agenda is picking up our credentials at the Convention Center, the nucleus of Official South by Southwest, with it’s myriad workers and volunteers and signs and lines and sign-in booths for press, radio, labels and performers, most of whom have that overwhelmed and lost look in their eyes. It’s a good thing that there is an artist’s lounge on the fourth floor stocked with snacks, beverages, internet and chair massages. The Convention Center houses the music panels, discussions, mentoring sessions, trade show and performance spaces. This year, SXSW now touts 1900 bands on over 80 official stages throughout the city.

The way all of these stages work is this: a club/bar/restaurant allows a business (NPR, Billboard, Labels, Magazines, etc.) to essentially take over for the morning or evening, allowing as many bands as they choose to play short sets. This, as you can imagine, is a logistical nightmare for most people involved. There is often a backline provided (a drum set, a bass amp, a guitar amp) in order to facilitate set changeovers, but even so the streets are constantly buzzing with musicians franticly rolling amps and carrying cumbersome instrument cases, loading them into illegally parked vans while navigating the influx of scheduled performers. This happens about every 45 minutes all day long at every venue across town.

Credentials in hand, we walked to the 700 block of west 6^th to see our good friend Sean Cannon at the Buzzgrinder Buddyhead room, packed with a full two day list of bands like Wax Fang, Apteka, These United States, Henry Clay People, Vandaveer and the Seedy Seeds, a hand selected list reflecting Buzzgrinder’s personal favorites in a cavernous room with competent sound. Our compliments to Mr. Cannon for successfully managing his first foray into partydom. Another key to an efficient SXSW trip is the ability to find the best places for free food and drinks. Arriving at the Speakeasy on S. Congress for the Vevo/Fontana party, a small buffet of southwestern themed foods and drinks allowed us to make it through an underwhelming Sass Jordan set. We caught a few tunes from Rey Fresco, providing island rock grooves and meshing a rhythmic Latin sound triangulated between Marley, Maxwell & Legend. The name means “king fresh” in Spanish, and with a passionate singer from Fiji, a drummer who builds his own drums, an incredible harp player, and a big bass player with a pencil-thin mustache to accompany his fedora, they definitely have a California feel. Their album came out in December & had a Song of the Day on NPR, and made the short list of Bands To Check Out Post SXSW.

We headed to the Galaxy Room for the Paste day party and caught the last few songs from Fanfarlo, a London based indie pop band, playing for a packed house of enthralled fans. The band multitasked trumpet, violin, mandolin, bass, drums, xylophone, keys, clarinet, and melodica. They had a great sound, reminiscent of Crowded House and the Talking Heads. After their set, we stepped out back to the outside stage under a tent and was treated to a set with Gordon Gano, singer of Violent Femmes fame. Despite having one of the most distinctive voice in alternative rock, his set began with little fanfare, the crowd meandering about, apparently not quite sure who this was. Except for those in the front, who were well aware and questioning the mental capacity of the sparse crowd behind them. With what could be described as a gravelly Midwest tenor, Mr. Gano worked his way through songs from his September 2009 release “Under the Sun”. Multinstrumentation seems to be the order of the year, with guitars, violin, accordion, mandolin, saxophone, bass and drums. By the time that the set was winding down into American Music and Blister In The Sun, the crowd had made the connection and packed in all available space.

The lull between day parties and night parties is usually the opportune time to grab dinner, and immediately afterward made our way to the Cedar Street Courtyard. Over a sunken patio area located between two buildings that contained a stage and a few hundred people, we perched on the balcony directly overlooking stage, giving us a nice vantage for the upcoming Miike Snow show. In the meantime, we had the Paris based Uffie, a synthpop disco rapper attempting to placate the crowd, who really couldn’t quite get into her. Described by one fan as a “crackhead caricature of herself”, she and her DJ were obviously hoping for a crowd more familiar with her work, or at least more sympathetic. When at last it was time for Miike Snow, 6 guys in black t-bird jackets took the stage. They are more like a production supergroup; electronic cyborgs whose instrument is whatever is lying within arms reach, generating a sublime stream of electro pop that also made the Bands To Check Out Post SXSW list.

We met up with a couple of friends at the New West Party as things were wrapping up with Kris Kristopherson, Buddy Miller and Patty Griffin. Deciding not to wait for the Harper Simon show in order to catch the Ben Sollee Daniel Martin Moore performance, we trekked down 6^th and made our way to an old church building, the Central Presbyterian Church at 200 E. 8^th. It seemed the perfect setting for such a reverent, commanding performance in support of their album Dear Companion, which we reviewed earlier. Accompanying Mr. Sollee on cello and Mr. Moore on guitar was Cheyenne Mize, an amazing female violin/electric guitar/vocalist and an incredibly tight drummer, Dan Dorff, who pulled out his old Stomp skills on an amazing rendition of Bury Me With My Car. Surprisingly, expanded songs from Dear Companion were enhanced in this setting and were everything and more that the album could suggest. Afterward we headed to the immortal Stubb’s and caught the absolute end of Besnard Lakes set, spontaneously deciding to treck across town and press our luck trying to get into the much-hyped Stone Temple Pilots reunion. Feeling nostalgic for the 90’s, it was great to see that they still had it, the jerky strut of Mr. Weiland still able to capture the attention of a crowd. The songs sounded great, the band in good form, but the crowd was a bit too fist-pumpy-glory-days for my tastes. The final stop for the night took us back down 5^th to Antone’s to see the Courtyard Hounds, the side project led by two of the Dixie Chicks who aren’t named Natalie Maines. In the same vein as Taking The Long Way, sweetly delivered vocals, acoustic driven guitars and fiddles and tight harmonies define their alt-country sound. The songs were really enjoyable, with even Jakob Dylan joining them for a couple.

As the day wrapped, I regretted not purchasing a pedometer. I would very much like to know how many miles we traversed throughout the day. My shoes immediately shouted "One Hundred!" as we slowly lurched like Boris Karloff in the Mummy, dragging one foot behind us on our way to sweet sleep.

Brian S. Meurer

SXSW 2010 Day One

SXSW 03.17.10

The South by Southwest Music Festival began in 1987 and is held every year in Austin TX, bringing together over 1,400 bands from all corners of the world, landing in every location anywhere close to downtown that has an occupiable space for a band to set up and an electrical outlet. Swirling around the core of South by Southwest is Ernest Hemmingway’s The Sun Also Rises, set to the 1974 album The Heart of Saturday Night by Tom Waits. Crowds conglomerate into mobs that form and disperse at the drop of a hat, if that idiom is still relevant. It’s an event that is powered by word of mouth and instantly public announcements through Twitter, which exploded here in 2007. It is geared toward those with a deficit of attention, with most bands limiting their sets to thirty minutes and only playing what they feel is their best material. Consequently there is a constant popping in and out of clubs and bars and tents. I overheard a guy on the street say that SXSW is like doing shots of bands. I understood his meaning, but felt it was more analogous to a wine tasting, finding unexpected discoveries and holding on with all your might.

There are one thousand thirty three miles from Louisville to Austin, and that takes roughly sixteen hours to drive. If you pick the right companions, it has the potential to be a journey full of music, comedy and conversation. And quite honestly, with that many hours in a vehicle, you had just better pick the right companions; the kind that will appreciate the serendipity of a well-shuffled ipod announcing the Days of Miracle and Wonder And Don’t Cry Baby Don’t Cry as you shoot through Memphis, and the gentle rebuke That’s Right, You’re Not From Texas as you curse the frontage roads of Texas. We left at 6:30 Eastern time, eight hours to Little Rock, five hours to Dallas, three final and excruciating hours south to arrive finally in Austin, TX at 10:30 pm Central time.

A brief hotel check-in, downtown Austin welcomes your decompression. As the capitol of Texas, Austin is laid out on a much appreciated grid, and for our purposes, the two perpendicular streets that hold our attention for the next few days are 6^th St. and Congress Ave. Housing a dense population of bars, clubs and restaurants, 6^th St. is ideal for the perusal of live music. As we began our recon of the area, we quickly realized that it was Wednesday, March 17, also known far and wide as St. Patrick’s Day. Also known far and wide as Underage Amateur Night, youthful experimenters with adult beverages ruled the scene. While there were a number of bands performing, the main events and destination bands would begin the following day. After a quick lap through 6^th and popping in a small number of venues, it was time to call it a night and get rest for the exhaustathon that was to be the next few days. And make a note for the future to avoid downtown St. Patrick’s Day festivities.

Brian S. Meurer

Then you comb your hair, shave your face

Tryin’ to wipe out every trace of all the other days

In the week you know that this’ll be the Saturday

You’re reaching your peak

Stoppin’ on the red, you’re goin’ on the green

‘Cause tonight’ll be like nothin’ you’ve ever seen

And you’re barrelin’ down the boulevard

You’re lookin’ for the heart of Saturday night

- Tom Waits