SXSW Reviews

SXSW Notes....

Mr. Wizard...that awesome drummer was none other than Brian Blade. He might possibly be the best jazz/session drummer in the world right now.

My highlights aren't really fair because I booked what I wanted for 4 day parties...but my highlights...

WED - Jeremy Fisher and Rocco DeLuca were fantastic. Fisher reminds me of a young Paul Simon; his keyboardist is about to be the new keys player for the Racontuers.

THUR - Jesca Hoop was awesome. Joe Ely and Ryan Bingham are always good. Hotel Cafe show that night was alright. Greg Laswell was impressive; has a nice David Bazan feel to his singing. Jim Bianco was great, too. Playboy party was hot and sweaty. Carson Daly was there and actually an ok dude to chat with. MGMT performance was not what I expected, but it was solid. Justice and Moby did not disappoint.

FRI - Dead Confederate melted faces. Holy crap it was good. Murs killed it and handled the crowd so well. Willie Nelson was Willie Nelson.

SAT - Christian Scott was amazing. I was blown away. Tift Merritt was really cool.
Perez Hilton party was unbelievable. Katy Perry and Meiko were good. Chester French were amazing. It was their 3rd ever show...and you couldn't tell. They rocked. NERD was the best thing I saw all week. So good...but then again I was delirious from 2 weeks of 18 hour days and lots of free rum.
 
best shows I saw:
the shackletons: saw these guys at the sxseattle show on saturday, and they really blew me away. great energy, solid songs...the lead singer is a nutbar. I went up after the show and said hi to him, told him they were my favorite show of the festival, the lead singer thanked me, then buried his very sweaty head into my t-shirt. check these guys out if you get a chance.

helio sequence: love their new album and they did not disappoint live. the drummer looks like animal from the muppets and with just guitar and drums, they create a lot more music/melody than it might seem.

holy f__k: just great, high energy, almost all instrumental. saw these guys at the wave rooftop (****** setup, but what can you do...) and saw bits and pieces of them at the rachael ray party and another show at the emo's annex. the crowds were getting into them every show. loved watching one of the members play a little slide guitar with a dinner knife.

raveonettes: I'd missed the previous 8 chances to see them earlier in the week, but was glad I finally caught them at the KEXP broadcast at the ACL studios. sounded great.

devotchka- never disappoint and such nice people. such purity in their music, and it was great seeing them with a full string section.

i'm sure i'll think of others, but those are the ones that stand out the most.
 
I can barely see straight. I filmed a bunch of shows and will youtube and post.

highlights were mmj and yo la tengo, jim james and m ward acoustic together, man man many times, some great reggae shows at flamingo, and about a million other bans who i have to look up again to remember.

sxsw is freaking amazing.
 
Saturday was a blur.

Went to the Don't Mess With Texas event @ Waterloo park. Met jeanine garofalo backstage, not nearly as scary as some people say. Very nice and tiny, with lots of tats.

Went drinking for a bit then caught some Ice Cube, hope nobody brought their kids to this show.

We then made it over to the Cedar Door to see Bobby Whitlock, it was very nice. Stephen Bruton, who is fighting cancer, appeared weak, but tore it up on guitar. Bruton and David Grissom blew the roof off during a cover of Layla.

We then headed to see the Lemonheads @ the Convention Center, but Liam Finn had replaced them on the bill. Liam is awesome.

We then went to see Hong Kong Blood Opera at the Ale House, they are a fantastic band from Mexico.

Next we went to Rio and checked out The Victorian English Gentelmans Club. Great show and the hottest drummer I have ever seen live, she was outstanding.

We then went back to the Convention Center and checked out CarbonSilicon, great stuff again.

Saw some crappy French band at Bourbon Rocks then went to Flamingo Cantina and saw a Japanese dub reggae group, Dokkebi Q. They were outstanding.

Next, checked out White Shoes & The Couples Company at Habanna. Odd Indonesia lounge band. Very trippy.

Finished up the night with Deanne Carter at Opel's.

What a great way to finish off SXSW.

Had a blast and getting a wristband was the way to go.

The Vice late party on Saturday was full of choads and poseurs, such a lame scene these parties turned out to be.

The day stuff was great, but lines were brutal if you wanted to see a "name" band.

I sat in the Side Bar and drank away the afternoon while Dead Confederate destroyed the place.

Also walked over to the French Legation, but was super packed and the lines for booze were lame.

Tips for next year, go ahead and get a wristband, you can see the big bands if you get in early and wait around. So much good stuff going on that you can hop from showcase to showcase and find some outstanding music.

The highlights for me:

Hong Kong Blood Opera

YB

Liam Finn

Dokebbi Q
 
My experience sucked. I know that some bad music is inevitible with this much dilluting of the market, but the bands I heard on Saturday, save for one group out on the streetcorner, were totally repetitive and unoriginal. They sounded like 2 guys who had been taking lessons for a few months decided to get together in someone's garage and bang around on their instruments. Blameshift did actually have a really awesome bassist who mostly made up for the guitar player sucking, but everybody else sounded the same.
 
"I can't focus on **** today at work. I feel brain dead to say the least."

God I know the feeling. I am 40 years old and wonder how many SXSWs I have left in me. It is still my favorite week of the year, but my second favorite might be this one when I can go to be early. Mrs Jelly and I finally shut it down at 11:00 on Saturday night and I did not regret it.
whiteflag.gif
 
Stat, you need to choose better music and venues. I heard a lot of crap music from places not on my agenda on my way to some *** kicking parties with great bands. Run your agenda by Huff next time.
 
I still will argue to the death against anybody who would say either of two things:

1: SXSW has gotten "too corporate." Get your lazy *** off E. 6th or Red River for a change.

2. Any band other than Monotonix won SXSW. I just saw them again a couple of hours ago in Houston, which makes my fourth Monotonix show since Thursday.
 
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