SXSW
Diary - Saturdaay, March 18
Photos
are back again – only because my dear friend Deb Pastor captured
most of the main events of day with her camera. The pictures that
follow are all her’s... clickable as well...
 We
woke up at 8AM on Saturday morning to help my dad with all of the
barbecue stuff. My girlfriend and I, both vegetarians (a vegan in
her case), sat at the table as my dad taught us how to shred the
brisket with forks. Since he smoked it all night it was so tender
it fell apart with the touch of a fork. Nonetheless, there were
four huge briskets and it took some time to break ‘em up.
After that we loaded up the car and headed towards the venue of
the day party - The Peacock. The proprietor, Jason, was running
late and hadn’t shown up. We split to get some more equipment
from Jeff from American
Death Ray’s apartment. We came back and still
no sign of the Jason – which was a bit worrisome as the doors
were supposed to open at noon and we 'd planned on getting there
at 11:00 to set up the P.A. and the backline. There were eleven
bands scheduled to start at 12:30 and move along a tight schedule
all day. He finally popped in just after noon and then we were in
business – with old friends from Death Ray, and the first
band, The Transgressors, lending a hand with the setup. It wound
up running only a few minutes late.
The
Peacock, for those who don’t know it, may be
the most beautiful bar in Austin. Designed Joel Mozersky, it’s
all white and teal with chandeliers, metal peacocks, and white furniture.
While this classy establishment of course is not the typical venue
for an underground music event – Jason Schell has varied taste
in music and is fairly adventurous when it comes to this kind of
thing.
The
Transgressors provided a thunderous opening. As most
of the folks weren’t there yet, and the volume hadn’t
been totally worked out, they were a bit loud – but still
totally shining in the situation. I wish I wasn’t still co-coordinating
stuff when they played – but that was the strongest leitmotif
of my day. For those who haven’t yet had the pleasure, The
Transgressors do a really amazing postmodern take on western music.
I can still hear Jeff's reverby guitar licks in my head. I wish
we had a photo.
 Fresh
Kills then set up and were ready to play five minutes
after their scheduled time when Menaguar’s manager said that
it was too late, they'd never get off the stage on time to get a
member to another gig, and that they were leaving. I had seen members
of the band walk in and look around and walk out a few minutes earlier.
She tried to be polite and give an excuse, but c’mon –
five minutes late? I could tell that the lack of people, the rough
sound, and the general chaos had put her off a bit and that the
band checked it out and asked whether they really had to go through
with it. Of course they didn't. The cancellation proved to be a
blessing because I told Fresh Kills that they could relax for a
few minutes before they had to go on – so we had a little
time to calm down and get everything on track. My dad popped in
and said hi, shook everyone’s hand, and said that he’d
love to stay but he had to get in the jacuzzi – what a cool
thing to say - I wished I could have ducked out of the monster I
created and do the same. We were back on schedule and Fresh Kills
took the stage. By this point they looked about as tired and hungry
and hungover as A
Fir-Ju Well a couple of days before. And like Ted
Leo the night before, singer Zach Lipez had lost his
voice. And like The Transgressors a few minutes before, they were
too loud. But like themselves
on Wednesday, they rocked their cold dark hearts out.
 Next
my good friend MC
Trachiotomy and his pal Lefty
Parker, both from New Orleans, Louisiana took the stage.
If you want to read the stories of these two, both of whom refused
to evacuate during, Katrina, go
here. The room began to fill in a bit at this point
and Trach and Lefty refused to disappoint. They did a really bizarre
set that, for lack of anything better to call it, is hip-hop –
but they were tapping on the edges of the already boundary-pushing
genre. Pure flava, charisma, and weirdness. Again I was running
around trying to make things happen and missed a bunch as the leader
of the next band, Tomorrow’s Friend hadn’t yet showed
- so I let them stretch it. But I do know that they closed with
the hit, “Everybody Knows What I Know (Unless You Don’t).”
Just as I was
in the middle of telling Damon
McMahon, who was filling in on guitar for Tomorrow’s
Friend, that I was going to have no choice but to cut
the band as it was going too late, we saw Allessandra a few blocks
away - running down the street with a guitar on her back. She got
an E for effort and I'm a softy, so I took the chance of running
late to let them at least get a few in. Her improvised band actually
pulled it off and, dare I say, I think it was the best I’ve
ever seen them. The stripped down approach really seems to work
for her a bit better than the chaos.
 After
that I got to witness something I’d been waiting for all week,
The
Notekillers. They're are one of those rare bands that
were so ahead of their time that, now that they’ve reunited,
twenty-five years after their breakup, they’re still fresh
as a daisy. Between 1977 and 1981, the Philly trio was one of the
first to fuse punk and jazz ideas – the resulting instrumentals
were absolutely electrifying. Thurston Moore talked about their
influence on early Sonic Youth in a few interviews and wound up
putting his money where his mouth is - putting out their album last
year on his Ecstatic Peace imprint (that's the kinda stuff ya gotta
luv about that man). While the daylight was busy casting soft shadow
patterns across the room, everyone within was completely transfixed,
transported, and transformed by the soundtracks unleashed by this
uncommonly powerful, original, and captivating trio.
 Next,
my old school chum MC
Sweet Tea, better known in Austin as Tiana Hux did
a brief audience-winning set leading up to her friends Pong. In
Austin Tiana was a local underground drummer, actress (she has a
really choice role in Linklater's Waking Life), performance
artist, film-maker, and god knows what else – but no one in
town knew her as the fluid and witty rapper she’d reinvented
herself as since moving to New Orleans a few years ago. She appeared
hooded as a sort of FEMA grim reaper and kept getting more comfortable
with each new song. By the time she ran off at the end, you could
hear folks chuckling and quoting her lyrics.
 When
Pong
hit the stage, The Peacock was jam-packed inside and out. Though
they played sans-costume and with only minimal lights, they took
complete control of the crowd, transforming the tight assembly of
bodies into a futuristic dance party worthy of a Mecco album cover.
These guys were all some of the finest and most colorful underground
musicians when I was an Austinite – Shane in ST-37, Jason
in Pocket Fish’R’men, and Lyman, Larry, and Gary in
my favorite local band for many years, the strange and beautiful
Ed Hall. Their new thing is a sort of new wave future funk that
must be seen live to be fully grasped – a thing of both surreal
ambiguity, positive energy, and playful humor. No one wanted them
to stop, except…
Now for a little
behind the scenes logistical talk: Though we caught up on time when
Menaguar cancelled, Tomorrow’s Friends’ tardiness and
Pong going over the time limit left an unsubstantial amount of time
for the final three bands. The reason that it had to move fast was
that the backline had to be at the Velvet Spade for the official
New York Night Train showcase by 7PM or the bands'd be cancelled.
Plus, all of the showcasing bands that night from 8PM on were using
the bass amp. The only answer was for the remaining bands to shorten
their sets – which was a shame because Hopewell, GoGoGo Air
heart, and Kid Congo and the Pink Monkey Birds are all headliners
in their own right and deserving of a little more time. Nonetheless,
Hopewell and GoGoGo are total professionals and sweethearts and
both volunteered to cut their sets down without me even asking –
so that Kid would also get a chance to do his thing before the end.
It was a double-display of selfless kindness that’s become
all-too-uncommon in recent years, but really drew to me to the indie
rock family in the first place – and it would’ve brought
a tear to my eye if I wasn’t such a damned macho.
 Hopewell
got ready quickly within the chaos and, after a running start, began
having problems with the P.A. Apparently it had some sort of built
in limiter that’d cut out whenever the vocals’d go past
a certain volume level. The harmonies are really important to their
layered sound and I felt really sorry for them – OK –
I felt guilty. Nonetheless, it came off well and they’re too
good a band to look bad because of a few P.A. problems. Hopewell
has achieved the feat of retaining the hallmarks of great psychedelic
music without any of the meandering – there’s never
a wasted second in their dynamic, solid, and intelligent compositions
– and that very deliberateness is never at the expense of
their soulfulness and poetry. Great guys and great music.
 I
love being a curator instead of a critic ‘cause I’m
aloud to love as much stuff as I wanna – and GoGoGo
Airheart is certainly more than worthy. Though they’ve
been around forever it’s this year that they’ve become
one of my favorite bands going. By this show I was hot on the heels
of witnessing both a beautifully disastrous Monday night set at
New York’s Mercury Lounge and a brilliantly defiant one at
Room 710 in Austin. In the small space provided they played four
or five of my favorite parts of there set – including a dub
song on which they were joined by their Gold
Standard Labs labelmate, LA offbeat rap king Subtitle.
I couldn’t believe how they were able to start burning so
quickly and extinguish it so abruptly while everyone feeling full
and satisfied.
This led in
to New York Night Train Recordings’ own Kid
Congo and the Pink Monkey Birds. As I mentioned in
this diary’s intro, The Monkey Birds’ rhythm section
couldn’t make it in the last minute. David Lloyd from my band,
Cause
for Applause, was filling in on bass, which he’d
done only once about a year ago.  Pong’s
Lyman Hardy,
who’d never seen the band or met any of the members before
today, filled in on drums. Whle Kid and Jack were visibly exhausted
from band anxiety, the straight drive from New York the night before,
and god knows what else, they took the stage like total pro’s.
Lyman kicked some amazing beats and totally stayed with it. Lloyd
was funky, forceful and flawless. Martin was twangy, daring, and
bizarre as always. But Kid Congo really took it to the next level,
grabbing the audience with his trademark guitar style, baritone
vocals, and general charm - refusing to let 'em out of his grip
until I had to steal the backline out from under him.
 As
I loaded up, Jack
Martin and New York rock legend Jerry
Teel (ex-Honeymoon Killers, Knoxville Girls, Boss Hog,
etc.), who just relocated to Austin via New Orleans after Katrina,
were setting up to do their thing. By the time I threw everything
in car, loaded into the Velvet Spade, and came back for the second
trip, the two were saying goodnight. I miss Jerry – particularly
his relaxed vocal delivery, his recording studio, and his bashful
grin – I hope I get to check all three of those out sometime
in the near future.
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