SxSW Journal – Day Three, 03.20.09

By day three the exhaustion hits you. Spending a majority of the last two days on my feet and living on nothing but pizza has left a wear on my body. The ringing in my ears has turned into that muffled audio that clouds everything and won’t wear off. I’m sure everyone at some point during the week wonders how much further they can push. That’s what I’m thinking as I park my car.

Today begins at Red Eyed Fly for the Little Radio day party. Free bloody marys are part of the promotion here. Not so exciting for me since I hate bloody marys. Though it is worth mentioning that it took until 1:15pm on day three for me to take my first alcoholic drink of the festival. It was a Dos Equis, a Texas staple. Need to so something in these long days.

The first band to catch my attention is The Pity Party, a duo from LA. It was kind of hard to not be impressed with what was happening on stage with lead woman Heisenflei. Don’t ask me how to pronounce her name but I can tell you she was handling lead vocals, playing the keyboard, and playing the drums all simultaneously. With a man who simply goes by M backing her up on guitar, The Pity Party serves a stripped down garage sound that I just ate up. Next up on the patio stage was Great Northern who built a buzz thanks to label Eenie Meanie’s street team efforts. However it seemed like a waste to me as I found them quite bland and boring. So I went back to the inside stage to await Melissa Auf der Maur.

This was a performance I had been anticipating. I’ve longed followed Auf der Maur from her years as the bassist in Hole, to her short stint in Smashing Pumpkins, to her now solo career. It had been a while since I last saw her perform and was very eager to hear if she would give us some new material from her forthcoming concept album. On stage, Auf der Maur is the type of performer you expect given her résumé, hard music and some hard trashing as she plays bass. She mixed in some new songs with more familiar ones from her solo debut like “Lightning is My Girl” and “Follow the Waves.” Afterward I took a minute to say hello to Melissa, and being that I’ve followed her throughout the years she immediately recognizes me and sends my heart a flutter. Yes, it’s pretty cool when a musician recognizes you as a fan even after a couple years in between meetings.

With that I left Red Eyed Fly and head a block down the street to Mohawk. This is one of my favorite hot spots in Austin – sporting a good sized outside stage with two roof top patios over looking it, another smaller stage inside, and a pretty good sound system for both of them. Unfortunately I had just missed Alela Diane (grrrr to that), but what brought me here was a second chance to catch The Rosebuds. I dug them so much yesterday I wanted to see it again. Yes another good thing about SxSW, if you really like someone’s performance you don’t have to wait a year to see it again. Plus many bands playing multiple shows like to switch it up every time as a bonus to those fans following them, or for the benefit of their own sanity.

For instance, this performance from The Rosebuds did not include a “Nice Fox” sing-a-long but instead had a dance-a-long. Ivan Howard with acoustic guitar in hand and Kelly Crisp armed with accordion jump off the stage and burrow into the middle of the crowd to perform “Bow to the Middle: Religion of Politics.” They enticed everyone to participate in a waltz to the song. It was quite fun.

From there my destination was one of the most well known parties of the week, The Levi’s/Fader Fort. Usually hosting a lineup of nothing but the biggest names in the festival and infamous for having free Southern Comfort drinks, this year it was located a block east of the downtown where they erected a massive stage for the event. After grabbing a SoCo & Dew (alcoholic drink #3 of the day) I took a minute to check out the Fort, which truthful was pretty cool. They set up a blogger lounge, a photo booth, and a Levi’s store. But I am here for the music and you can always tell when the big buzz bands are about to go on due to the rush to the stage.

Out of pure curiosity I wanted to check out Tinted Windows, the new supergroup featuring Taylor “MMMBop” Hanson and James Iha (former Smashing Pumpkin #2 of the day). Those crowds rushing the stage are in full effect here; the Hanson fans have arrived. Some of them are already decked out in Tinted Windows merch. Really, SxSW is the band’s first publicized appearance and these folks are wearing t-shirts. They could suck to high hell but they already have a hardcore fan base. That must be the power of having a Hanson brother in your band. Good for them that Tinted Windows doesn’t suck to high hell. Not that they’re any good either. But truthfully, that Hanson kid is a pretty strong performer. The music itself is right up the pop rock alley of his recent material and of bassist Adam Schlesinger’s home band Fountains of Wayne. So fans of those bands will be very pleased. But for anyone interested in what Pumpkins alumni Iha was up to, it’s nothing but frowns.

Showcase time. Tonight would start at Buffalo Billiards to see Canadian bubblegum-ish electropop musician Lights. One of my music reviewer finds, I discovered Lights when I reviewed her EP for Stereo Subversion. I found Lights growing on me the more I listened though it is not the usual thing I would gravitate to. Plus she is so tiny and super cute. Surprisingly there were other Lights fans in Austin and she played for a decent sized crowd. She gave a handful of songs off the EP like “Ice” and “February Air,” mixed in some new material, and covered the Backstreet Boys. Between her playing traditional synthesizers and a keytar during the set, you really can’t help but smile at those catchy pop tunes. What is there not to like about someone who rocks a keytar? Anyone who plays the keytar is cool in my book.

To finish up the night I would be going to Club de Ville for a hip-hop showcase. My trip across town brought me past Stubb’s now hosting the most publicized event of the festival, Metallica’s not-so-surprise performance. The block was quite crazy with the frenzy but I was more interested in catching Philly trash-rapper Amanda Blank and British grimmer Lady Sovereign. Coming to the Club de Ville stage when I get there was Cage, who no matter how much guitar he adds to his music will always be compared to Eminem. It’s the unenviable curse of being a white rapper.

A scantily clad Amanda Blank jumped on stage to camera flashes galore. Her music draws a lot of comparisons to Peaches, but Blank is actually far superior in every aspect. She touts her vocals on her dance jams, but still has the ability to lay down some vicious rhymes when she needs to. Don’t let the booty tights and fishnet stocking fool you. Amanda Blank is a true emcee and probably can rip anyone in a battle. The last performance of my day came from London’s most well-know female rapper. Lady Sovereign claimed her crown as the “biggest midget in the game,” pulling out her past hit “Love Me or Hate Me” with the crowd sticking up their middle fingers to the haters. She cranked up her latest single “So Human,” which has a big interpolation from The Cure’s “Close to Me” that encouraged everyone to sing along.

Day three comes to an end. An earlier end compared to last night, but I saw all the performances that I wanted. I’ve actually crossed off many of the bands that that wanted to see this week. Only a few names remain for tomorrow. Could SWXS really be ending so soon?

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