SxSW - Day Two

BANDS COVERED IN THIS POST: SOMEONE STILL LOVES YOU BORIS YELTSIN | BROTHER ALI | SAGE FRANCIS | SMALL SINS | JESSE SYKES & THE SWEET HEREAFTER | AQUEDUCT | MENOMENA

Corrections: Yesterday, I asked the question, “We have to do this four more times?” There were two mistakes in that sentence. We only have to do this three more times, and it should have ended with an interrobang (?!), not a question mark. Also, JoAnna James' frappucino was not potentially dosed with cod liver oil, but rather, the earthy gentleman was implying that by using 2% rather than half and half in the concoction, he may have created a ripe environment for the breeding of bacteria. Still, kind of lame.

So …

Dear Austin: It’s really all kind of about how a day unfolds, then, isn’t it? It’s like ultimate determinism down here—none of this crap about going to your job and then whiling the night away on the couch (which sounds so awesome right about now). Each day lays before you with unlimited potential, and, by the end of the day, it’s a relatively simple calculus you have to execute to determine whether you spent it well. So far, so good.

And also? Beware the ides of March.

With the night that wouldn’t end behind us, we all split up in the morning. Cell phone recharged and ready (thanks V-Cast Lounge in the Convention Center), I want—nay, need—some terrible food for lunch. Yesterday, Oren and Ryan told me about this burger joint on 6th St. past Congress called Hut’s. It’s a real ’50s relic, with a quality neon sign and it looks just a bit dilapidated on the outside. Inside, however, it’s a top-notch diner/burger joint, and they’ve got about 20 different kinds of burgers on the menu, with every conceivable topping imaginable. Plus, they’re available as buffalo burgers or veggie burgers, if you lean that way. I go for a cherry Sprite and a Sink Burger, which comes with lettuce, tomato, ham and hickory sauce. My waiter suggests a delicious substitution, since it’s his favorite burger: a pineapple slice for the tomato. I like this guy already. The burger, when it arrives accompanied by a side of peppered onion rings, is certainly the messiest burger I’ve ever had. Not a bad thing, though, and it certainly ranks up there with great non-gourmet burgers like those at the Corner Bistro in New York.

On the way back east on 6th St., the familiar strains of “Pangea” by Someone Still Loves You Boris Yelstin waft over the fence from the patio of a joint called Mother Eagan’s. The SSLYBY boys are still a shock every time I see them. Their “look” (as people in the biz say) hasn’t caught up with their killer hooks and melancholy lyrics. Seriously, people, these kids from Missouri write some of the most unassumingly beautiful power pop I’ve ever heard, and if the new songs they played are any indication, they’re only getting better. They have a kind of goofy nonchalance onstage, passing instruments around and trading off vocal duties. They’ve garnered a fair amount of attention for their debut album, Broom, and I sincerely hope they can keep it together and keep growing as a band.

While SSLYBY is playing, I notice a guy tuning up a guitar on the side of the stage. Like roughly 85% of the people there, he's wearing incredibly skinny jeans, but he's also rocking a pretty terrible tie-dye T-shirt and makes me wonder: What the hell is up with this hair band fashion thing? I understand the ironic component to it, and the fun component to it, but at some point, you're just mimicking something terrible, and you're no longer making a comment about it. You're just dressing like a fool. I'm all for fashion moving forward, and reposessing acid wash jeans and all that, but let's not mistake bad for good, eh?

Meanwhile, 89.3 The Current is throwing a shindig at Buffalo Billiards, and the whole crew’s down here, including DJs Steve Seel and Mary Lucia, Program Director Steve Nelson and Music Director Melanie Walker. I get there in time to see Brother Ali walk in with Sound Unseen Artist of Distinction Award winner Randy Hawkins and Rhymesayers' J-Bird. And that guy Slug is here. He's a sweetheart--don't let anyone tell you different.

Before Ali takes the stage, Mary chats with music writers (and hosts of their own awesome music talk show) Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot. Kot wrote an awesome book about Wilco and he and DeRogatis' show, Sound Opinions, is basically the show that I'd love to do on radio. Not just have bands on to play live and talk about the picayune details of their last album or tour, but to really do a critic's show, where music can be seriously discussed and delved into. And not just the personalities of the musicians themselves, like on the Actors' Studio, but the nuts and bolts of the craft of making music. Anybody? Call me.

DeRogatis (I believe--from the back of the bar, where I've retreated to after snapping a couple of pics, it's hard to know for sure) espouses his philosophy about showgoing at SxSW: If you come to someplace and there's a line, just move on. There's too much good stuff to waste time waiting in a line when you might be missing out on a surprise. I concur. Of course, I'm also sitting on a couch at the Convention Center writing this while literally dozens of bands, some of them no doubt awesome, play sets. Moving on.

Ali takes the stage with his DJ, BK One, and chats with Mary for a bit about his new album, The Undisputed Truth, and about some of the problems he had getting down here, and then he rips into a new track, which is simply jaw-droppingly good. I should start writing down song titles. I'm sure you can find it online at the Current's website somewhere, but anyways. He has what I would call a cast iron flow. There's no hype, no flash; it's just solid as hell-- thoughtful, measured and cohesive, but still playful when it wants to be. It's all that and a bag of chips.

After another little interview segment, where Ali discusses meeting his rap heroes (including KRS-One when he was 12 years old), he drops another new one on us, and this one's called "Uncle Sam Goddamn." I know so because he can't say the whole title on the radio. It's a stirring and topical track, quite obviously. I have little reason to doubt that his new joint will live up to its title when it drops on April 10.

I take a break from the hustle and bustle to return my computer to our van so I won't have to lug it around for the rest of the day. On the way back up to the epicenter, I walk by David Cross. Hey, David Cross. (waves back) I can't come up with a Tobias Funke joke quick enough.

Other than Antone's, Emo's is the club name I most associate with Austin, so I'm glad to be heading there for the Kork Agency's showcase, which Slug is hosting. Emo's is a sweet venue-- it's sort of semi-enclosed, with the stage and a portion of the floorspace under a roof, but with the rest of the joint outdoors. It also connects to a smaller stage, 7th St. Entry style, through a patio. First Avenue would be a lot cooler if part of it could be outside, but that'd be as dumb as having an outdoor baseball stadium for the Twins, right? Slug comes out to introduce the showcase's first act, Sage Francis, and tells a story about a time when he and Sage were on tour and decided to go out on Halloween while they were at Penn State for a show. The way Slug tells it, within five minutes of getting into a bar with a costume contest, Sage was demanding that the contest winner hand over his inflatable Budweiser couch to him. Clearly, a troublemaker. Sage's response when he hits the stage is to say that Slug was just upset because he got carded that night-- and he was 42 at the time. Har.

Sage Francis looks like about the last guy who would ever be a rapper, but he's actually incredibly good. A lot of his stuff is built around famous samples, like "Broken Wings" by Mr. Mister and "Closer" by Nine Inch Nails, but he does more than just jack the beats-- he uses the songs as jumping off points that recontextualize the originals. His lyrics strike a nimble balance between dextrous and technically impressive runs and killer punchlines and hoooks. He bites KRS-One's "I'm going back to Cali, to Cali, to Cali. Nah, I don't think so," turning it into "I'm going back ro rehab, to rehab, to rehab. Nah, I don't drink though." He ends his set with a fantastic spoken word thing that revolves around a breakup. Yeah, it was emo. But damn, Sage really has a way of sucking you into the stuff and making it relevant. There's nothing pro forma about him; it's just the realness. Did I mention he's also funny as hell? He is.

On my way back west on 6th St. to hit up Antone's and Small Sins, I walk past an impromptu demonstration in the middle of the street exhorting sinners to repent. There's a clutch of respectably-dressed people handing out flyers or pamphlets, plus a guy in the middle with a bullhorn. It's a.) kind of nice to see business casual-dressed people look like the freaks for once and b.) just kind of silly and misguided. The bulk of the people here are not just music fans or wayward children on a road to nowhere-- most everybody is either a musician who's gotten into a showcase that might further their career or a music professional who has taken their passion for music (or for being a lawyer or an agent or whatever) and turned into a career that can allow them to come bask in music and nothing but for four straight days. We're not sweating it, is my point.

The scene outside Antone's when I get there is another reminder of SxSW's superiority to that other music conference, CMJ. At CMJ, a badge don't get you shit. As Jerry from Vitriol pointed out, you were treated worse with a badge at CMJ than if you had just paid cash to get into the shows. But here at SxSW, there are separate lines for badge holders, people with wristbands, and people paying cash, and you can almost always get into the showcases with a badge. Now, I've gotten mine as a professional thing, and I'm in no way thumbing my nose at anyone who's paying cash. It's nice for me to be able to get in and all, but who it really rewards are the people who shelled out the $500 for the badge. You damn well better get something good for that kind of scratch, right? Plus, there are plenty of staff at every venue entrance ready to tell you which line is which and give you all the info you need. Take notes, CMJ.

So I snake right inside just as the Stax 50th Anniversary is wrapping up, and I manage to take this sweet shot of Booker T & the MGs with none other than Isaac Hayes:



Pretty sweet, eh?

The joint empties out before Small Sins take the stage, but it afford me a chance to get right up front, and the venue starts filling up again shortly. This is the Astralwerks Showcase, and Astralwerks has been killing it recently. Smalls Sins hail from Toronto and put out a great self-titled album last year full of restrained power pop that owed more than a bit of debt to Spoon, Jackson Browne and a whole host of other pop influences. Live, they're quite a bit more fiery than on record, and I have mixed feelings about it. Their disc had a couple great sonic tricks to it: Lead Sin Thomas D'Arcy sang with a hushed croon, but when the choruses to songs like "Stay" would kick in, this giant choir of harmonies would enter, and it was a jarring and evocative effect, especially when set against the icy restraint of the songs. With that aspect removed, Small Sins are more like any other able powerpop band. That said, they're still very able, and their new stuff was great, showcasing more effectively than their album their debt to Austin-native Spoon. After six songs, someone tells them to cut it, and they start packing up, but then some other guy jumps on stage and tells them not to listen to that first guy and to keep playing. There's been a nice quality, generally, at the shows here that weds looseness with regard to execution to keeping things on track and on time. Maybe that's a Texas thing.

It's getting on towards 10 p.m. by this point, and I'm dragging. My dogs are barking and I'm pretty sleep-deprived, not to mention the fact that the sleep I did get was not really quality. So I decide to park myself at the Barsuk Records Showcase for the night. Besides, Menomena are playing and they're the only band I really care about seeing this week. I catch the tail end of Rocky Votolato's set, and then muscle my way to the front for Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter.

After a couple of technical stumbles, Sykes and co. hit their stride and deliver ably on the the promise shown by their latest album, Like, Love, Lust & The Open Halls of the Soul. I'd seen them once before, actually, about three years ago at Bumbershoot in Seattle, but I didn't really get into them until I got this latest disc, which is a fantastic mix of brittle vocals and roadhouse rock. Sykes' voice sounds just raw on record, but she's been preserving it on the road, and hasn't had anything to drink for the past six weeks. "I can't wait to get fucked up after this," she says to the crowd between songs. I miss the horns and some of the other textures from the disc (she's just got a bassist, drummer and guitarist along for this show), but it's still a solid set. Apparently, some blogger last year wrote that the only reason Sykes' band stays with her is because of the poontang they get after the show. Sykes says, "His name was Mike. Mike, if you're here, fuck you." I'd like to make it plainly clear that no one in her band is getting any from Sykes. Damn bloggers.

I buy an EP from the Menomena merch guy that features "Wet and Rusting" plus three new songs and two remixes. He's a genial dude wearing dark brown khakis, a blue button down and has a haircut like a Congressional page (no jokes, please). He's also reading Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. I ask how it's coming and he says, "Great." I'm unable to come up with a Colonel Kurz joke. Nice chap. Turns out he's the keboardist/guitarist for Menomena. And also now the winner of the "Guy Least Likely to be in an Amazing Rock Band, Based on the Way He Looks" award.

Aqueduct play next, but I'm firmly staked to the bench at the back of the venue, which is Buffalo Billiards, by the way. Sitting with your legs crossed when your feet are tired? The new black. It's incredible. Aqueduct are a little too silly for my taste, although they open with the theme song to "Walker, Texas Ranger," which is a nice touch.

I've waited all damn night for Menomena, who were slated to play 1 a.m., but don't actually start until 1:30. As such, and because there aren't enough pictures of drummers, I'm putting up two, starting with this one:



I can't believe they pull off their songs with just three guys, but the volume of stuff onstage is remarkable: three guitars, one bass, one baritone guitar, a bari sax, an alto sax,a keyboard, a set of bass foot pedals, a drumset and assorted percussion. Their latest, Friend and Foe, is still the best record to be release this year, in my opinion, and they're even better live than they come off on the record. What little sacrifices are made in the way of subtletly are more than made up for by their energy. Unfortunately, a couple of douchebags behind and to my right decide that Menomena would be a good band to mosh to. Idiots. Moshing is so '95, and it wasn't cool even back then. One of the cardinal rules about showgoing should be to not disturb other people's space. If you're going to a punk show, there is one set of acceptable behavior, because people know that slamdancing might go down. But at your average rock show, even if it's a particularly loud and/or energetic band, it's not cool.

Menomena split their set down the middle between their first disc (I Am the Fun Blame Monster!, which is an anagram of "Menomena's First Album"--genius) and their latest. I'm joyed by the inclusion of "Muscle 'n Flo" and "Wet and Rusting," but dismayed by the lack of "Air Aid." Maybe they'll play it when I catch them again tomorrow. Their set is cut short when they turn on the lights at 2 a.m. (a lame move--why would you even have a band start playing 1 a.m. if you're going to close at 2?), but by that point I'm the walking dead. I can't even think, I'm so beat. I'll just close with this photo, because every blog post about SxSW should have a photo of a dude with a guitar screaming.