SXSW & Mess With Texas 2
Photo by AustinSoundCheck
The Friday Night rule has become the Saturday Night rule. It’s better anyway as I’m trying to get back into working out on a regular basis. So on Saturday I went downtown to experience a bit of SXSW. Strolled the streets, had a couple of beers in a great little blues place called Nuno’s on Sixth Street. There were bands playing everywhere. Some great street performers.
After a few beers, I was feeling warm and fuzzy and was just taking in the sights and sounds and somehow ended up in Waterloo park where they were having a free concert http://www.messwithtexasparty.com/. That was a lot of fun. Some interesting acts. Met a girl there while standing in line for a hot dog that had never had sauerkraut before. I asked her what her ethnic background was, Scandinavian. Would have been funnier if she was German. Met her again later in the concert as she wandered right in front of me with her friend. I smiled at her and called her sauerkraut. She and her friend laughed. She was a good looking girl but she wasn’t particularly interested, I wasn’t dressed to impress with my glasses, rather disheveled appearance and in obvious need of a haircut. Also, I was a little inebriated. Girls love that serendipity type stuff. If circumstances were different, things might have gone differently. Possibly.
The concert was great. Some really good acts. Headliners being Breeders and NOFX. Discovered a great new band called Yeasayers. Very kool. They also had some comedy acts earlier in the day which I missed but Janeane Garofalo was there. So after I listened to a few sets of the Breeders, I decided to make my way out so I could avoid the crowd. Headed back down to Sixth Street and ended up in Barcelona on a whim. They had an act from the UK. A UK desi[1] named Riz MC and a couple of DJs. I talked with the DJ who had a thick British accent. I think it was Cockney. I think I understood about ten percent of what he said. I just laughed at what I thought were appropriate moments in the conversation. The act was pretty good and controversial as he was rapping about the War on Terror http://www.myspace.com/rizmc. He did the People Like People song but I think I like the Post 9-11 Blues better. The songs are good on youtube but to be honest, it didn’t sound that great in a live act. The energy of the crowd and Riz himself was infectious though. That’s what made it good. In fairness to him the sound guy at the club sucked so that might have been a factor. Not a bad act but not really my deal. I hung out at Marq for a while and then called it a night. Next year, I’ll definitely take more advantage of SXSW and see a lot more. People I’ve talked to really weren’t that impressed with it this year so don’t think I missed much. Had fun the way did it.
[1] ‘desi’ is a slang term for people from the Indian Subcontinent.
