SXSW 2010 :: Day 1

Cokemachineglow @ SXSW, Day 1 :: Wednesday, March 17

As an intrepid Cokemachineglow reader, you may have noticed over the years that the Glow favors quality over quantity. This is why Rolling Stone is paying some poor schmuck to Twitter 140 characters apiece about 100 bands and I will be sending out 500-word dispatches filed with the steely resolve of Hunter S. Thompson at the Super Bowl VII. Then again, we all know how that went. In other words, folks, welcome to Cokemachineglow’s coverage of the 2010 SXSW Festival. I, Austin, Texas, first-timer David “Boogz” Greenwald, will be your host, and like my esteemed colleague over at RS, I will also be flooding Twitter this week (follow the Glow at @cmgzine), though us serious critics have been Tweeting for years—Lester Bangs used to call it, “taking notes.” But the real stuff will be right here, posted each day in the hour of impossible clarity between when the hangover wears off and the drinking starts again. Like I said, this’ll be my first rodeo here at SXSW, so apologies in advance to more experienced Austinites for venue descriptions, use of the phrases “Levi’s Fader Fort” and/or “Perez Hilton,” and general awe at the city’s ability to produce barbecued anything. To counterbalance my tendency for hyperbole, I’ll do my best to keep a running tally of my inebriation levels so you can calibrate your cynicism accordingly. With that said: bands!

Wednesday’s shows started off with free coffee and a dose of The Walkmen, who played like they needed it, at the IFC Crossroads house, which features an intimate performance space for filming—and means one needs to be inside more than five minutes before the band goes on, which I was not. On the upside, I met Hold Steady frontman Craig Finn, who is here doing interviews and presumably being really nice to everybody all week while avoiding picking up a guitar.

Next it was off to Red River St. for a “secret” Broken Bells parking garage performance—secret except for the football field-ready banners. Broken Bells, the new collaboration from the Shins’ James Mercer and jack of all trades Danger Mouse, somehow managed to draw the biggest crowds of SXSW’s first day, both at the afternoon show and during a splashier nighttime gig at Stubb’s, where they gathered a larger audience than Spoon. Spoon! This is like if the Postal Service had been the biggest act at SXSW 2002. (Veterans: did this happen?)

At any rate, I ended up at WOXY/Austinist’s showcase at the Mohawk instead, where I caught Yukon Blonde—a country-rock act that peppered its Fleet Foxes harmonies with a healthy dose of Gram Parsons.

At this point, venues started to really fill up—and especially as a photographer, crowds are the Kryptonite of SXSW. Thus a skipped Japandroids show at Emo’s and on to Force Field and Terrorbird’s showcase at Red 7.

Outside, it wasn’t clear which religion dream-pop act Choir of Young Believers were preaching for, but Beach House is likely their central deity.

On the inside stage, the Fresh and Onlys played noisy, retro California pop—a step above Wavves in technique, but I’ll be glad when the fad fades.

Disheartened, I broke for lunch with a turkey dog (about as healthy as it gets in street vendor-filled Austin) and spied former Beulah frontman Miles Kurosky hanging out before his set at the Red Eyed Fly.

My hunger quenched for a brief moment, I took a walk down to a next-door creek with Toro Y Moi main man Chaz Bundick and talked childhood cartoons (dude was a Nickelodeon watcher; I’m still a Darkwing Duck man), his next record (due at the end of this year; “more traditional” than the just-released Causers of This but also more ambient) and tried to avoid using the word “chillwave.”

Back inside Red 7, Real Estate played well, if limply, but struggled with a mix muddier than the water streaming below the venue. Not an auspicious start to the band’s week in Austin, but their songs—a looser, earthier take on the Silver Jews’ early recordings, to these ears—remain excellent; hopefully I’ll catch them in a crisper room in the next few days.

Up the street at Plush, I heard glistening major 7th chords emanating and discovered the day’s biggest surprise: International Waters, a slightly nerdy indie-pop act filtering bossa nova chords through straightforward hooks a la the defunct Ancient Greeks or the Crystal Skulls. The band, Austin locals, zipped through their set with verve and sophistication and left me begging for a full-length; they promised to mail me their single.

After a dinner break at Jaime’s (which either has a three-for-one deal on tacos or has the best prices in history), I endured the long walk across town to the IAMSOUND showcase at Malverde, which, unlike the charmingly dive-y vibe at most of the festival’s clubs and bars, was scrubbed to a Hollywood dazzle. It offered a crowd to match—backstage looked like Jack Nicholson’s house on any given night during the peak of the Lohan era.

VOICEsVOICEs, an apocalyptic female glitch-noise duo without much in the way of lyrics (or choruses, for that matter) had trouble with their EFFECTsEFFECTs and went on late; after 10 minutes or so, I got bored (Ay! Let me Twitter dat!) and headed out. Then Alex Chilton died, three days before his scheduled Big Star performance in Austin, and I wandered around downtown mumbling “Nighttime” to myself with a mixture of shock and grief.

The relief I was after was available in spades (and with seats, thank God) at the Central Presbyterian Church, which last year played host to an already legendary Grizzly Bear gig but made do on Wednesday night with the experimental efforts of Dustin O’Halloran and Hauschka.

O’Halloran, the more traditional composer and pianist, played first; his work was thoughtful and melodic, warmed by the presence of a string quartet.

The quartet added further accompaniment to Hauschka’s set, not that he needed it – the German composer taped all manner of screws and coils and nails to the church piano on the spot in order to replicate the prepared piano groans and whirs of his recordings. His next effort, he announced, is due in October—after his transcendent set in the hallowed hall, it can’t come soon enough.

At the stroke of midnight, Rose Elinor Dougall—formerly known as Rosay, the brunette Pipette—took the stage at Paste’s Galaxy Lounge showcase. In a shimmering leather jacket and all-black ensemble, the formerly fey singer looked like a cross between Kristen Stewart in “The Runaways” and Ellen Page in everything—nevertheless, she lead her new band through a striking 40-minute set that picked up right where the Pipettes left off—and rebooted in the ‘80s. Driven by keyboards and Depeche Mode-toned guitars, the new project had the electronic air of acts such as Metric and Reverie Sound Revue—but while those bands err on the side of glassy cool, Dougall still thrives on pop drama and a stunning vibrato. The best of the new tracks were as exuberant as past Pipettes favorites—and even as a solo frontwoman, she hasn’t forgotten the occasional choreographed move or two from her polka-dot days, too.

The night’s biggest crowds seemed to be at Stubb’s, as noted, for Broken Bells—once they’d left the stage, I had no trouble making my way into the vast venue for Spoon. The hometown heroes played a bristling hour taken mainly from their three latest albums and sounded monstrous on a sound system capable of handling the legitimate rock stars they’ve become.

Serena-Maneesh was just taking the stage at the Brooklyn Vegan showcase when Spoon finished up around 1:30 a.m., but as I’ve learned already, SXSW is a marathon—not a sprint. Now, to sleep, perchance to dream of Rose Dougall—and of doing this all again for three more days.