Rockfeedback @ SXSW ‘09 – Day Three - 20/3
5/5
By: Thomas Hannan
So begins perhaps the coolest day in Rockfeedback's SXSW history? It might be a brief history, granted, but this one's going to take some beating, starting as it did with arguably the best thing our cameras have ever filmed. Promptly at 10.30am, on the porch of our amazing bed and breakfast (the charming Austin Folk House on West 22nd Street), arrived the four members of Balkan influenced, sometime Neutral Milk Hoteliers A Hawk And A Hacksaw to perform another in our series of exclusive acoustic sessions. Not only were the four tracks they treated us to absolutely mesmerising and so refreshingly removed from all other music we've filmed ever, a further privilege was witnessing the things take shape in an impromptu rehearsal beforehand, offering an unique insight in to how the band works, writes, and comes together musically. Jeremy Barnes leads the ensemble with his accordion and haunting vocals, whilst trumpets and tubas take up the rhythm, allowing Heather Trost (who we all fall in love with) to scramble her fingers over a violin with a manic elegance, the like of which we've never seen. Passers by stop in their tracks, entranced by one of the most unique spectacles in all Austin has to offer this week . (5/5)
[A HAWK AND A HACKSAW]
I then travel back in to town to meet Transgressive's Esser at True Blue, a tattoo parlour on Red River. Sure, we've had chats countless times, but there was something about the idea of him holding court whilst having a toothbrush and safety pin inked on to his arm that struck us as worth catching. He seemed remarkably composed, but occasionally squirmed when the needle hit a more delicate patch of skin near the inside bend of the elbow. Conversations went something like this (capital letters indicate pain) - "you spend ages contemplating your first tattoo, then you get your first silly one, and it opens the flood gates - now I CAN'T STOP AHHHHRRRHGHH..."
[ESSER]
Holding the boom mic for us an occasionally chipping in with her own tattoo related words of wisdom was Micachu, author of what we're already calling the best debut album of 2009. We spend a lot of our interview with her and her band The Shapes telling her so, praise she accepts with a humble modesty. The rest of the chat involves the working methods of producer Matthew Herbert, why sound men at SXSW are shockingly ill informed, and which dog from the book of tattoos mounted on the wall would we most like to get done on our arms. 'Better not miss that', I'm sure you're thinking. And you'd be right to - footage soon.
Whilst half our crew heads in the direction of Maps and Atlases and is wowed by the first band Rockfeedback has ever encountered that actually lives up to the genre tag 'math-rock' (these guitar solos are positively Pythagorian), the other fifty percent have a chat with a far more gutsy type of rockers to attend to. The Hold Steady are holed up exactly where you'd hope them to be before a gig - in the back room of a bar, dressed in plaid shirts, enjoying the rider. They're charming, welcoming fellows, and their set at Club De Ville only endears them to us further - what we'd previously thought of as just a Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band rip off turn out to be, in actuality, a really good Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band rip off, and we genuinely enjoy pumping our fists in the air to 'Sequestered In Memphis', throwing beer over new found friends to 'Born In The USA' and generally getting fired up for all the other Bruce appropriations they triumphed with. Imitation is the highest form of flattery - The Hold Steady know it, and nail it. (4/5)
We wander, for once, away from a crammed and sweaty bar an in to one of SXSW's few relatively large venues. One of the nice things about the event is that due to the nature of the town, your favourite act are likely to be playing at least one set in a space more intimate than you'll be used to seeing them in. Unlike most of the venues here other than the Austin Music Hall, Stubbs is actually of a fair size - and entirely outdoors. But for a band of the stature of Echo and the Bunnymen, more used to playing the likes of the Royal Albert Hall than sweaty barbeques like these, it's quite a step down. A descent in size of setting doesn't mean a cut in quality of performance though, and a perfectly delivered greatest hits set (peaking on a really rather lovely melding of 'Nothing Ever Last Forever' into 'Walk On The Wild Side') elevates a band who we'd previously thought of as being more of a relic than something worth our day to day attention in to one who we're determined to go back and reassess at length. Watching such accomplished Northern English indie song writing did also confirm to us exactly what's wrong with Oasis, too - namely, they're really bad at it. (4/5)
And so from one of SXSW's slickest shows to one of the most ramshackle and loveable we'd ever seen: out in a record shop that also served as a pizza parlour on the edge of town was something that was far more in keeping with what we think the spirit of the festival/conference is about - not industry execs eating tacos sporting a judgemental sneer, but music fans discovering new bands in the exhilarating way we discovered Mika Miko. They set up in the corner of the shop, with no P.A. system whatsoever, and jump about and make a racket like they're celebrating that music hasn't ever really been as fun since Bikini Kill stopped jumping about and making a racket too. One of them isn't using a microphone, she's using a telephone, and screaming in to it like a kid who's been refused another portion of ice cream. The others have instruments and are all playing the same note at the same time. Sometimes, it can be really, really fun to do that for three minutes. These kid are the last real punks. (4/5)
Whilst in said record shop, I purchase a copy of Husker Du's Zen Arcade on gatefold double vinyl, a bootleg, white label Rapeman 7" and, to replace a copy that was stolen at a house party, Bruce Springsteen's Born In The USA on LP. The shop owner deems this such a bizarre trio of purchases that my photograph is taken as a memento. I inform him this is just how we at Rockfeedback roll.
We split, again. One crew flies to be charmed by Micah P Hinson's continued oddness and subsequently becomes wowed by the complex arrangements and big rock slickness of The Paper Chase. My crew are adventurers down the road less travelled, heading to Austin's finest venue, Antones, for a date with Wildbirds and Peacedrums. A two piece resembling Amy Winehouse fronting a Chris Corsano drum solo, credit really does have to be given to front woman Mariam Wellentin - she's a voice capable of anything, and must have had it suggested to her at some point that with her stunning looks and remarkable vocal chords, she should take the pop route and make her fortune. Do a Lykke Li, if you will. What she's chosen to do instead is to join with drummer (and husband) Andrew Werliin and make really, really bizarre music - tribal, primal, primitive (I mention the word primitive in the interview subsequent to the set an immediate realise I've made a mistake - it's incredibly complex, it just sounds... prehistoric), thoroughly and consistently stunning. Spellbinding on record, it's yet more worthy of praise when you can see precisely how hard they're smacking these cymbals and steel drums with your own eyes. You won't understand what it is this band mean, but all you need to know is that they do mean it. (4/5)
[GALLOWS]
Our crew remains split for the rest of the evening. The Others get the wide eyed, psychedelic punk of White Denim to act as an appetiser to what a few of them come back hailing as the best gig of the festival, namely Gallows, who smash lights, punch people and deliver the majority of the set stood on the venue's bar just kicking the crap out of stuff. The band claim they can't play shows like that in the UK anymore, "because of the violence". The footage looks killer.
Sure, they make it sound exciting. But I'm in indie geek heaven right now - I've taken my own hero, Graham Coxon, to interview his heroes, Dinosaur Jr., for Rockfeedback TV. J Mascis doesn't 'do' press any more, but Murph and Lou Barlow are more than happy to chat. Funny thing is, it takes them a good five minutes or so of on-camera time to clock who Graham is, and that they all used to tour together, back in the day. "You should be interviewing, him, not us", Lou chirps upon the moment of realistation. "Blur made WAY more money!" They discuss the perfect guitar solo, the Dinosaur Jr line ups when Mascis sacked everyone, and why 'You Made Me Realise' by My Bloody Valentine might be the best song ever. It's perfect, as is being able to squuezein right at the front of the 150 or so capacity courtyard in which Dino play the night's headline set, watching as Mascis assembles his nine (NINE!) Marshall stacks, before a set that comprises the entirety of their career, regardless of who was in what line up - we get 'Little Fury Thing', 'In A Jar', 'Freak Scene', 'Broken Heart', 'Sludge', 'Feel The Pain', and even, at one point, Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene on vocals. Feet away from us. At this point, despite having no idea where my friends were, being 5000 miles away from home and unsure as to the whereabouts of my hotel keys, I died and went to heaven. (5/5)
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