Okay, ceasing and desisting with the April Fool’s jokes…you’ll now get a rash of stuff that should’ve been posted last week. I hope you don’t mind.
Edie Sedgwick @ Waves
When I first saw Edie Sedgwick in Washington DC I wondered just what shitshow I had stumbled into. I think that most of the people at Waves fell into that category (although there were definitely a few Dischord diehards in the audience as well as Medications played as their backing band.) Knowing what I was walking into this time around (a cross dressing dude with a Harley mustache singing kitschy lyrics), I had a lot more fun. At the end of the day, some of the songs are actually pretty fun and it was pretty funny to see Edie grab people’s personal belongings (and badges) and sort of fuck with the whole “industry cool” vibe that some people bring along with them to Austin.
Here We Go Magic @ Ms. Bea’s
Ms. Bea’s ended up being my favorite venue of the entire week. Unfortunately, that’s all I can say about the Here We Go Magic set except that I saw it. I don’t really remember much of this set. I feel like that happens sometimes at SXSW…you go back and look at the utter crapton of photos and go – wait – I was there? Crap, this is already happening after night one? Last year it took until my last night to forget sets. I remember liking them, but clearly not enough to give a good report. My apologies to Here We Go Magic. The Telepathe set that finished off the night was even less memorable but here’s a photo of them as well.
The Pains of Being Pure At Heart @ Ms. Bea’s
I paid a little more attention to The Pains since I saw them in DC and was pleasantly surprised. I knew that I liked their album, I just didn’t expect them to bring it so thoroughly live. POBPAH have this innocence about them which shines through beautifully in their lyrical content, but while it comes off as vaguely twee on their albums, it just makes them come off as incredibly likable. Moreover, there’s a certain grit that was especially evident during the Ms. Bea’s show since they were actually playing on the ground. They know how to bring the rock live, blow all of our minds with a short set of the songs we all know the words to at this point and in such an intimate and DIY-style setting – it was just really cool.
After The Pains, my friends left Ms. Bea’s and I made an attempt to get into see Yoni Wolf (of Why? cLOUDDEAD and various other projects) at Mohawk and paid the ten dollars to make it inside just in time to see everyone leaving. Because he had just finished. FAIL. But my friend and I went to the Death Metal Pizza place on 6th Street, which had just come recommended by a member of Deleted Scenes. I also had my first unexpected celebrity sighting at this point. I’ll bet you didn’t know that Panda Bear was at SXSW. But I have photographic evidence. See!
Parenthetical Girls @ Beauty Bar
I walked into the Parenthetical Girls set having only listened to their material once, but knowing that their singer’s voice sounded like Colin Meloy’s…but with more cracks in it and that the music seemed at best, twee as fuck (and unlike PJ, I am NOT a champion of twee) and at worst, boring and irritating. As such, I hadn’t quite expected Zac Pennington to be as good of a showman. By the end of the set he was singing from the top of the truly huge speakers and I’d walked in on round two of his “Marry, Fuck or Throw off a Cliff” game. The comment that he’d love to fuck Morrissey because what a great story you’d have of having fucked a celibate = “priceless.” It made me want to give their albums another chance, because the happiness I felt at the end of their set was just what I needed after a long day on my feet.
Casiotone for the Painfully Alone @ Beauty Bar
Casiotone for the Painfully Alone started off the set on a promising note. He covers a Parenthetical Girls song, and actually brought Zac Pennington back onstage to sing “Love Connection.” He also brought up Nick from No Kids for a nice relaxing duet. Here was the major problem with the Casiotone set. Next door, some extremely loud punk band was playing so in between songs we’d hear the residual “BAM BAM BAM BAM” that just didn’t mesh well with downtempo keyboard bleeps. It fared better, however than the Casiotone show I had seen at The Talking Head in Baltimore which just straight put me to sleep. In this case, it helped me unwind.
Additional posts you may be interested in:
Entries (RSS)