SXSW 2008 Day 3: Friday
I started out my Friday trying to catch Bon Iver again because my camera ran out of batteries the night before right after they started and I wanted to get some videos, but I arrived at Emo’s too late to get anywhere near the front, so i just enjoyed some more of their stuff and moved on to the next venue. I caught the end of another Kaki King set, wich was cool because I missed the very end of the set i caught Wednesday night.
After that it was time to catch Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin. One of the guitarists had broken his amp, so they played as a 3 piece instead, and it really sounded to me like something was missing, so I left after a few songs.
After getting a great steak and brie sandwich at some weird biker bar, I went to see Evangelicals again. It was hard to hear the vocals in the particular spot I was in the night before, plus I really love this album, so I was very happy to catch them do another stunning show. That is another cool thing about this festival; If I want to see a band I love multiple times, it is no problem. Here is some live videos:
I stuck around to catch Cloud Cult next. Between this set full of new stuff and the tracks floating around the internet so far, I don’t think I like the new material as much as I loved The Meaning Of 8 stuff, but they are still pretty good.
After that, we made our second attempt to catch Akron/Family. It was again a failure, and if there is one regret I will have about this fest, it is not seeing them. Although the party they were at had them listed in the biggest font, they played first. We did not figure that out until enduring a wanna-be Panda Bear act and some French dude who thought we was from the South with a puppet of himself. The upside was that the show was in a furniture store and they were serving free booze.
We dedicated the rest of the night to hanging out at the Ecstatic Peace party, Thurston Moore‘s record label. It was easily the best total party package of the fest so far. First we caught Northampton Wools, a noise project duo featuring Thurston. It was such an unbelievably awesome set, and there were only like 40 people in the room for it. If you can’t tell from the alias I use on here, Sonic Youth is one of my favourite bands and living in Atlanta, I ‘ve never got the chance to see some of the non-Youth stuff Thurston does live, so I feel so blessed to finally catch it.
The next band I caught that I really dug was Black Helicopter. They do good, hard stoner-rock, and I’m always a fan of that stuff.
The next great band I caught was Tall Firs. They were probably the closest thing to the Sonic Youth spectrum of all the bands I saw here, and they were damn good. Their newest album comes out Tuesday and their set was packed full of those tunes, so I’m pretty excited to hear it.
Next up was Be Your Own Pet. I had got their first album, and I had not really loved it, but they were so much better live than on record. Total old-school punk, thrashing around the stage like crazy. Nathan Vasquez’s bass was stained with blood. The set got interrupted by a power outage, but it did not deter them as front-woman Jemina Pearl Abegg held a question and answer session for the crowd while the generators got refueled, and then they commenced the rock again.
The night kept getting better as J Mascis did a solo set. He blasted through his greatest hits and jammed out long and hard, ending with a 10 minute solo-fest. No matter how many times I catch him and in whatever incarnation, it is always a great show.
The night would end with Thurston Moore and his band (featuring Steve Shelley) doing a set comprised of pieces from his Trees Outside The Academy. It was everything I could have hoped for and more. There is really nothing I can say to describe how much I enjoy what Thurston does, so we’ll just leave it at that. He did two encores, including a Velvet Underground song.
SXSW just doesn’t stop amazing me. I have one last day and then it is over, so I’m gonna go live it up while I have the chance. Some time late next week, I’ll post my Day4/Wrap-Up post. Biggie C has taken billions of beautiful pictures that will start showing up here soon and I still have a bunch of videos to upload, so stay tuned.
- Posted by Davy Minor on March 15, 2008 at 2:50 pm
