SXSW Wrap Up Pt. 1

Last week I attended SXSW in Austin, which was fantastic. I stayed with my buddy Jared, who was incidentally fired from SXSW for providing me a fake badge. (First UT student ever to be fired from South By!) Either way, we saw some fantastic bands and movies, ate some amazing food, had a great spread!

Here were my highlights from the event:Lou Reed: Seeing his concert film Berlin followed by a relatively coherent (for Lou Reed) Q&A. I can't wait to get this on DVD, Antony from Antony and the Johnsons as well as Sharon Jones sing back up, and Antony does an incredibly moving version of "Candy Says."

Bananaz: Documentary about Damon Albarn, Jamie Hewitt, and the incarnation of Gorillaz. The film basically documented the inception of the idea all the way to the follow through of Demon Days. Over 5 years worth of footage, or something ridiculous like that. The director was very cool, is good friends with both artists and presented a very intimate portrait of the inside of the operation.Cadence Weapon: Straight from Canada, Cadence Weapon put on an awesome live set, complete with DJ Weasel, who I was watching most of the show. I have a newfound appreciation for scratching since this particular festival, there were so many awesome DJs who were working hard and you could tell. Great surprise guest Subtitle followed through, for one of his 2 great sneak appearances that I caught this week!
Dizzee Rascal: Holy shit, what an awesome free show with the Newham Generals. Tons of free stuff going on too, notably the Steamworks Beer tent!

I also caught a couple of bands at a free Emo's show, which is impressive that they manage to pull that off every year. I was pleasantly surprised by the Shout Out Louds, who were really fun to watch. Apparently a lot of the free corporate events at the festival are not sanctioned by Roland Swenson and C3, the people who put on South By, and so this is upsetting the festival investors. These events have been discouraged by C3, and there are even some instances of the organizers trying to shut down these non-south-by shows.