March 23, 2009
SXSW.07
I need to remind ya'll that an event like South By Southwest is just perfect for Twitter. Where or how else are you going to get real-time instant text messages (on your cell phone from other cell phone users) of cool or unusual events at a huge thing like this? So, if you'd just like to see what I "tweeted" throughout the past 9 days, it'll add some details to the review I'm blogging about. You won't have to join or anything to do that. Just visit twitter.com/dooglar and you'll see the many little 140-word posts (and photos and video from my phone, too) there. It really is fun.
It's funny how I approached the SXSW music festival this year. While technological advances abound that allow me to carry the music schedule on my person (via cellphone text messages, an online calendar in a phone, iPod, or PDA), I spent the typical hours beforehand figuring out who I wanted to see, but then just wrote it down on four sheets of paper, which I carried in my pocket. As old school as that was, I never got lost or confused (at least very much).
FLATFOOT 56
Thursday was packed with lots of daytime showcases and parties that various organizations put on. My 13-year-old daughter wanted to see a local band really bad, so I brought her with me. Our first destination was to see the ever-popular Devil Wears Prada at an all ages show at Emo's. Turns out several hundred other people had the same idea and we couldn't get inside. Darn it! I pulled out my paper schedule to look up the next band to see: Flatfoot 56 at an outdoor stage called Texas Rockfest. The band sounded nice and loud, which catered to their lively and rambunctious energy -- even in the Texas heat. The crowd was mildly enthusiastic at first, but soon warmed up to the band's Irish sounds. In true celtic punk fashion, soon two guys skipped around in front of the stage arm in arm during "Battle Of The Bones." Very appropriate for a St. Patrick's Day week gig. They announced that they'd been holed up in a studio in Houston, recording its new album. More than likely, they built more anticipation from new friends and fans that looked turned on to the band's fiery music.
INVISIBLE TARGET
This local band played in a tiny old club on the East side of town, which is slowly but effectively expanding the live music district beyond the city blocks downtown. The first thing I noticed about this very young band (most if not all are still in high school) is that the frontman, Josh Flores, noncholantly walked through the crowd and coaxed the audience to sing their pop punk anthem with them. He already had some really good experience and confidence in being a frontman. I was impressed. Fellow sibling and drummer, Caleb Flores, wore a nice Japanese rice farmer's hat, making a nice fun fashion statement. He showed much merit at one point in the show when his snare stand broke. He cradled it with one arm and played it with the other. Not getting side-tracked by technical malfunctions is a big lesson that these guys apparently have learned already. Kudos! The high point might've been the band's fun pop song, "Waffles," which feels like a love song until you realize it's an ode to the breakfast treat. They followed up this light-hearted moment with one of their heavier tunes, "A Choice To Make."
The sonics and tones were a tad raw, the vocal sound and musical performance show enough promise to hold on. "Again" has a nice plucking guitar intro, but the song's slow timbre doesn't cater to the vocalist's strengths. I found myself thinking, though, that, 'If these kids get to where their potential points, they'll look back to this formative period as being just that: rough, raw, and growing.' They ended with a tune that featured those creepy movie trills in it, which dropped out for the slow, thoughtful verses. Then it was a fake encore of "TNT." It was kind of a dry cover of the early AC/DC classic
BROOKE WAGGONER
The hype on this little energetic singer/songwriter is legit. She played to a packed Gibson Guitar Room at Maggie Mae's on 6th Street. Her playful tunes stood out and were buoyed by a string section that offered building crescendo's, lifts and drops like a classic Beatles song, but with a petite-yet-strong female voice. In addition to the strings, there was an additional vocalist friend that stood behind Brooke and her piano, which were very helpful in adding a nice touch. During one or two songs, the backup singer refered to a lyric sheet to help her with the mouthful of verses. I've been told she doesn't need the string section to fill the room with beautiful sound, and I believe it after hearing her soaring voice and her fingers hitting keys on her keyboard that sounded like plucking violin notes. Most of the showcases are run like clockwork, so her set got the axe when she went over time, but the crowd really protested and she was given time for one more song.
HE IS LEGEND
While this band was kinda mistakenly refered to as a "Christian" band in its early days (and their start on Solid State), they don't disappoint in the realm of pure riffage, sounding part Pantera and part Maylene. Tough, gritty muscle comes screaming out of their cabinets, while singer Schuylar Croom proves to be a modern day frontman extraordinaire in the vein of Jim Morrison. One dirty joke aside, he was captivating and hard to ignore. In the middle of the "China White" song he dipped into Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams" song for a few lines ("players only love you when they're playin'...") They announced a new album coming in June, which pleased the capacity crowd at Spiro's. They tried one of their new ones out on the audience. "It's got a good beat and you can dance to it -- 'Party Time.'" It had more of the great snarling guitar riffs that these boys know how to dial in. Very heavy.