The rookie was learning, and by SXSW Day Two he began to hit his stride.
Rule one, learned yesterday: allow for serendipity.
Rule two, learned today: when there’s a hot act playing a small room, arrive for the previous performance if you want to have any hope of getting in.
That would be the Kaiser Chiefs, my only disappointment of the day. But I’ll get to that in a minute. After clearing the cobwebs with bottled water, quarts of coffee and breakfast masquerading as lunch (or was it lunch masquerading as breakfast?) my day started with the rare privilege of attending a taping of Austin City Limits, the legendary PBS show filmed at KRLU on the University of Texas campus. Alas, the artist I’d been most looking forward to seeing—Ray LaMontagne—fell ill and had to cancel his appearance. So the taping was solely devoted to Austin’s own Spoon.
The ACL studio was actually much smaller than it appears on television, where it seems to roll on forever. (In fact, some viewers have been fooled into thinking the show is filmed outdoors.) The taping itself felt rather antiseptic. Spoon frontman Britt Daniel said it best when the band took the stage—“You people are always so polite.”
As a former keyboardist, I have a soft spot for bands who employ ivory-ticklers on a full-time basis. And while Spoon will never be mistaken for the latest Ben Folds project, the band’s piano grooves give it a distinctiveness. That said, I was hoping to be bowled over, and I just wasn’t. Spoon rocked competently and the vocals were spot-on, but the band is lacking in the killer hook department. One of its older songs, “The Way We Get By,” was close to a contender, but I didn’t hear it from the ACL stage. Of course, I left before the set ended. (SXSW rule three: staying to the very end of a band’s set is rarely a sensible course of action. Time’s a-wastin’.)
The next stop was a party at Cedar Street Courtyard. My reward for hopping on a city bus to trek all the way back into downtown from UT was Sweden’s The Soundtrack Of Our Lives. I’m a newbie to TSOOL, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. But once I saw them—if fictional band Stillwater from Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous needed an opening band, these guys would be prime candidates.
Surprisingly for a Swedish band, the lead singer wasn’t a rail-thin blonde but a beefy, bearded guy who looked like a long-lost member of Molly Hatchet. The music was anthemic arena rock (Paste editor Josh Jackson astutely pointed out the Who vibe). And I was now two-for-two seeing keyboardists gainfully employed—some tasty, Ray Manzarek-style organ lines were pumped out as part of TSOOL’s towering wall of sound.
A quick hoof across town took us to the New West Records party and Buddy Miller, who was for all intents and purposes putting on a gospel concert in a tent behind Club DeVille. As I arrived he was playing The Louvin Brothers’ “There’s A Higher Power.” “All My Tears,” the song Buddy’s wife Julie wrote when their friend Mark Heard died, was a highlight, as was the Heard-penned, set-closing, “Worry Too Much,” which can be found on Miller’s latest, Universal United House of Prayer.
Miller is one of the most consistent performers I’ve ever seen. I’m sure he has bad nights, but I’ve never witnessed one of them. You can always expect gut-wrenching soulfulness, jaw-dropping fretwork and a tight rhythm section at his shows, even if it’s different players each time out.
The next stop on the night’s loose itinerary was the Hotel Café—a venue for L.A.’s best up-and-coming singer-songwriters. I heard a few songs from Tom McRae (accompanied by cellist), and then Rachel Yamagata took the stage. It’s a sad fact that the parade of oh-so-earnest songsmiths, with their acoustic guitars and capos in hand, sometimes bores me. It can be impeccably tasteful, well-crafted and well-sung and still put me to sleep. So anything to shake things up is welcome and appreciated. Fortunately, individuality has been the hallmark of the troubadours I’ve encountered here. Yamagata was a perfect example. She isn’t afraid to wear her heart on her sleeve and let the emotions in her songs take over. And she isn’t afraid to scream.
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