There's a whispering band of five skinny guys from Brooklyn in various stages of beardage playing to a courtyard full of creative types (and the people who blog about them), all with laminated badges dangling from their lanyards as they ready themselves to grab the last empanada from a tray of the passing tattooed waitress.
It must be SXSW.
And indeed, it is, though this was on a sun-baked Tuesday afternoon, just as the Interactive and Film versions of the 2008 South by Southwest Festival were winding to a close, and the Music portion was getting set to shift into high gear. (For a list of Film festival winners, including Mark Webber's shot-in-Philadelphia Expected Ills, which took home a special jury award for cinematography, go here.)
SXSW music kicks up in earnest today, with an ever more sprawling day-party scene and the increasingly anxiety inducing nighttime showcase festival that includes over 300 aspiring bands from all over the world playing at more than 70 venues across the Lone Star State capital sending conference goers into what-to-do-and-when?! panic attacks.
Tonight and every night through Saturday, as the overstuffed fest plays out, and headlines are generated by big name acts like R.E.M., who are launching their souped up new Accelerate with a show Wednesday at Stubb's that's going to be insanely difficult to get into, lots and lots of those bands striving for a higher profile in a crumbling music business will be from Philadelphia, as the city's thriving indie scene relocates itself for the music industry's annual beer and barbecue fueled spring break.
The poster above advertises a Friday night showcase at the Beauty Bar Backyard hosted by DJ King Britt that, if you can read the fine print, features a bunch of Philly acts, including hip-hop rock band Nouveau Riche and skateboarding-punk rock hero Chuck Treece.
Philly indie heavy hitters like the pictured above Man Man - pushing their excellent, upcoming Rabbit Habits - and Diplo are in town, as is Making Time DJ Dave Pianka, Bucks County rockers Eastern Conference Champions and minimalist duo Pattern Is Movement, and for old school blue eyed soul fans, Daryl Hall.
On Saturday at Emo's Annex along Austin's Sixth street strip, there's a lineup hosted by Schwenksville's Park the Van label with Delaware indie-popsters Spinto Band plus their Philly cohorts The Teeth and Dr. Dog, the latter which will also be playing a Thursday afternoon tribute to Lou Reed, at the Fader magazine fort, which also features Yo La Tengo, My Morning Jacket. Reed, who plays the Electric Factory April 19, is doing a keynote talk on Thursday morning with Philadelphia raised record producer Hal Willner.
By the way, the band from Brooklyn - one of the two places, along with Austin itself, that seems to have more representatives here than Philadelphia - was Ola Podrida, and they weren't bad at all, even if the sound man did confide to me that he wished the singer David Wingo would sing a little louder.
Wingo, incidentally, scores the music for director David Gordon Green's movies, including All The Real Girls, which starred Zoey Deschanel, the actress whose band with M. Ward, She & Him, is one of the more buzzed about of this year' SXSW. But that's another story.
Okay, enough with the scene setting. On to the music.
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