In the last 3 days, M have burned through the SXSW torrent in 2 sittings.

Without the help of an intern or outsourcing the task to India, we have managed to RSVP for EVERYTHING (We have a google calendar of it all.  If you are nice, maybe we will share it with you). The only way to manage this was to check the internet a lot.

Sched.org is live now.  M and I are adding the chosen bands to sched so we can make sure that we don’t miss anything.  Since music doesn’t start to Wednesday, we may table the band selection and start on films/SXSWi parties.

Things have been a wee bit stressful with the SXSW volunteer thing but I promise to recap my days at SXSW as soon as possible.  The netbook fits nicely in my new backpack.

I posted some of this in my Fun^3 Fest 2008 wrap up.  I cannot stress the importance of having the right gear during SXSW.

Useful Festival Gear (for the whole Fest):
So I noticed that very few people are prepared for an all day outdoor festival. Granted, the door people search your bags for weapons, booze, and food. But still, that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t pack a few things. This is what was in my bag (FYI: This year I am testing out the KEEN skyline.  It’s a kid’s bag but I looks like the right size for the job):

• Tissues - also useful when the port-o-potty is out of TP
• Hand Sanitizer or Moist Towlettes, wet wipes and/or face wipes.
• Visine/Eyedrops
• Extra Sunglasses
• Earplugs - I prefer the reusable swimmers earplugs. I bring disposable ones too, it is a good way to make friends.
• Camera - with extra memory (note that cameras are not always allowed at festivals but you can check ahead of time).
• A descent size bag to carry all your stuff and free swag (your friend may or not be willing to be your sherpa). I carry a messenger bag. M usually has her cycling backpack.
• Cash - not all events take credit or have an onsite ATM (It’s also nice to tip the bartender for those free drinks).
• Empty water bottle - staff might prevent you from taking in water, but they can’t stop you from bringing an empty bottle. You can usually find a water fountain or restroom to fill it up.
• Coozie- Most of the time the beer chicks are somewhere in proximity distributing them. Never when you need them though.
• Chapstick
• Sweater/Sweatshirt- It’s good to dress in layers. By the end of the night you will be glad you packed it. I usually stick a hat in my bag for that reason.
• Bicycle- It is the best way to get around town. Driving is not really an option.  Public transit isn’t reliable.
• Walking Shoes- Go practical before cute.  You will be standing long hours on concrete most likely.

Useful Festival Gear (for SXSWi):

• Laptop- Ever so important for blogging on the go.  You can attempt it on your smart phone, but really, a keyboard is your friend.

like order…

I like schedules…

I like to do lists…

I had the afternoon off from work so I got started on my SXSW 2010 Game plan.

Where do we start?

1)Bands -  M has pasted the list of SXSW Showcasing Artists to a Google docs spreadsheet.  From there we download the torrent and begin rating the bands (somewhere along the lines of “sucks balls” to “I would give an organ to see that band”).  If there are too many in the “I want to see this so bad”  we make an attempt to check out more songs by the band to determine the new ranking.

From there I have been using the wretched my.SXSW feature to save the list of bands I am interested in checking out.  The only perk is that it exports to Google Calendar.  I can make sure that all this gets added to sched when the time comes.

2) Schedules- Now there are a few scheduling tools out there. The best one available so far is Sched.org.  Unfortunately they don’t have the 2010 schedule up right now.  In the interim there are a few tools/sites M and I are using to get a head start on RSVP’s and such.

(edited 2/27)I built a Google calendar to share which has all of the day parties that have been listed on Donewaiting.com/sxsw, Do512.com’s SXSW Edition,  and Austinist’s SXSW guide (M has also been cruising the Twitter).  If it is on the calendar, it means that M and I are RSVP’d and ready to go.  Right now the plan is to RSVP for everything and sort it all out later when sched is back.

For now I will give you the wrap up for 2009.  I may have some words on the last decade later.

This year in live music: Broken Social Scene, Lymbyc Systym, The Submarines,  SXSW (Flosstradamus, Asobi Seksu, Titus Andronicus, Chairlift, the DJs from the Hood Internet, Kanye West, Big Sean, GLC Consequence, Really Do, Tony Williams, Mr. Hudson, Kid Cudi, Common, Erykah Badu, Buck65, B.Dolan, Sleep, Sage Francis, the Obits, Handsome Furs, American Analog Set, the Rosebuds, Bishop Allen, Au Revoir Simone, These Arms are Snakes, Cursive,  Passion Pit,  the Soft Pack, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Matt and Kim, Amplive, Franki Chan and Curt from Flosstradamus, and Echo and the Bunnymen),  Crystal Castles, Loxsly, the Dears, Great Northern, Passion Pit, Harlem Shakes, Clues, Explosions in the Sky , De La Soul, El Ten Eleven , Free Press Summerfest (Broken Social Scene, Explosions in the Sky, Prince Paul, Voxtrot), Los Campesinos!, Broken Social Scene,   FFF Fest (Royal Bangs, Crystal Antlers, Foot Patrol, Sugar and Gold, Vega, MC Chris, Neon Indian, Yeasayer, Les Savy Fav, Pharcyde, Atlas Sound, Why?, Broadcast, Dj Numark,  Lucero, MIssion of Burma, Buraka Som Sistema, GZA, Kid Sister ) Regina Spektor, Hockey, and Pheonix.

This year in non-live music: I am still having Last.fm iPod scrobbling issues.  Here’s to this year’s new albums that kept me awake at my desk. NASA, Mos Def, Amanda Blank, Del tha Funky Homosapien, Discovery, Walkmen, Headlights, Passion Pit, Yo La Tengo, Heartless Bastards, Animal Collective,…

This year in Sewing: I entered the Little Black Dress Contest and helped a friend who is writing a book on green clothing design.

This year on the interwebs: I am still bad about updating Twitter.  I have fallen in love with hulu and the hood internet.

This year in Movies: (theater) SXSW (RIP: A Remix Manifesto,  500 days of Summer,  Died Young, Stayed Pretty, The Time of Their Lives, Yes Men Fix the World,  Alexander the Last, and  I Love You, Man), Inglorious Basterds, Up in the Air, (dvd)Persepolis,  Thank You for Smoking, Fast Food Nation, The Yes Men.

This year in Books: Goodreads This is what I read: Story of the Eye-Georges, Bataille, Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper- Diablo Cody, He’s Just not that into You- Greg Behrendt, Fast Food Nation- Eric Schlosser, The Other Side of Thirty- M.A. Thakor, The Manual- Steve Santagati, Another Roadside Attraction- Tom Robbins, Love is a Mix Tape- Rob Sheffield, Even Cowgirls get the Blues- Tom Robbins, Choke- Chuck Palahniuk, High Fidelity- Nick Hornby,

Here is the list of things I neglected to do in 2009 along with excuses for not doing them:

1. More bike rides (and maybe a bike with gears). No new bikes.  I did go on a few long rides though. I would bike more if I weren’t allergic to outside.
   
2. A jumble of personal goals: tolerance, being a better person, being more trusting, baggage reduction, etc… I haven’t made things worse (At least I don’t think I did).
3. Design for another fashion show.  Hopefully Stitch, when it returns. Stitch did not return this year.
4. Demolish the back porch and fix the fence. Those are still there.  The plan is to ditch the whole house.
5. Road trip. Didn’t happen.  I flew to Seattle instead.

2010 will be my 33rd year.   My Yenta says it should be one of the best.

SXSW dropped a big bag o’ Xmas cheer.  The 2010 Showcasing Band List.  Which means I get to start my research early this year (last year I barely scratched the surface).

Stay tuned little readers.  This weekend I will start the google docs spreadsheet.

Bands I look forward to so far…

Apostle of Hustle (Toronto ON)
Bomani Armah & Project Mayhem (Washington DC) - Read a Book!!
*Breakestra (Los Angeles CA)
*The Dollyrots (Los Angeles CA)
*The Ettes (Nashville TN)
*Fool’s Gold (Los Angeles CA)
Frightened Rabbit (Selkirk UK-SCOTLAND)
*HEARTSREVOLUTION (New York NY)
*The Hood Internet (Chicago IL)
We Are Scientists (New York NY)

It was Day 7 of SXSW.  M and I were at the one scheduled show for Matt and Kim.  Are we fans or stalkers at this point?  Maybe a little of both?  Anyways, I got to the show early to insure that we were  close enough to eat their faces.   I waited for M by the right speaker (I usually grab a spot by the speaker.  We always pack earplugs and the speakers on the sides of the stage are a good reference point if someone is looking for us).

Post SXSW I was reading Pitchfork and noticed this in their write up of the show…

Matt: “I want to thank the people sitting outside who couldn’t get in, you guys rule.” Then Kim: “I want to thank all the people up front, you guys are incredible.” Everyone was thanked. But there was an ever-so-brief interruption to happy-time– apparently there was something wrong with Matt’s monitors. “I hate to do this during a show but…” he said, requesting a quick adjustment. Monitor problems are common, but Matt knows how it looks when people on stage bitch about their sound. So he offered a snippet of the opening “Sweet Child O’ Mine” lick while the monitors were spruced up. No down time, ever.

Pitchfork missed something in their write up.  I recall Kim saying that there was a certain someone who had the best seat in the house and they didn’t even pay.  Who could that be?

Dumpster Boy by Limorama

While M and I were stuck in the mosh pit, 10HDG was on top of a dumpster (full of cardboard).  He had the best seat in the house.

More later on the Matt and Kim show.  For now you can check out their video of Daylight.  I bet they were wishing the dumpster they climbed into was full of cardboard and not trash.

RIP!: A Eemix Manifesto movie poster

So SXSW Day 9 was pretty f-ing awesome (and it wasn’t because I started the day with a free beer).  I saw Remix first. Then I watched Flossy remix several of the artists that I heard later in the day (Chairlift and Kid Cudi).  As I’ve mentioned before, the MAN is not to keen on this whole “borrowing” of content for use in bigger and better things.

I went into the movie thinking it was about M’s boyfriend Girl Talk before he became the Unibomber (Sorry Gregg, the mountain man look doesn’t suit you.)  The movie was actually about more than Mr. Gillis.  It started there, then moved on to talk about the MAN.  Then it took a surprising turn.  It went after Disney.  Yes, the creator of happily ever after was a remix artist.  He borrowed the dark and often gruesome tales of Grimms,  Andersen, and a few others.  Then he sugar coated them, tossed in some song and dance numbers, some woodand creatures, etc… and BOOM!  He made millions.  Not only did Disney make millions but the megacorp made sure that there would be no further remixing of those works.  Just try using the likeness of that famous mouse or sing that popular birthday song.  You will pay.

There was some filler about Napster, illegal downloading, etc.. (It merely reminded me that I was supposed to hate Metallica.  I know first hand that artists make the real money on gigs and merch.  Not on record sales).  Blah, blah, blah…

The most informative section of the film for me was the part on Brazil.  The ultimate remix nation.   It’s not just about the music.  It was about intellectual property.  It was their renegade effort to offer cheaper medications to prevent the spread of HIV that impressed me.  What is more important to the MAN?  Making a buck or saving lives?  Sadly, it’s making a buck. Watch the clip… (if you are low on time skip to 5:50).

I am still researching bits and pieces of the ever morphing film. (more…)

Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) falls for Summer (Zooey Deschanel). I think she wants to eat his face.

I caught this film during SXSW.  They had one viewing at the Paramount and I made sure that I was there (even though it was day 9 and I was beyond tired).

This film not only had me swooning for JGL but it also reinforced my plan for the year.  Enjoy EVERY moment and when it’s gone, it’s gone. I would also like to revise that plan based on viewing the film.  I would like to only remember the good parts of past relationships.  Because I have documented all of the bad shit somewhere on this blog I can use that as a reference for later use.  It’s not healthy to keep replaying all of that stuff in your head.

The film is a romantic comedy that was actually believable.  Boy meets girl, boy falls in love with girl, girl can’t commit, boy and girl fight a lot, boy has his heart broken (Zooey you made me hate you),  girl finally commits (but there is a twist there).  The part that makes this movie different from the standard love story is that the story is told out of order (but not in the way Memento did it).  We start during a time of breakup.  Flash back. Flash forward. Repeat. The filmmaker does a favor throughout the film and lets the viewer know what day they are on.  Without that it would have been a little hard to follow.  Even better, the movie was filmed by Marc Webb, a director with a music video background.  The colors popped and the scenes were just the right size for the short attention span generation.

I got to stick around for the Q&A after the film.  Most of the cast was there along with the writer and director.  The usual questions about what type of camera  came out.  The best question was if any of this had happened in real life.  Apparently the story is stitched together from a few relationships the writer had.  Slightly frightening but, It made me think that I should do more with the stuff that I put out for you, little readers.

The movie should be coming out in July.  You should check it out for yourself.   The soundtrack is phenomenal.  Regina Spektor, the Smiths (very important to this love story), the Pixies, Belle and Sabastain, etc… and somewhere near the middle of the film there is a dance number set to Hall and Oates’ You Make My Dreams Come True.

M and I heart the Pixies.  I am still torn on my favorite Pixies album.  Doolittle or Surfer Rosa?

I was listening to the Pixies at work today and I was reminded that I forgot to post one of my favorite 500 Days of Summer moments. (I know, I promised a full review but I don’t want to write all those spoiler alert disclaimers). Joseph Gordon-Levitt singing “Here comes your man” at a Karaoke bar (My other favorite moment was the dance number.).  He’s so dreamy (He is also 5′10″ and Jewish). If that clip were available I would play it as much as I play On a Boat.

Since there aren’t clips available of JGL, I give you  the Pixies…

Somehow I forgot to mention one of the great taglines of SXSWi. I was catching up on my blog reading and found a reminder embedded in this post. That’s right kids. 3G. 3G. 3G was on FIRE!  I knew there was a problem but I hadn’t done any research to see if my hunch about too many iPhones in the downtown/convention center region was right.  Yes, little readers, I was right.  The number of iPhones social networking was too much for the 3G network to handle.

M and I are on the T-mobile network but, 10HDG and a few members of our posse are on that other wireless network. While the 3G network was experiencing a little burning and discomfort, M and I were texting away.  Unfortunately the recipients of those texts were receiving them minutes later and often receiving a flood of incoming information.

According to Business Insider, AT&T was aware of the problem:

AT&T (T) tells us it’s adding wireless capacity in downtown Austin to deal with “unprecedented” demand (that’s resulted in service that’s flaky at best). This, of course, a result of thousands (tens of thousands?) of South by Southwest attendees bringing 3G iPhones into this part of Austin for the first time. The telco expects service to improve tonight and throughout the rest of the show.

So next year when the dork boys descend upon downtown,  the network SHOULD be able to handle it.  Surprisingly enough, my other theory didn’t come to fruition.  I had expected twitter to crash and burn.