SxSW 2008 Diary: Wednesday, March 12

These reports might have come during the actual festival if a) my hotel hadn't been out by the airport meaning I was never there apart from sleeping or dropping off stuff occasionally; b) my hotel's definition of "high speed internet" seemed to have been written in 1995; and c) I am lazy.

Wednesday night was kind of a bust anyway. Didn't get into Austin till around 7pm and didn't get downtown till nearly 9pm. Colin from Cubik Musik was nice enough to pick up me and my cohort Dev at the hotel and took us downtown to the convention center to pick up our badges. Within seconds of entering the convention center I run into Courtney and Benjamin of Kaiser Cartel -- which I kind of thought was wild until I later realized almost everyone from my neighborhood was at South by Southwest. (In retrospect, not that surprising considering I live in Williamsburg.)

Heading to SxSW Ground Zero (6th St.) we grabbed a beer and then went to check out electronic musician Eliot Lipp, as recommended by Colin. Not bad at all, though I can never tell if they're actually doing anything up there or just checking their Facebook page.

Didn't stay long, as I was heading over to meet friends Liz and Jack at Maggie May's Gibson Guitar Room to see Pattern is Movement who look kind of like the Jukka Brothers but play that shouty rock that is popular with folks who go to Todd P shows. But they come off as such an anomaly, so genuinely strange it worked.

Could that actually be it for the first night? It would be a long day Thursday and the offer of a free ride back to the airport was for me to call it a day. I know... weak. I made up for it later. Photo above is Pattern is Movement, taken on Wednesday but not at the show I attended -- I took my camera with me but forgot the battery.