Friday brought with it one of the craziest days in my role as a journalist. I took care of many of the interviews you’ll soon be reading and watching on the AU review. Thankfully, it also happened to be stunningly beautiful weather. I began the day sitting down with An Horse by the beautiful Austin river, as bands were playing at the BMI/Billboard Acoustic Brunch – these included Honey Honey and Andrew Belle (pictured below). While I didn’t experience enough of any artist to critique, it certainly set a great mood for the rest of the day. The Bloody Mary I “borrowed” also helped kick off proceedings very nicely.
Welcome to the third day of the AU review at South by Southwest!
One of my obligations for the afternoon was to head to the SXSW Stimulus party at the Parish, where Bob Pressner (pictured below) was finishing up his set as I entered, and quesadillas were just about to be served. If I haven’t mentioned it already, day parties are the perfect place to get stocked up on food and drink for the day. I spent less than $10 almost every day due to this very fact. My poverty was thankful. I only caught a couple of songs, but from what I saw, Bob’s set came across as a bit over the top – almost like he was auditioning for American Idol … except he’d put together a pretty impressive backing band. So that wasn’t so much a bad thing – I just really wasn’t a fan, in either case.
650 North (pictured in header) followed and with them I felt much more at home. Reminding me a bit of Sydney’s Sargent Sapphire, this was a young rock band who knew what they were doing, and definitely impressed a few people in the process. I daresay they are still working out the exact band they’re going to become, but they’re definitely on the right track, and talented to boot. They did a cover of “Time after Time”, for one, which was a near perfect rendition.
Next to perform was Dave Shulz (pictured above), an artist perhaps best known for his work on the keyboards with the Goo Goo Dolls. Working as an independent artist for some time now, Dave is on the circuit promoting his album Connect, which features guests such as Daniel Lanois (his self-confessed hero) and Mike Porcaro (Toto). While these artists didn’t make an appearance today, he had a talented back-up band to support, and with his hands on the keyboards and his voice on the mic, Dave put forward an impressive set.
Tracks such as “Stray” and “Lovers” were particular standouts, and his style definitely channelled plenty of Goo Goo Dolls influence – I even sensed a good dose of Fastball in there (i.e. late 90s popular rock). But he made it his own, and performed a selection of tracks which varied in style and influence from one to the next. While unfortunately an artist I could never see the masses rushing out to support, I don’t see why this shouldn’t be the case. A great talent.
Neighborhood Bullies (above) were next, with a set including “Going Back to Drinking”. They were yet another entertaining act to hit the Parish stage, though unfortunately I couldn’t stick around as my next obligation took me to the “Make Waves Not War” day party, celebrating the launch of the album of the same name by band Nuke the Soup. This celebration included free sake and sushi in an upmarket Japanese restaurant (did I mention they use ANYTHING/EVERYTHING as a venue at SXSW?) – and I couldn’t think of a better way to get the crowd to hear your tunes.
Nuke the Soup (below) is a project put together by Cubic Feet founder Mark Davison, and with keyboardist Brian Simms alongside for today’s performance as a duo, they were ready to show off their tunes to a well treated crowd. As the name suggests, “Make Waves Not War” is an album with a distinct surf tone – not only the sort of rock music you can sense was inspired by a man sitting down at the beach, but the sort of music that someone sitting down at the beach would listen to. As Mark confessed, the tracks were originally written acoustically on the guitar, with such influence in mind, so it’s no surprise that this comes through in full band mode on the album. You’ll be able to read more from our chat in an upcoming AU interview.
In addition to tracks off of MWNW, the duo churned out a couple of Cubic Feet tracks (a project which remains active) including ”Superconnector” and “Monkey”. Head to either bands Myspace page to hear more: http://www.myspace.com/cubicfeet or http://www.myspace.com/nukethesoup (or http://www.nukethesoup.com/). I doubt most Australians are familiar with either act, but the latter should definitely resonate with those beach dwellers!
