AUSTIN'S SXSW FESTIVAL AND THE FOUR NOBLE TRUTHS

You can’t see and hear everything (so get your money’s worth). This is an important lesson of life in the world also, of course, that since it can’t all be seen and done, then one must define one’s self and situation for maximum enjoyment. In the case of SXSW, that meant for me to see the big names, including Ray Davies, John Hiatt, Smokey Robinson. I paid over $100 for my locals’ wrist-band and I want my money’s worth (I can pass for ‘local’ in 42 cities in 18 countries… without lying… much). Until Big Star at least (more later), Ray Davies was the highlight of the show, playing an excellent set both with and without LA’s ‘88’ backing him up. I had a high-priced badge last time but have since learned my lesson. Why pay to hear self-appointed experts ruminate over the future of the music industry? Hell, I can do that.

It can get extremely cold extremely fast. This is another of life’s lessons. Thursday and Friday were so beautiful that it’s easy to take such for granted. But when a cold front moved in, Saturday was absolutely brutal. That’s no problem when you’re inside, of course, but that’s not what a festival is all about. I had planned to get serious about seeing groups I’d missed on the previous two days, but all that is useless speculation when you have to walk eight blocks with a wind chill factor approaching 0 degrees F.

All music is local. Austin has taken a rap on the knuckles, if not the speakers, for being so white, i.e. no hip-hop. What next, do they have to apologize for being so happy and well-adjusted, so liberal and so successful? For one thing, Austin is only ten percent black, and the show reflects that. It IS maybe thirty-forty percent Hispanic, and the show reflects that. For another thing, the level of musicianship is high in Austin. That’s not always the case with hip-hop music- OR ‘world music’ OR ‘indie’ either- for that matter. I know world music groups that dress in ‘traditional’ costume- fit to kill- but who can barely play their instruments. That doesn’t cut it. Likewise with the typical hip-hop ‘tude- it’s the tunes, Homie, not the ‘tude, that counts. Trash-talking doesn’t cut it with me. Neither does bashing your bitch.

People die. In this case, the death in question is that of Alex Chilton, former Box Top (“The Letter”) and Big Star, arguably the first ‘indie band’ and huge influence to REM, the Replacements, and everything that came after. Just last week I caught myself thinking, “I wonder whatever happened to Alex Chilton?” Now maybe that’s not so strange until you consider that I’d never heard the man’s music until yesterday. Flashback to 1985, and I’m living in Berkeley, selling items on Telegraph Ave. and contemplating the future of rock & roll over lunch of pesto pizza. The classic era is long gone of course, ditto psychedelia, blues-rock, folk-rock, country-rock, punk-rock and many other hyphen-ated, apostrophe’d concoctions of music including some that I really- I mean REALLY- didn’t like, e.g. glam and glitter, bubblegum and disco, etc. until now there’s only… nothing… all R&R returned to the commercial pop schlock from which it originally emerged and to which it finally succumbed, to an industry emboldened and fortified by the massive export success of the Eagles, the Bee Gees, John Denver, and other such ‘cross-overs’. ‘New Wave’ held great promise, but that only, it too the victim of its own pretensions and excesses.

There was only one hope left, ‘college radio’, an undefined but apparently thriving underground entity that celebrated the process of creation and discovery itself, real R & R, ‘teen spirit’ if you will… more than album sales. Though the groups all differed and were hardly a genre, they all said the same thing- it started with Alex Chilton. Now he’s dead. He was supposed to play SXSW with a revived Big Star, but died three days before the gig. Cause of death- too much life, maybe? I like the death certificates in Thailand, ‘heart stopped beating’. No sheet, Somchai, just open the casket one last time before you torch it. I want to see the skid marks.

Bottom line: Austin is the star of SXSW, and so are their musicians. After hearing some disappointing ‘world music’ and ‘indie’ stuff… and popping into shows at random and popping right back out after being subjected to head-banging ‘metal’ (give me some hip-hop, please!), I finally started concentrating on the local shows. That’s what this festival is all about, after all. They need us once a year to help support some hundred entertainment venues, but that’s about all. They’ve got a home-grown music scene second to none. Next time I’m not even sure I’ll bother with the wrist band. They don’t count for much down on South Congress. That’s where Alejandro had his post-show show last night. And with people like Lenny Kaye (Patti Smith Band) and Chuck Prophet on that bill, you don’t have to worry too much about being guillotined by a cowboy hat. Just call it ‘Americana’ music; this, after all, is America.

What’s that? You don’t like my four noble truths? Okay, how about this then? 1) LIFE IS FUN, 2) DESIRE IS THE CAUSE OF FUN, 3) THE FUN ENDS WHEN DESIRE ENDS, 4) THERE IS ANOTHER WAY TO MAINTAIN THE FUN- THE EIGHTFOLD PATH. Buddhism and I get along just fine. It’s just a ‘glass half-empty/glass half-full’ thing.