SXSW

So March was really taken up with South By South West - a quite spectacular music/interactive/film festival held for 10 days in Austin, and one of the biggest music festivals in the US.  I volunteered, a whopping 47 hours over a 5 day period (more work than I have done in a year!), which gave me a free music wristband (yay!) The first weekend and beginning of the week was interactive/film, and even at that point the city was pretty busy. 
One of my favourite experiences of the festival was manning an info desk in Austin Convention Center, where all tickets were collected, and lots of showcase lectures and talks were held (and free drinks sometimes handed out) on the changeover day between the 2 parts of the festival.   Watching the interactive/film-goers leave the building bedraggled and tired and searching for taxis to the airport, as the music-goers arrived, fresh and styled to the hilt, ready for the free booze, and looking for where best to be seen.  The number of hats rose exponentially on that day, and the number of Star Wars T-shirts decreased by about the same number. 

The whole city was soaking up the festival spirit, free reggae buses to who-knows-where, (and do you really care? You just want to get on, right?) and music and events from 9am in the morning.  Texas obliged with the best Spring weather it could offer, making millions of visitors think they would love to relocate here (without imagining, if it is summer in March, what does that mean for JULY?)

And in the middle of it all, it was St. Patrick's Day!  This is a pretty big deal all across America, and I reckon it didn't do any harm that the whole city was in holiday mode anyway (the university actually does coincide spring break with SXSW).  Anyone with remotely Celtic roots was required to wear green, and as you can see Captain Birdseye popped in after an official SXSW gig, to play some old sea songs for us.

I had made sure I had taken the Friday/Saturday/Sunday off volunteering, to make the most of the music.  On the Friday, Rich took the day off work, and we attended various British/Scottish gigs.  This one is Colin McIntyre from Mull Historical Society, playing at one of the clubs which had been taken over by the British Music Embassy for the week.  Unfortunately, this was at noon, and there were very few people watching the gig, but we still really enjoyed it.

In the afternoon we headed to another club, with various outdoor areas, to watch We Were Promised Jetpacks, and Frightened Rabbit.  Boyd and Lorraine were with us.  As you can see it was a belter of a day, and the four of us had to rotate under a tiny sun umbrella to protect our reddening Scottish skin!  Most of the Austinites seemed oblivious though.

Mid afternoon we went in search of something to soak up some of the alcohol consumed - the boys were particularly chuffed with the choice   -  Dr. Hoeck's Death Metal Pizza Takeout.

Boyd and Lorraine headed home after dinner (more alcohol-sopping food, burgers I think) and Rich and I went in search of some more, em, culture.  We watched this man.  I have no idea who he is, but we loved his outfit.  The queue for the venue was enormous, but upon Rich strolling to the front and enquiring about the chances of getting in (which were zero, as they had reached capacity) the bouncers seemed very concerned that we had travelled all the way from Scotland to hear whoever he was.  Next thing we knew, we had VIP access, including to the free bar!  Unfortunately (or possibly it was a good thing for our heads the next day) it was after 10pm and the free bar had been fully consumed.  Whovever you were, we loved your music!
And it appeared he must have been pretty popular, because we were next to these people, wearing T-shirts that said "I came here to get down".  And they sure were!

What a great event!  Really loved volunteering, meant that through the week I had a great sense of being right in the meat of everything, and got lots of hints from other volunteers of good places to go, and gigs worth seeing.  Can't say that I know the names of more than about half the bands/musicians I saw, but amn't too bothered, just happy to enjoy the vibe.  Can't wait for next year!