@ZackTeibloom This was everything I ever wanted and everything I always feared when I started calling myself “The Festival Crasher.” In a cocktail party, anecdotal “Oh, wouldn’t that be funny if they were actually looking for me” kind of way, I wanted to be hunted. But when you find yourself cornered by two uniformed cops threatening to tase you as they ask you how your prison lingo is while holding your license, you question why you ever wished this on yourself. I knew what I was getting myself into when I decided to put my full name and picture all over the Internet, and friends would joke about wanted signs with my picture, but I always laughed it off. I knew when C3 blacklisted us back in May, I knew I’d have to be extra careful for Lollapalooza and ACL crashes. Lollapalooza was harder than ever, but Andy and I were confident we could get by again at ACL, which has always been a literal walk in the park, having crashed it easily the last 3 years.

We got to the festival grounds early on Friday. It wasn’t even noon yet, but there were so few people going in at that hour, there was no way to blend into the crowd and the security set-up was air-tight. We started at the main entrance to scope out the situation. To get in, you needed a wristband with an RFID chip in it that went off when you walked through a metal detector like booth. Typically, guards stand off to the side of these booths and half-heartedly watch you go through, but these guards were smartly positioned inside the lane. You would have had to run them over to go through and with a second line of defense right behind them, it wasn’t worth an attempt. I saw some second-line guys with walkie-talkies, but no uniformed cops, so we figured we could try again when it got more crowded. We figured we might as well try the crash that got us in last year. Go to the booth where they help you if your ticket won’t scan, pretend the issue is resolved, pick up a schedule and walk right in. If only it were that simple. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom On the final day of the festival, the festival gods said, (1:3) ”Let there be pass backs and there were pass backs.” There’s no festival bible yet,* but this will certainly be a proclamation when one is written. I couldn’t get my best friend or my girlfriend to give me their wristband on Saturday, but Sunday? Even my girl who puts her emergency brake on when parking on completely flat land and asks, “Is it legal to park next to street lamps?” was happy to assist in a pass back. After meeting up with Jess “always has a sport bottle of wine at a fest,” for lunch, I paid for our cab to Grant Park, knowing she’d be hooking me up shortly.

We found ourselves on the side entrance, and decided to try our luck there. Jess and Caitlin walked in, while I stood outside tweeting and holding onto two umbrellas.** They played it coy and hung around for a few minutes inside the fest, which was a tad unnecessary, but I appreciated their stealthiness. As I got to the point of … OK where are they already … Caitlin walked out as I had picked up my phone to call her.  Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom “We just saw the striped sweatshirt go bounce, bounce, bounce, back.” That’s Jeff describing watching me try to use an already-scanned 3-day pass on Saturday. On the third bounce, the guy scanned the ticket, said “This was first scanned Friday” and ripped it in half. I then retreated back to Jeff and Jordan and we started the trek to the media entrance. We had to walk all the way around the park, and decided to check out the Volunteer entrance, but even that had a gate with wristbands we didn’t have.

20 minutes later, we came to an impass. We were at the far end of the field at a bridge that connected to the media entrance, but they weren’t letting anyone in there, since media check-in was closed. Never mind the fact that there were three of us and none of us had media credentials. I had slipped on a green SXSW ’11 wristband and a blue Rock ‘n Roll hall of fame wristband in addition to my commemorative Lollapalooza laminate that said “Not valid for entry to the park” written plainly on it. Why? It never hurts to have extra passes. Someone could just assume it’s the right one. Security wasn’t buying it. They made us go even farther around. Every 15 feet, there was a guard waiting behind the fence, with this sign, clearly posted everywhere. Not a great start. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom I’ll admit it. I did have a printed ticket for The MTVu Woodies Awards show, but it took a crash to get in at all, let alone front row. story, I think you’ll agree a legitimate crash occurred here. A couple days before the awards show, @kibbe of @skoablog asked me if I wanted to help out on the red carpet. If that meant I could hang out with Dave Grohl, Matt and Kim and Sleigh Bells for a bit before the show, I was all for it. But on the afternoon of the show, I got caught up in day drinking at Ezra Furman and having a large glass of whiskey at home before checking out a couple bands at Liberty. I told her I’d be there a little after 8, but didn’t get out of the shower until 7:50. That was when she reminded me that press check-in closed at 8:30. My phone said I was 2.3 miles away, and my head said I was a little passed buzzed. Even if I was OK to drive, it would have been a traffic/parking disaster. I threw on a sportcoat and started jogging. My phone said it would take 38 minutes. I had 31 to spare.

I jogged about five or six blocks before I was sweating enough to take off my jacket and keep running, while awkwardly draping it over my arm.. It’s really hot down here. I then ran into Bennett, a good college friend of Andy and I, and the first person I knew in Austin. “Teibloom? Why are you wet?” “In a rush. See you later.” That was the only time we saw each other during SXSW. I kept alternating running and walking quickly when I ran out of still kind of drunk breath, refreshing my google map until it was clear I’d beat the estimated arrival time. I arrived, dripping sweat, at 8:23 and found @kibbe just in time to check in. That was when it was revealed that her pass would let her into the venue and mine was only good for the red carpet. They gave me a purple, square MTV sticker that looked official. It would come in handy later. As cool as that could potentially be, I had to make sure I’d get into the show. I was told the ticket I had printed had to be retrieved in line in the garage. I figured I could just grab the ticket (since I had priority ticket seating) and come back for the red carpet. It was far, far more complicated than that. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom Every year it seems there’s a show before SXSW music officially starts that sets the tone for the rest of the week. Last year it was Metric at Fader Fort. Now, @supercooleric would tell you this year’s hot pick was Sleigh Bells and TV on the Radio at the Zynga party, but for me and Meg, Yeasayer at Moody Theater was the pick Tuesday night. Much like the Conan crash, this was badge only. At least I had a fake badge this time around. I went through my drawer of old badges and realized none looked like the green badge everyone else would have. I found my old badge from Pitchfork ’08. The badge wasn’t the same color, but the lanyard/necklace part that goes around my neck was black, so I tucked it into my dress shirt and hoped I could pull off the “I’m trying to hide the badge, because it’s even cooler to not have one on” look. I didn’t think I had that look in me, but what do you know. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom The world premiere of “Conan O’Brien: Can’t Stop” was as hot a ticket as they come at the SXSW film festival. The film events are exclusively badge only and I didn’t have any kind of fake badge on me. Just a full stomach from a two-plate breakfast buffet at Trudy’s and a head full of sandwiches. I approached the line 45 minutes before the screening and saw that it stretched for blocks. I had no intention of entering this line. I walked to the front of the theater to check it out and saw Conan himself being interviewed in front of the theater. Here’s a video someone shot of how ridiculous the line was. That had to be long before I got there, since Conan wasn’t even there yet.

I stood by and snapped the pictures of Conan I used in this post and tried to figure out how I would make my way into the theater. I started by getting right next to the entrance, standing behind Conan as he did his interview, pretending I was just taking pictures. I realized I would have to get through 7 or 8 guards lining the 20 feet entranceway. At one point in the film, Conan says he has to remind himself to “act as if this is completely normal” when doing things like interviewing President Obama. It’s a good thing to remind yourself when crashing as well.

Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom A crash like this proves that you don’t need to do anything more than just show up at the venue. It truly is that simple. Freelance Whales and Miniature Tigers were playing a sold-out show at the ND just down the street from me. I had Meg on the inside letting me know it was a square stamp on the right hand the size of a quarter with a blotch in the middle. First things first, I didn’t have my ID. I mean, I had it, but it expired on my birthday and two failed DMV attempts (grr Veterans Day) left me without valid ID. I dropped Meg at the door and drove back to see if I could dig up my passport from a drawer overflowing with festival guide books, magazines and wristbands.

I come back home to see @Shiftywhiteguy engrossed in his NBA 2K11 Pacers season on Xbox and he seems disappointed in me that I’ve returned so soon. Not to worry. I dig up the passport and head back. I quickly stamp my hand in the car and it’s barely registering. It may be time for a new stamp. This thing has carried me for three years, but I have to get it wet just to make any kind of mark. I attempt a small square on my right hand with a blob in the middle and head in. The set-up inside is a door guy right at the door who is just checking ID’s and giving you the stamp. OK this is important. I didn’t need any kind of stamp, just the passport. He stamps over my feeble stamp and it’s on to round two. One guy checking a will call list and a second guard blocking the entrance. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom Day one and two of ACL crashing were a breeze. We had beautiful fake wrist bands that weren’t always scanning, but the “ticket help line” was like a highway into the festival. With no tolls. By day 3, I didn’t want to get out of bed. When I finally dragged myself out to make final fantasy football adjustments and get back to Zilker Park, everything changed. The “ticket help” line was now closed off at the end. And if that wasn’t enough, there was a cop (not a security guard) waiting at the end of the line. Yikes. It wasn’t crowded enough to waltz by, and I was going to need a little help. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom It always helps to have the pass and good friends. I can’t even credit the amazing friend who did all the work, since she’s so afraid of getting caught that she asked me to delete our text message history to ensure that nothing could be traced back to her. We didn’t have much  of a crashing plan, but our friend, who we’ll call “the Internet,” took it upon herself to get a wristband, do a high resolution scan, and print multiple copies of. I gotta say, it’s more impressive than any undertaking we’ve done. Crashing by yourself is hard enough, but not only did Andy and I have to crash, we had two rookie festival-goers with us for a project we’ll tell you about soon that we had to sneak in. No easy task.

We met with “The Internet” at her office where she gratefully gave us four fake wristbands that looked shockingly good. They even had the scannable barcode on them. The question became: would the wristbands scan if we used them one after another? Would they scan at all? Really only one way to find out. As we got closer to the gates, we saw other wristbands and noticed ours looked almost identical to the real thing, but were a few shades darker than the real thing. No worries. We’d just look for someone with sunglasses on. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom I’m still trying to wrap my head around how I failed so hard on what should have been such an easy Stubbs crash. Apparently Stubbs flew Roy Halladay in to man security after his no hitter Wednesday night. I scoped out the night’s pitcher from the on-deck box (Watched which wristband they were using tonight – pink- and was happy to say I had it in my Stubbs wristband collection.) Fastball. Right down the plate. That’s always been one I can take deep. I dug my batting gloves (wristband) out of my pocket and fastened it fastidiously like Nomar Garciaparra and headed back to the dugout (Jackalope) to meet the Lighthouse crew for buy-one-get-one-free burger night and waited for my at-bat.

I strolled up to the plate with my batting gloves on,  wondering if I should just combine crash #37 and #38 into one story, since I’d never bothered to write up my easy Ween Stubbs crash and this one would be just as easy. You need to be confident for a crash, but that level of cockiness is a recipe for disaster. It’s like I was calling my shot and only Babe Ruth can pull that move off.  Read the rest of this entry »