@AndyShore From the bottom of my heart, I want to sincerely thank Umphrey’s McGee. Not just for one of the single best Umphrey’s shows I’ve ever seen. Not even just for the last ten years of Umphrey’s shows I’ve seen (2/2/02 was my first – I had to use a fake ID to get into an 18+ show). Thank you, because every single time I see an Umphrey’s show, whether it’s in Chicago, Los Angeles or anywhere else, I feel at home. I’m always seeing a band I love, surrounded by people I love. My friend told his girlfriend, who was seeing the band for her first time, that it would be a lot like the Rush scene in I Love You, Man. It so was, and I am not at all ashamed of that fact. I had a great time. Read the rest of this entry »

@AndyShore Soul music comes in all sorts of packages. Ricky Minor (former the American Idol bandleader currently with Leno) put together a show that would showcase soul music from all over the world. The purpose was to educate as well as entertain. The goal was to raise money for the Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles (YOLA). Soul music fans come in all shapes and sizes too (look no further than this Jewish soul child), and the Hollywood Bowl was packed with them. There was no doubt in my mind that I would attend this show when I saw the lineup, and it really didn’t even take too much convincing to get my no-income brother to pry open his wallet for a ticket either. Read the rest of this entry »

@AndyShore “Uh…do you mind standing? It’s kinda crowded in here?” I said no and paid the cover, before even looking up to see what the doorman meant by kinda crowded. The Baked Potato is a tiny bar, filled with two dozen or so tables. There is no dance floor. We pushed our way to the back by the bar, but soon realized that we would be in the way any place we stood. Almost as soon as we settled, the band weaved their way through the crowd and up onto the miniature stage. So what is OHMphrey? It’s Jake Cinninger, Kris Meyers and Joel Cummins from Umphrey’s McGee and OHM members Robertino Pagliari and Chris Poland (also of a little band you may have heard of called Megadeath). Read the rest of this entry »

@AndyShore I jumped at the opportunity, when I saw Grace Potter post on Facebook saying they needed people for the studio audience for a taping of Cee Lo Green’s new talk show on Fuse. Those are two of my favorite artists in one place, and Cee Lo has proven to be as funny as I expected on the Voice. I could only imagine the hilarious back and forth between Cee Lo and Grace. Unfortunately I still can only imagine, but more on that later. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom I had no intention of crying at the Arcade Fire show. Even as tears were streaming down my face, only a song into their set, I didn’t know why I was doing it. There were enormous expectations for the night. Was it the hours and hours of build up coming out in a moment of pure ecstacy? Was it Win coming into the crowd? I’ve always had a thing for singers coming into the crowd and getting right in my face. Was I just that enchanted by Win and Regine and Will? I know this ranks right up there in the 9.7-9.8 range with LCD at Stubbs and Phoenix at La Zona Rosa, for truly pantheon Austin performances at our biggest venues, but why did it resonate more than any others? I’ll start at the beginning and try to figure it out.

When you take a day off work, pay above cover for a ticket and find your way to Bee Caves two hours before the doors even open, you better pray the show will be worth it. You hear a rough and unpolished, brand new band doing sound check as you sit in the dirt outside, realize there’s another band coming before Explosions in the Sky, and hope for the best. “We Used to Wait for It.” We’re used to waiting for it. You kill another hour in the dirt, rationing out water and sunscreen. You sweat, holding sweatshirts for the thirty degree temperature drop on the way. The doors finally open. You’re told not to run, so you hop, skip and jump your way into the venue and settle in. Three rows back, dead center. The kids that got there at 11 am, 5 hours before you, got themselves an extra 5 feet closer than you. You get a perfectly cold beer and a cold enough water bottle as last supplies and hunker down. You joke that you wish you could take a number and go further out of earshot for Schmillion and be laying down, staring up at the sky for Explosions in the Sky, but you know that if you want Win Butler singing into your face, you’re going to have to stay right where you are. And you most certainly do want Win Butler singing in your face. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom I couldn’t sleep Tuesday night. I spent god knows how long tossing and turning, imagining conversations I’d have with Jack White after narrowly missing having sushi with him*. I wasn’t going to let anything stop me from finding him on Wednesday. I put a message out on Facebook and Twitter that if anyone knew where Jack was and didn’t text me immediately with cross streets, we would no longer be friends. Once that was settled, I put on my red and white arm bands, a hat that said “keeping vinyl alive,” and my favorite record store t and headed downtown.

My phone started blowing up with messages, telling me something was happening at noon at 4th and Colorado, so I ran the mile over there and arrived at 11:30 to see the Third Man Records truck and a line. At that point, I figured Jack would introduce the shop and say a few words. I had no idea that I was about to have an unthinkably perfect  hour. Last year when Third Man had a pop-up show, I left work on my lunch break, drove 25 minutes each way, and budged the entire line to get into the shop before anyone. This time, I wasn’t in as much of a rush, so I only budged 4/5ths of the line**.  I made small talk in the line for a few minutes before, wait a minute, is that who I think it is?! Read the rest of this entry »

By Eric Pulsifer (@supercooleric)

Zynga, the San Francisco company behind FarmVille, Mafia Wars and Words With Friends, knows how to throw one hell of a party. Setting the bar high for freebie-filled events in the days to come, the browser-based game developer’s shindig at SXSW Interactive last night is among the most impressive events I’ve attended in my six years of South by Southwest-ing.

The venue

Last year, Zynga’s music event was held at the Fader Fort in East Austin the Tuesday night before SXSW Music and featured Metric and The Constellations. This year, the party was moved to the Zynga Dog House, (a.k.a., Whitley Warehouse, where we saw Chromeo Sunday night). Though I’d just been in the space 24 hours prior, the transformation was remarkable. Zygna painted the blank concrete canvas with splashes of red light, photobooth flashes, and the the joyous glow of vintage arcade cabinets and skeeball scoreboards. There were multiple bars and a lounge area in the center of the main room offering guests a place to nibble on food while watching the main stage. Entry was difficult, to put it mildly, with the wait-list line stretching on for blocks.

The drinks and food

My rant against freebies yesterday? Forget what I said—I’m a changed man. If Zynga’s lineup would have been Courtney Love reading the Bible aloud and a Spin Doctors ska cover band, I would have waited in line an hour just to get in. Read the rest of this entry »

by Eric Pulsifer (@supercooleric)

The smartphone app RedLaser is used by many to seek out the best deals, but no app was needed to find the best ticket Sunday night in Austin. Chromeo played a free show for fans and SXSW Interactive attendees at the RedLaser party at Whitley Warehouse, the home of last year’s Perez Hilton party and tonight’s Zynga party featuring Sleigh Bells and TV on the Radio. Read the rest of this entry »

@AndyShore There is a special energy that goes with the final show of a tour. Not only do you know the band is going to leave it all on the stage, but they’re also boosted by the knowledge that life in a tour bus away from family and friends is about to end. Add to that a sold out Fox Theather, far enough removed from a typical LA crowd in Pomona, and you’ve got the mix for a special evening. Read the rest of this entry »

@ZackTeibloom Robyn was an infectious party from the minute she danced her way out onto the immaculate new Moody ACL Studio stage to the perfectly appropriate “Time Machine.” It kind of felt like the Swedish Gay Time Machine** of concerts.  Tell people you’re seeing Robyn, and they’ll ask if it’s that “Show Me Love” Robyn from the 90s. Yeah, same girl. And better than ever. After missing a few Midwest dates due to illness, Robyn was a healthy burst of energy, even if she had to eat half a banana and chug some water to get through her set with two unforgettable encores.

Coming out in the jacket pictured, Robyn was flanked by two male synth/keyboardists and two male drummers, all in white jumpsuits. It was an assault from the word go. She sang over a backing track that mostly served to echo her call and response. Her voice sounded spectacular in a room with dynamite acoustics, and the girl can flat out dance. As my girl Meg said, “As much as I loved dancing to Robyn, I’d watch her dance and think no one else could do it as well.” Robyn oozed stage presence. It was hard to take your eyes off her. I didn’t even notice when one of her dancers unzipped his jumpsuit down to his waist for the second half of the show.

The show was a steady stream of Body Talk hits, with “Fembot” following “Time Machine,” and led to her taking off her jacket and yelping ‘How you doing, Austeeen?” and straddling the drum kit before launching into “Don’t Fucking Tell Me What To Do.” I found it a bit odd that she blew her single load of “Dancing on my Own” so early in the show, but she had more than enough to keep us locked in for the next hour after it. She danced around with determination, dominating the stage and doing that back to the audience, “I’m-gonna-make-it-look-like-someone-is-groping-me-self-hug” thing to smiles and hoots from the crowd. Read the rest of this entry »