SXSW Thursday: Gomez, Andrew Bird, Late Of The Pier, Young Galaxy

Gomez's Tom Grey said it best: "Welcome to the great endurance test on earth!" You can't help but laugh. Between the heat, lines and music blaring from every corner and street, while brands like Myspace, Levi's and Blackberry try to shove their propaganda down your throat, SXSW can get exhausting. Did I mention the free beer and whiskey? That too.

My wrist has been fully molested by wristbands and stamps, a result from the RSVPs I sent out over the last two weeks. Between the showcases, day parties and evening blow outs SXSW is alive and kicking, despite the shyyt state of the economy. The people at Fader ponied up the cash for another fort this year, although this time you got to cross Interstate 35 to get to it ( a pedi-cab will cost you $10/person - not recession-friendly cheap!)

After a morning that included stops at the Low Anthem and the Black and White Years (both = awesome), the Fadar Fort was a little oasis in the hot desert Thursday sun. While people sipped on Southern Comfort and Mountain Dew, (not too bad actually, just a little too sweet) UK metal, electoclash outfit Late Of The Pier was throwing a hissie fit on stage due to the bad sound. The synth player's parents watched from the front row with cameras in their hands. The proud papa shrugged, "They won't play if they are not happy with the sound." You fly in from the UK, you'd expect to at least have the audience hear your vocals. After walking off stage the band, in their early 20s, returned and finished off the set with Led Zepplin power chords, screamo vocals and synth that pegged them somewhere between mosh music and dance music.

Next up was model turned garage rocker Lissy Trullie. Trullie, plugged heavily by tastemaker/producer Mark Ronson didn't impress to the point of Oh-my-GAWD-I-need-her-album. The stand out song of her entire set was a Hot Chip cover, "Ready For the Fall." She closed out her set with her hit "Self Taught Learner." As the sun set the lines for the port-a-potty and free booze got longer. Up next was former Massive Attack rapper Tricky, who played under some heavy blue and red mood lighting, sexing up the place and recalling Portishead.

Young Galaxy are Canadians who make some good spaceship's soundtrack music, something you'd hear on Star Trek's Voyager, but not the Death Star. The guitars saturated the room with shoegaze dissonance that lured people in. Tambourines were involved too. The only complaint for the mellow set was that it was mostly new songs from the bands forthcoming new album, Invisible Republic, and I fell in love with the ones off the old one.


At Stubb's the night was just getting started with a showcase that brought Gomez, followed by Andrew Bird and Ben Harper's new band the Renlentless 7. Gomez opened with their new tune "Airstream Driver" to roars from the audience and would sample another newbie "Little Pieces" before the night was over. But it was the band's How We Operate that tunes that got people really zealous. "See The World" became a group sing a long, while the band actually made the adult contemporary sounding "Girlshaped Lovedrug" and "How We Operate" into party jams. Gomez can put out an album, but they function best in a live setting.

Andrew Bird came out doing a little bird call that quieted the place down and got people's attention. Bird seemed socially awkward on stage switching between violin, guitar and the microphone.