Rolling Stone Rock and Roll Daily SXSW 2007

Regular attendees know that, like in Vegas, what happens at South By Southwest is supposed to stay at South By Southwest. Nonetheless, we sent Pete Maiden down to Austin, Texas, for this year s festival with filmmaker Alexis Boling and contributing editor Jenny Eliscu and asked him to report back to us with all the grisly details about what he had seen from local weirdos offering free hugs amid the throngs of concertgoers on Sixth Street to can t miss footage from emerging artists the Pipettes and A Fine Frenzy. Pete also crashed great performances by Albert Hammond Jr.

, Pete Townshend, The Good, the Bad and the Queen, Kings of Leon and caught unforgettable late night sets from rock roll royalty including the Stooges and Perry Farrell s band, Satellite Party.
See it all including exclusive interviews with Iggy Pop, the Buzzcocks, Perry and Nuno Bettencourt right now! For those of you who aren’t lucky enough to be in Austin for this year’s South by Southwest festival or for those unprepared to brave the debauchery you re in luck.

This year, not only did we dispatch badass photographer Noah Kalina to nail all the sights (See his , , and galleries), we sent intrepid Pete Maiden down south with cameraman Alexis Boling, a big booze budget and contributing editor Jenny Eliscu, who s charged with making sure it all works.
We gave Pete clear instructions: See as much music as possible, talk to the bands and fans, eat BBQ and drink an obscene amount of Texan beer. Watch the video now.

And tune back in Monday to catch a hyped-up set from the Stooges, more interviews with bands and fans, glimpses of the monstrosity of live shows and, of course, check back to see if Pete survives the weekend.

Checking out Sixth Street, which closes to vehicle-traffic so thousands of fans can roam in and out of the music venues that line the blocks.

Caught an Attic Jam hosted by Pete Townshend, where he rocked out with Rachel Fuller, Willy Mason, Martha Wainright, European sensation Mika and more.

Sat down with the Horrors to talk U.S. vs.

Euro festivals and why you need a homing pigeon in Austin.

Chatted with A R legend Michael Goldstone about why SXSW is still an amazing opportunity for bands to get seen and signed.

Heard a hilarious confession from a young English lad who’d gotten blacked-out drunk back in the U.

K., woke up in Austin, shagged a Texan and didn’t know where or how he was going next.

And of course checked out a ton of live music from Bloc Party, the Horrors, to Albert Hammond Jr.

(from the Strokes).

As with any other maturing festival, there are questions about who should play SXSW, Austin’s near-mythical annual music gathering and uniter of the indie-music universe. Has the festival gotten too mainstream and corporate?

Much like Sundance, another comparable event struggling with authenticity, the final word on whether Austin s bash still matters is ultimately up to the artists.
Take the 2001 Festival: That year featured the weirdest lineup in the festival s two-decade history, encapsulating the best and worst of what SXSW can do. The Shins (pre-Garden State) and Mogwai both played.

Cool, right? But KC The Sunshine Band played under the festival’s banner that year too. Uncool…and a preview that something was coming to an end?

Go back to 1987: SXSW was founded to feature local new music around Austin. By the time Johnny Cash headlined the festival in 1994, its importance had grown to such a degree that SXSW Film had been added to the roster. (Watch out, Sundance.

OK, not really.) By 1999, SXSW was reason enough for Tom Waits to play his first Austin show in fifteen years. But then that awkward 2001 festival with KC and friends seemed to derail some of the momentum.

In the last two years, SXSW has returned to its roots. But as those roots indie have started to sell records, major labels have begun to flock. After their break-out Austin appearance, SXSW s 2006 all-stars Tapes N Tapes saw sales of their self-released debut album rocket, prompting label attention from XL Recordings and the praise of music critics.

So we re taking a look at this year’s juggernaut line-up, and everyone involved from AA Sound System to the Zykos seems like a pretty pure result of SXSW’s mission statement: to showcase music the mainstream has largely ignored. After all, more than 1,400 bands will duke it out this year in multi-leveled lounges and parking lots.
At its heart, SXSW is a rallying call to the indie masses who share small apartments and work shitty day jobs while trying to carve their niche in the arts scene.

It’s a flashlight beacon in an entertainment industry dominated by teen fantasies and music channels that don’t play videos and radio stations that don’t veer from playlists.
And thanks to SXSW’s prestige and built-in audience, every band that plays has a chance to get noticed. And we re watching, giving you nonstop coverage of one of the few remaining events that’s all about music, and only music.

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