SXSW 2005

This is my cutesy little SXSW write up of shit so it's kind of long but if you care about reading this shit well then go ahead. Oh and I think the funniest part of the whole trip was when I decided to light a miller light promo girl's hair on fire.

Day 1:

Wednesday morning I got up at about 4 am and hopped on a plane to Houston. We got there about 2pm or so; picked up the car and busted out to Austin. We refueled on some Vietnamese food from some spot next too our hotel called Saigon Kitchen where I decided the most appropriate meal was the Bun Bi. I called up some homies from Texas then the next plan of action was to mob up to the BackRoom were Matt Sonzala was throwing his first SXSW showcase of the week.

We missed some of the opening acts because I had to wait for two hours trying to get my SXSW pass but we got there just in time to see the group with the best name ever, Abstraq Da Grindologist. I thought they were a group but turns out Abstraq is just one dude who happens to have a whole crew on stage with him who rapped about haters and getting hated on. The name was probably the most outstanding thing about them. I would have thought that name would go to some generic LA rapper who loves 4 elements and outer space but I guess they kept it Texas with the term "grindologist." They were followed by Basswood Lane, who performed the best song I heard all fucking week. The song was for the ladies and was titled "I'm So Pretty." Well at least I think it was, whatever though the important part was that they had about 15 dudes on stage screaming "I'M SO PRETTY IN THE ATX!!" Honestly I felt so pretty in the ATX just because these dudes where screaming that shit so fucking hard. Oh and to top of their performance they didn't have instrumentals so they just rapped over their CD which works if you got no other choices but shit at least try to make it look like you're rapping. They had a couple dudes up there mouthing the lyrics but holding the mic to their stomach as if no one would notice that shit.

After Basswood it was time for some of the bigger dudes to step up, first came Play-n-Skills doing their shit. I probably should have paid more attention but shit after Basswood lane I was concentrating on how pretty I was. Anyways they ran through some of their material and then Chops hit the stage. I'd heard some of Chops remixes on Rapid Rick's CD so I was surprised that the guy who I first heard on J-rocc and Rhettmatic's old Dynamic Duo tape was now dropping remixes for Texas artists. I was very interested in seeing what he would actually do on stage. Chops broke out his keyboard and got to jamming out on that piece. He mostly played a bunch of beats on the keyboard but he did do a little rapping. After Chops Paul Wall came out and had the Gritboys and H$E on hypeman duties. I missed H$E's performance earlier that night which sucked because I really wanted to see those dudes. Paul Wall tore through his set which I enjoyed mostly because it was my first time ever seeing that guy on stage. But the best performance was yet to come.


coughee brothaz


devin the dude

Fucking Devin The Motherfucking Dude came out and rocked that shit so hard. It took a while for him to actually get on stage though but in the mean time I got to see Matt yell at all the rapstar sidekicks who like to pretend they are mannequins when he's yelling at them to get out of the area by the stage. The Coughee Brothaz came out and opened the set for Devin which was a relief after waiting so long for people to yell at. My friend Walker from Austin began to have doubts that Devin would actually show but then we saw Devin walking around backstage and our confidence was restored. Devin came out and rocked that shit for a good forty-five minutes or so. He went a number of songs such as "Do What You Wanna Do," "Like a Sweet," "Boo Boo'n," "Doobie Ashtray," "Fuck Faces," "Fuck You," "Fa Sho," "Just Tryna Live," "Too Cute," and "Anything" Jugg Mugg and Rob Quest came out and did "Fa Sho" and "Just Tryna Live" with Devin to give the crowd some of that Odd Squad flavor. Devin had Erica Marlin join him on "Too Cute." ""Anything" was my favorite part of the set, devin just killed it with that and had the whole crowd singing along. It was fucking great. After Devin was Bun B and the MDDLFNGZ who although their performance was good it just didn't top Devin's. It consisted of mostly MddlFngz material that they rocked all the way up to 2am when the soundman tried to shut them down. I'd never seen any of the MDDLFNGZ guys in person by my god that one big dude is like the Andre The Giant of rap just towering over motherfuckers. He hadn't even picked up a mic and I was in awe.


shitty matt sonzala yelling at people to get the fuck out of the backstage area


bun b

After that show we piled up in the rental car and broke out. I had been up since 4am that day but man was I fucking pumped. If that first night was any indicator of the things to come I was ready to fucking rock.




Day 2:

Roll out of bed around noon or so and brush the hangover out of my mouth. Stef and I decide to hit up The Kettle because it's America's kitchen. After some catfish sandwich for breakfast we mob out to have a look at Austin. I drive around and show her some spots around town that I use to hit up when I lived there. I drove up to 33 degrees because I wanted to see if they still carried Italian cop show and porn music records but instead I found out they had gone out of business so that sucked. Instead we hit up Music Mania and I copped me some southern albums I'd been meaning to buy for a minute and got some new shit like that new Trae joint. On the way back to the hotel I found out there Fader has a daily party with free Red Stripe so Stef and I decided that would be the best place to throw down on some pregame action. Props to Catchdubs for hooking up the RSVP on that shit it definitely eased some of the hurt on my wallet.

Left the Fader party to get some food and ended up running into Subtitle and some folks. He was rolling with some dudes from the Unicorns and some label dudes who ended up buying us dinner with Interscope picking up the tab. After that we parted ways and hit up Zero Degrees to catch a bunch of dj's throw down. Here is where shit got a little fucked up but not until after we say DJ Fingathing and Dj Panko rock some shit. I was throwing down some lone stars the whole time and getting a little handsome with it. At some point these Miller Light promo girls came by to hand out all kinds of useless bullshit that I was sick of holding so when they gave me a lighter I decided that the best way to use it was to light the woman's hair on fire. I turn to this dude, Jeremy, who I was bullshitting with and said "Watch this shit." I then went to light this girl's hair with the lighter she just gave me, the first time I didn't light it though but Jeremy was like "OH SHIT." I guess him bugging out made me want to really light her shit so I tried again and this time her shit went up in a blaze of glory to which I responded with a "OH FUCK!" as Jeremy smacked the back of her head to put the fire out. The woman turns around and asks "Did ya'll light my hair on fire?" I replied "no" and act like nothing happened even through that whole area smells like burnt shit. After a short moment of awkwardness I just told her "it was that guy" and pointed at no one. She finally walked away and I went to watch Rapid Rick throw down an all screwed set that was fierce as fuck. He also brought Magno and Charli Boy on stage to get cute with it.


rapid rick


charli boy, magno, a white tee

After their set Diplo came on and things started to get fuzzy for me. Well before Diplo we actually cut out to hit up The Vibe to see some live band hiphop I was hoping to catch Bavu Blakes' set but ended up watching Mojoe set up their sound for about half an hour before we said fuck it and went back to Zero Degrees to watch Diplo. He threw down his shit while I got drunk but I did get pictures and I remember having fun. I think after that we cut out because I was on bad news status and after lighting that girl's hair on fire I don't think my girlfriend really wanted me to be around the public much longer. We got home and I threw up on the hotel's lawn.


diplo

Day 3:

I woke up around 3pm feeling like a motherfucking champion. Stef was feeling like total shit and stayed in bed till around 8pm. During that time I ate some shitty subway sandwiches and then rolled over to my friend Walker's house to drink some beers. I ended up missing Bun B's little birthday celebration at the Fader party but word on the street is that shit was hot. Around 9 I went to pick up Stef and we mobbed out to catch the Shapeshifters at Flamingo Cantina where I ran into my old roomate from UT who I hadn't seen in about 5 years. The last time I partied him I was drunk in Austin throwing up and peeing in a toilet at the same time, I'm so fucking suave. Anyways we caught the Shapeshifters set then rolled over to Zero Degrees again to watch Grand Buffet do it up. They had Bluebird from Florida get on stage and do some song that I don't remember but they jumped around a lot. After a few songs I decided it was time to break out as roll to the Fox & Hound to hear some Texas shit go down.


shapeshifters


grand buffet and bluebird

We walked in right as Trae, Z-Ro and about 30 other people hit the stage. I saw the GRIT boys in the background along with a bunch of dudes throwing up crip signs. Trae only did a few songs but it was great to see him just wreck it. I didn't think Z-Ro would make an appearance but he did and just flowed on a couple tracks.


trae


zero

After they performed the crowd kept screaming "Z-Ro! Z-Ro!" but then Dj Chill announced Chingo was up next and they started chanting "Chingo Chingo!!" Now I've never been the biggest Chingo Bling fan. He's funny and all but shit came off more like a novelty act with some la migra jokes tossed in so I wasn't really expecting all that much from his performance. I was so wrong about Chingo. Him and Stunna came out and fucking killed that shit. They definitely had the best performance of the night. Chingo just tearing through his songs cracking jokes and dancing while staying on point as fuck. I have a new respect for that motherfucker. Peep the picture I got of him holding up some girl's homemade sign.


chingo bling

In the grade school I use to get notes from girls who wrote just like that, goddamn hearts and bullshit all over the goddamn notebook paper asking me to check a box if I didn't think they had a shitgrill. After his performance people once again chanted his name but didn't get anywhere with that because it was time for some Boss Hogg action.

First to step on stage was Killa Kyleon who came out and got kids hyped up until Slim Thug came out to do his thing showing why he's the boss. Diplo blowing his fucking raver whistle and jumping around in the front row while Slim tells kids he knows they bootlegged his album but he ain't mad cause the new one is dropping in may and its all different. Slim had a dope set but the best part of it was then end when everyone had walked off except for Kyleon. Kyleon stayed on stage and did two free styles and just ripped the motherfucker then just dropped the mic and walked off.


kyleon


slim thug


kyleon with too much flash in his grill



slim thug

Day 4:

Woke up Saturday feeling better than the previous day so we hit up some breakfast and then some record stores. Afterwards we once again rolled through the fader party to get some beers. We ran into the Hanger18 boys there. They were performing at Emo's later that night. We hung out and drank. At some point I'm standing inline to pee and some short motherfucker comes up like he's going to piss in a portapotty pauses and asks me, "is this the line for the bathroom?" I tell him, "yeah, go to the end, back there." After he walks away I start wondering why he looked so familiar and then it hits me, he was that little motherfucker from goddamn Lord Of The Rings. I end up asking the dude next to me, what's that hobbit motherfuckers name and he informs me that dude is Elijah Woods so yeah that was my dumb celebrity story.


hanger18 and dj stef

Anyways after that shit we hit up some food and then Emo's for some indie rap action. Some fucking girl band that I don't know shit about opened. The girl on bass had a Kriss Kross shirt on but that was pretty much all I bothered to remember. After them Buck65 came on and did his shit doing a mostly new material and remixed versions of his older stuff. Buck was followed by Saul Williams performing with Thavius Beck and some girl on a violin. I've never been to big on Saul Williams, his delivery is my biggest problem but his set wasn't bad at all. I'm not rushing to pick up his shit but I'll definitely peep it. After that it was time for them Def Jux boys starting with Rob Sonic and then Hanger 18 coming in. Word around Emo's was that MF Doom, the headliner, had canceled so what was suppose to be some short 15 minutes sets by the def jux guys turned into 30-45 minute sets. I don't know what it was but I started feeling like shit and ended up peacing out after Hanger18's set.


buck65 being :(

so yeah that was my sxsw experience as far as music goes. On Sunday we decided to roll up to Houston and just hang out. On the way there we made a pitstop in Bryan, Texas cause I felt like showing my girlfriend where I grew up, but I won't bother posting all that shit.