SXSW Obviously Did Wonderful Things To My Brain.

It’s Wednesday afternoon, and I just realized, and remarked to Kier and Chris, that I can’t actually name a single one of the acts I’ve seen since I got here. It’s a problem: everyone’s come here with high hopes, I’d imagine, and what a way to blow it—put on a good show, make an audience happy, and miss out on any of the subsequent benefits because you forgot to identify yourself. And never even know what the problem was.

Shit. I wonder if that’s ever happened to me?

I’m Andy Hyman, and I’m here in Austin for a lot of reasons, none of them particularly worth going into, beyond saying that I’m more or less a tourist, providing you with as good a record as I can of just what it is I saw.

Of course, some people don’t seem to mind the lack of artist identification, and, really, why should they? Like me, they’re here to have a good time. Like the pretty blonde standing in the corner by an ATM, separated from the rest of the crowd and somehow in a perfect spotlight, dancing by slowly swaying back and forth and swinging a phone by a cord in slow, wide circles.

On stage is yet another beautiful woman, with curly brown hair and a look, cultivated or not, of innocence and sweetness, which her music reinforces. The joyous (yet reserved) smiles and coy glances complete the package; she’s a portrait of wholesome, All-American decency, and I can see why she’s on the stage, and the hundreds of us other idiots are in the audience paying attention to her.

In fact, it’s a little while before I realize how good she is with her facial expressions. These aren’t just coy glances. Every shift of the eyes seems perfect, every side-look to her left, every roll down and to the right as her lids drop in a moment of deep sensation, every turn to her bass player while pivoting her body in the other direction (making the actual seeing more difficult, I’d imagine, but being far more evocative), every near-smile followed by a bashful blushing withdrawal (she knows she shouldn’t show too much emotion; she was raised better than that in her idyllic Midwestern farmhouse, or wherever) is executed perfectly. It’s wonderful to behold, and, while the music itself doesn’t strike much of a chord in me, I wonder how many artists here can compete with her first-rate symbolism.

People come to this festival for the music, for the exposure, for the networking, and so forth, but one could just as legitimately, I think, say they come here for the youth and beauty. The presence of these qualities is almost overwhelming, and even for those of us who may not be young or beautiful ourselves, you can’t help hoping it rubs off on you a little—even if you know that some people look good in tank tops, and some of us don’t, no matter where we are.

To be 30, and say I’m not young, is a little ridiculous, I know; but I’m confronted, lately, for the first time, with seeing people who look old to me, only to find out that they’re younger than I am. I know that experience probably lasts the rest of your life, but it’s a little jarring when it first rears its head. Just as it is when you look at a photograph of yourself, and you see a human being staring back—one who should, from the looks of him, have a productive, adult life, and you know that he just doesn’t.

So here in Austin, we have the antidote to that way of thinking, I suppose—a chance to surround yourself with youth, beauty, vibrancy, and know you’re part of it, else why would you be here?

Although I don’t wanna’ draw too many conclusions yet. It’s still my first day.

* * *

My first images of the day on Thursday were what someone more inclined to talk this way might call “a study in contrasts.”

A girl jogs pat me, her backpack weighing her down and her flip flops clapping. I watch to see where she’s going, until she makes it to the waving arms of her two awaiting friends, who pop out from around the corner.

And then, as soon as they disappear, happy, reunited, ready for the amazing day they’re surely gonna’ have, I’m confronted by a sad and solitary drumstick lying abandoned on the sidewalk in front of a vacant lot. A stupidly appropriate symbol of, I don’t know, forsaken hopes and shattered dreams (too dark?), success unrealized, destiny squashed by reality, the harshness of the music business? If this were Vietnam and I were a photographer, that fuckin’ drumstick would be my ticket to a Pulitzer Prize…but this isn’t Vietnam, I’m not a photographer, and this isn’t a war, just a giant party full of melodramatic jerks like me. And melodrama doesn’t always photograph well.

But what a party. Whining and cynical as some of this may seem, that whining only serves as a method through which to enjoy, and celebrate, just whatever this is exactly that’s going on around me—think a lizard smelling with its tongue, or something—and, really, with anything there might be to actually complain about here, if you’re not moved, stirred, inspired by the tidal wave of human thought and feeling collected into this one time and place, I’d say it might be time to start asking yourself some very serious questions. Even someone like me found a place here last night, after the bars closed and a party accompanied us back to our rented condominium. In hosting this group of strangers there was that surprising contradictory familiarity, the comfort of being in your own space and mimicking, as best you can, the kind of welcome you can only hope the world’ll offer back to you, as you pour drinks, listen to stories and gaze out at the freeway, while people fall in love around you on the balcony.

But few things will bring you crashing out of that romanticism more than a bunch of young anorexic-looking British guys in skinny jeans waiting on a stage while a haywire fog machine coughs sickly clouds in to the space between you and them. And yet, even here, now that I listen for a moment, I can hear some joy in what they’re doing, just as I can in the words I’m writing myself, their Rickenbacker Anguish tempered by this city they proclaim to have “fallen in love with.” And so I guess I’m not the only one who’s started to find…well, let’s just say a way in.

The funny thing is, though this is a festival more and more each year (or so I’ve been led to understand) driven and augmented by advancing technology, thriving off of tweets and text messages and smart-phone apps, I’m finding that all that technological plugged-in-ness is still no match for the irresistibility of human impulses. Information, speedy though it may be, about where people are and what they’re doing is often obsolete by the time I can act upon it, because it can’t keep pace with any impulses we may be experiencing—the impulse to drink, the impulse to go get laid, the impulse to find a place to sit down or get food or avoid waiting in line, to follow the people you just met because they seem like fun, to see something even better or be part of something even more special. And here, acting on these impulses—feeling them, and not fighting them—is, I think, just a bit easier, and more acceptable, then it is back in real life—and shit, isn’t that one of the reasons we’re here in the first place? Which means that, until someone invents a program that tells you what you’re gonna’ feel before you feel it, and how you’ll react when you do, I’ll still be eagerly showing up at clubs ten minutes after my friends have left. And an event that celebrates technological interaction and development winds up rife with examples of the failings of the attempt to technologize our lives at their very core, like my iPhone not making me any less late, or the guy I just watched spill a bottle of water all over his camera.

The real beauty, though, is that even when I am late, or misinformed, it doesn’t matter. The “wrong thing” doesn’t really seem to exist here, in the way to which I’ve grown accustomed as a life-long regretter—instead, it just becomes “something else.” There’s so much happening, so many options, and so much constant adjustment and realignment of one’s expectations required that it becomes natural to accept that something wasn’t meant to be, and to trust that the alternate path on which you’ve been placed will be just as fulfilling.

Actually, now that I think about it…you could live the rest of your life like that, too.

I mean, if you really wanted to.

* * *

Things ramp up as the sun goes down, and I head out into a night begun with a near-flawless karaoke rendition (undertaken at a dirt lot food truck parking ground on a portable setup in the corner) of “Nuthin’ But a ‘G’ Thang”, performed by a woman with black hair and black clothes, the whole Gothic look, for the two-dozen stragglers eating tacos by themselves.

And then onto Lee Fields and a soulful world, hearing beautiful ballads to the power of women and a deeply-felt love for the jolt of love itself,

pleas for perfect destiny and the dream of a yearning listener,

as people outside fight with each other about

who or who shouldn’t be listening,

apologies to strangers and

red faces steeped in forgiveness,

the weight of the week on top of them,

humble apologies for drinking all day and

not behaving right around people

at night.

Wandering over to the big fat warehouse,

wristbands for backstage and a strange collection of

quest-ers for ?uestlove,

hippies and perfect gentlemen,

high school kids all high on maturity

and a woman who’s obviously schooled in bellydancing.

Then leaning on the railing

perched right beside the speakers,

standing peering far out to the crowd beyond the lights,

watching all the people as they

make their own horizon…

waiting there alone

for the rarely-witnessed ending,

all the day-long shows abandoned

long before they’re finished for

some other place and other sound but

not this time

so I can stay to watch the crowd file out,

and be one of them too, ‘til

I make my way back home and find

more people at the condo,

bands hanging out and

passing out along the couch,

tired from the journey and

not quite sure where they are yet,

smoking on the balcony, the

girls dancing to Salt ‘n Pepa,

reveling around me as I write this all down,

all of us staying free and safe and

waiting out the waning evening,

knowing soon we’ll tire and make

our way back to our beds,

hugging and smiling our guarantees to

remember this

and promising how

we’ll come on back

to start again

tomorrow.

* * *

All the hipness in the world doesn’t count for shit when you’re sitting alone at International House of Pancakes. And that’s why I’m here.

Well, that, and the pancakes.

If there’s a great equalizer, it must be IHOP, where kids, grown-ups, probably fuckin’ Nobel Prize-winners all get asked alike if they want anything from the Lorax menu or a breakfast with chocolate chips and a smiley face. It’s a nice break from the festival world, where status seems to count for a lot—separate lines, VIP lists, lanyards loaded with laminated passes and wristbands stacked along multi-colored arms, a hundred indicators dividing those who’ve succeeded from those who merely plan to succeed. The other day at a tech networking event, I watched a hush fall and the crowd part as the delegation from Google exited the party, a path clearing for the half-dozen or so of them as they shuffled self-consciously down the stairs and out the door.

Not that I blame the crowd for its reverence; it’s the same in every field, you see someone who’s done what you’d like to do, and you want to see just what exactly the secret is. And heaven knows it’s valuable to learn the steps those before you have taken, examine their methods, track their successes and failures.

The problem is, it’s very easy (at least for me) to forget that a methodology doesn’t exist in a vacuum; its efficacy is contingent upon the talent, insight, taste and dedication of the person who executes it. And its suitability is tied to those qualities, which allow that particular person to achieve any notable success in the first place—that is, a method isn’t necessarily perfect, but can be perfect for you. Human achievement isn’t a science (oh, if only it were…) and results aren’t replicable; and that’s not even taking into account the context of an ever-changing and expanding world. So I’m starting to believe, more and more, that it’s not just the method itself that’s worth knowing, but specifically What It Is about someone that brought out the best in that method (and what about the method brought out the best in that person). In other words, just because you tell me exactly how to go about achieving something, doesn’t mean I can do it. Maybe I actually have to be you to make it work, in order to capitalize on that interplay of technique, knowledge and personality that leads to real accomplishment—and so maybe that’s where the focus should be, on the nature of that interplay, when it comes to learning from those who’ve succeeded before you. Assuming that my personality can benefit from any “learning” in the first place, and isn’t just stuck on ‘asshole’ with the key broken off in the lock.

So is that what brings people to Austin and SXSW? No. I mean, yes, some people, obviously. But a hell of a lot of them come for the music. And so it’s time to take a break from the other garbage and talk about some of what I’ve seen here:

Reptar, fun, silly, energetic, lively, is just right for the backyard at 508 on a sunny afternoon, with something just all genuine and rock-and-roll-y about them. They make the audience hold hands and declare that [They] Want To Get Nasty, and sure enough, the audience complies. And subsequently gets very nasty. And likes it.

Lee Fields, you beautiful, beautiful bastard, clean and comforting like a…shot of penicillin? No, fuck, don’t want to say that, but I will say, that the label “dance music” gets thrown about a lot. As far as I’m concerned (and I can only speak for myself), this will always be the dance music I’m looking for. And the incredible melodies, and the power of that unabashed emotional declaration…though, if I were Lee Fields, I’d lay it all on the line too. In a person with his talent, anything less than that kind of confidence (pure and total as it is, without arrogance or condescension) just wouldn’t ring true.

The Belle Brigade, earnest and honest and impeccable harmonies, amazing voices telling captivating stories, singing with, and about, an equal embrace of fear and strength, of failure and triumph. Like I try to do, only these guys are way better.

Dan Deacon, with his explosion of sound (all right, I know it’s cliché to say that, but what the fuck do you want me to do?, it sounded like a goddamn explosion), equally worth loving for the energy, the charm of the way he interacts with the audience—letting them in on what he’s doing and what he’s thinking, erasing the emotional distance between himself and them just as easily as he erases the physical distance by setting up in the crowd—and the references to La Bamba (“no one wants to be Richie Valens’ brother,” he remarks. Which is true.)

Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros have figured out something special about putting people at ease, and it’s not just the enjoyment, but the lightness of the enjoyment (as opposed to heaviness, that is), that breezes over everyone and has the crowd staring back with twinkles in its eyes. It’s a feeling of being “in touch”, or “connected”, yes, but also the reassurance—not sure where it’s coming from, but it’s there—that being “in touch” is perfectly all right, and something you should probably just embrace while it’s here.

Jackmaster knows how to take a room full of unsuspecting people and destroy their minds and have them thank him for it; and gladly go through it all again. He tows a fine line between captivating and overwhelming, without ever forgetting to have fun, which, you know, allows us to have fun.

Kwes, plays a music all their own, unlike anything I’ve heard before. Of course, it does exactly what it’s supposed to do, which is make you think, “why hasn’t someone else come up with this before now?” I don’t know, but someone else didn’t; Kwes did.

And there were countless others, good and bad, but I’m not here to shit on artists I didn’t like, and these are the ones that come to mind now, as I reflect on it, the ones who, each time, said to me in their own way, “just shut up and enjoy being where you are, right here, and right now.” And that’s a pretty incredible gift to give, when someone says that in a way, that actually allows you to listen.

After a four-hour break at the condo during which I try to sleep, but can’t, I head back out into Friday night sensing something ominous in the air. The energy has turned slightly sour, and the openness and general goodwill isn’t quite so pervasive as it’s been the last few days. The week is starting to wear on people, and as a brass band and accompanying entourage marches, banging their drums and sounding all bellicose as I pass them by under the I35 overpass, I feel like I’m walking into a battle royale, or something, only without the real threat of danger. Well, at least not physical danger.

Sure enough, things go wrong when I least expect it. It actually starts as a great moment; I’m gathered with friends and their friends at a bar, DJs playing and drinks flowing, happiness and excitement and general camaraderie running rampant all around us, and I feel good, happy to be here with just these folks. Josh and I step away for a second, through the dance floor, and then walk back to rejoin the rest of the group, when we see Mike head of us, waving for us to turn around and go back the way we came, and I see the whole group awaiting, ready to follow us. Okay, I think, we’re going back in that direction, (Lead Us, Andy!) and so, confidently, I pivot back around and march purposefully ahead across the floor, to an empty spot where we can all stop and watch the show, feeling triumphant as the head of this column marching with strength into a beautiful night.

Only when I stop and turn around, they’re all gone.

It had only been about ten seconds between Mike’s signal to turn around, and my realizing they weren’t there anymore, but the lot of them had somehow vanished without a trace. I start to look around the rest of the crowd, sure that they couldn’t have gone far, but I don’t see them anywhere.

I march back to where we started, thinking maybe they stayed put after all, but they’re not there either.

I can’t understand it. We’d all just been standing there together. How could this happen so quickly?

I circle through the venue but there’s no sign of them. My confusion is turning into real consternation, and I decide to try to look for them on the back patio, thinking maybe they slipped outside, but the guy at the door stops me.

“Okay, two things,” he says, leaning in as if he’s confiding something I’ve been dying to know, and have coaxed him into revealing. “First, you do have the right wristband to go out there. But, second, you’ll have to go through a different door. The one over there. Not this one.” Only when I go to the other door, as instructed, I’m stopped by the woman there too, who informs me that, no, the correct door to go out was in fact the first one I tried.

What exactly is going on here? I’m not allowed to go outside? I’m trapped here, is that what they’re saying? I’m drunk, high, getting angry that something so pleasant has been transformed so quickly into something difficult, and, worse, nonsensical, starting to wonder what exactly happened or if anything happened at all—did they leave?, did they disperse?, did they blissfully head off into the night, unaware that their party was one person short? Am I imagining this? Were they even here to begin with? Do they even exist? Am I having my “A Beautiful Mind” moment, realizing these friends I’ve had for half my life, these people whom I love are figments of my imagination—“oh my god, Mike doesn’t age! Josh always wears the same clothes! Kier’s feet DON’T EVEN TOUCH THE GROUND WHEN HE WALKS!”—and have been figments for all these years we’ve known each other? Am I about to find out that what had been a glorious sense of belonging was really just a mask to cover the most desperate loneliness?

The place is the same, but the world’s out of focus as I make what feels like lap after lap around the bar, looking for people whom I’m not even sure can be found. I start making panicked phone calls, sending blunt “where are you?” text messages— none of the usual frills, jokes or nuanced innuendo for me, not now—and no one’s picking up, no one’s responding. Are these numbers even real?, or just strings of zeros, placeholders in my phone meant to help complete the fantasy—fuck, I always have been good at the little details like that!. it’d be just like me to come up with something so devious…

The fear is real, and I’m about to give up, go home, sit on the couch (if I even have a home anymore) and do some serious freaking out, when I finally see Josh at the bar, with some of the others, like they’d never left, even though I was sure I’d been past that very spot five times already with no luck in seeing any of them. I go up to him, and tell him what’s happened. I’m filled with relief, and we laugh about it all—the world’s suddenly righted itself again, and the others drift in. “Where did you go?,” Priya asks me, and I tell her that I never left, and there’s more laughter. It instantly all seems so silly, and things settle down, but really, I’m still shaken.

“Dude.” I say to Josh. “I’m so glad you’re real.”

This kind of thing happens all the time—you lose track of your friends in a crowded place, and you find them again. No big deal.

But this time, something made it more frightening, more severe…and I can see what a fine line I was walking for those few minutes, or however long it actually was. Surrounded by the right people, life was good, things were complete, and we’re on a heavenly road to a fantastic night. Suddenly pull them out of the picture, with no explanation, and I’m standing in what feels like hell.

All within the same four walls.

* * *

I wake up in the back of my car just west of Tucson. The sun is beginning to set as I climb out of the back seat…I shiver in the cold wind, have some water, take a picture of the sky, and make my way back onto the interstate.

The last day has come and gone, started as I walked out of the condo into the Austin afternoon, lasted through the night and the next day and the night again as I slept a motel sleep I didn’t even feel, then through the next four hundred and fifty miles from Van Horn, TX to Tucson, when my eyes are closing and I pull the car over, crawl into the back and pull my coat over my head. And on the highway again now, temporarily cleansed, I finally feel like I’m awake.

I guess if you go looking for ‘conclusions,’ you’re bound to find them, or at the very least, thoughts, feelings and incidents from which you can retroactively extract a sense of finality. Over the years, I’ve gotten’ very good at this; and have even grown to believe that my peace of mind depends on it—that, somehow it must have been valuable if it can be made into a good story. If I can follow the plot from beginning to end and say, look where I crossed the finish line, and, oh, this is why that was the finish line in the first place.

But this time, the hitch is this: this was valuable. I know that now, beyond any doubt, without ever repeating these stories (if you can even call them that) to see if the pieces fit together and everything adds up to a satisfying end. I can feel it, in a way, with a confidence that’s rare for me. In fact, that rarity just confirms its significance to me all the more.

So what’s left, then, is for the seasoned narrative manipulator in me to fuck off for a minute, and, instead of looking back and saying, “what can be said, and how can this be told, to make it all so special?” ask myself, “where exactly is this feeling of specialness coming from?”

So where the hell did it come from?

I don’t know. What exactly happened the last night?

I’m in a field at the University of Texas, the hillside covered with concert-goers, Luke and Jess and I watching Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros lull the crowd against the background of a beautiful evening sky, an occasional firefly lighting up in the dim light between songs.

I’m at Bandpage HQ, finding Mike, Season, Kier, while Josh runs around making sure everything in the showcase happens as it needs to—the very picture of the act of creation. I’ve seen it in all these folks, at one time or another over the years, just as they’ve seen it in me too.

I’m laughing with Luke as Hudson Mohawk plays, then seeing him off, as he heads back home, and we vow to make sure our paths cross again.

We’re back at the condo, realizing we don’t have anything to drink for our impending guests. Kier and I march down the street, armed collectively with my determination and his money, not knowing where we’ll find anything but not willing yet just to turn back. Hedging our bets with cynicism and urging ourselves on with hope. And when we wind up at another party—one that is broken up immediately after our arrival, and we coerce the bartender into sneaking us a bottle of rum and some beers, we walk back smiling, inviting people over now and basking in the all-to-rare experience of having blind faith followed by a quick reward.

I’m standing in our apartment as the room fills with strangers, more than we could’ve expected, drinks are poured, cigarettes are smoked on the jam-packed balcony, friendship is proclaimed, wristbands are cut and I am thanked for my hospitality again and again, in a place I do not own, have not paid for and have no claim to beyond my willingness to stand in the center and call it mine—and tell people, “you’re welcome here any time.” But I guess having someone around, offering that presence, well, isn’t always such a small thing to a room full of people, independent, triumphant or successful as they are, who are have all found themselves far away from home.

I’m standing in my bedroom and I’m kissing a girl from the party. I can’t remember her name, even if I can say where she’s from, what she does, what languages she speaks aside from English. After a few minutes, her phone rings, and she stops kissing me to answer it, listens to what I can hear to be an agitated voice on he other end. She says to me, “hold on wait, I can’t leave my friend,” unwraps her arms from around the back of my neck, hurries out the bedroom door into the party, taking my hand and pulling me with her. We go out the front door and I watch as she hurries down the stairs and through the parking lot, and I open the gate with the clicker, so she can go find her friend out in the street, knowing as she disappears that she won’t be coming back.

I’m wandering around the room, wondering just what I should be doing with myself, watching the whole place come alive with frenzied conversation meant to stave off this final sunrise. I start to open the dishwasher, looking for more glasses, but two guys are in the way of the door, so I tap them, ask if they can step aside. “Sorry, man,” one of them says, “we’re distracted. This conversation’s gettin’ real.”

I’m lying to people about having cigarettes left, telling each new person who asks me for one that I got one from the last person who asked me for one.

I’m saying goodbye to Kier as he follows Season back to their hotel, saying I’ll see him back at home, cheering together what an incredible week it was.

I’m saying goodbye to Priya, as she heads back to her hotel, and on to New York and then Singapore, not sure when or where we might meet again.

I’m saying goodbye to Austin and Chrissy, marveling at how we’ve spent all this time together, though we only just met, and demand that we see each other in Los Angeles.

I’m saying goodbye to Zach, as he grabs his bags, the party still hopping around him, and heads outside for a cab that will take him to the airport.

I’m saying goodbye to the strangers one by one as the sky shows signs of lightening and they head into the morning, looking for a bed, or another party, or someplace else that might just offer them whatever they didn’t find here.

I’m waking up the passed out people on the couch and saying goodbye to them too, saying the party’s over as I send them stumbling out the door.

I’m staying goodbye to Josh, who stayed right through ‘til the end, the last one left, as we smoke a final cigarette and smile at the fact that we couldn’t be outlasted.

I’m saying goodbye to Mike after he’s woken me up (I’d passed out by then) and told me that his flight has been moved hours earlier, so instead of my taking him to the airport he’ll just catch a cab; saying just one more damn time What A Week It’s Been, and laughing our goodbye, my eyes closing and drifting back asleep as I hear from the other room the front door close behind him.

And then by noon I’m awake and I’m the only one left.

I clean the apartment and pack up my car, leave the key under the mat and head down 6^th St. one more time, just time now to say goodbye to the city, which I watch disappear in my rearview mirror as I make my way down Highway 1.

And now I’m west of Tucson, finally awake, and still on a highway, heading for home, the music blasting and the sky lit up in the west. And still, to me, it all feels right, feels valuable and complete, and though I can’t pinpoint it to any one occurrence, it gets stronger with each passing mile. Maybe I need more time to figure it out.

Maybe with the wealth of artistic stimulation, it’s just impossible not to feel like you’re taking away something that you didn’t have to begin with.

Or maybe adventures are just fun. No big revelation there.

Or maybe this makeshift community does exactly what a community is supposed to do—make you feel like you’re part of something. Again, no real surprise.

Maybe it’s just nice to have had so many goodbyes to say in the first place.

Maybe I’ll have to come back next year, to take another look. Just to be sure.

Austin, Tucson, and Los Angeles, 2012.