I had my list for what I wanted to see Thursday night. But I didn’t know what I would be able to get into as I had not badge or wristband.

Our friend Oni told us to check the site http://www.showlistaustin.com/

Looking through this list I start seeing that some of the bands I really want to see at night are playing free shows during the day. We end up on Sixth street around 2pm and just start looking around. Every club has some sort of music going on. It was almost overwhelming at the amount of sound you heard. It was 2pm and there were more people walking down Sixth than on a busy Saturday night.

My brother David goes to meet his girlfriend at Emo’s to watch Tokyo Police Club. Erica and I start wandering and enter Agave on Sixth. This 3 piece band from Brooklyn called Appomattox blew me away with the three songs I heard them play. They had a cd for sale, but I wasn’t carrying cash (which is really stupid as SXSW).

After seeing this band tear the stage apart we wandered off and amused ourselves with the kind of things you would only see at a place like Austin during SXSW.

Paste Magazine had a free part in conjunction with Dell for the next 2 days at Volume Night Club

We picked up some free magazine and watched Delta Spirit, sounding like a cross between Ben Harper and Coldplay (yes, really!)

We then stood in line at Flamingo Cantina for the Under the Radar magazine event. The place was crowded, no air conditioning and small. We were given a shitload of stuff by the Under the Radar people including magazine, t-shirts, playing cards. Free swag is nice. The Shout out Louds came on about 20 minutes later. They sounded like a Swedish “The Cure” and it was evident that they had a large Swedish crowd in the audience.

I love The Cure, but this for some reason wasn’t doing it for me. I am guessing it was the heat and the smell of armpits and beer that made me want to get out of there. We made our way back to the Hideout and grabbed a coffee and took some time to answer some work email, even though I was on vacation.

I had a whole list of bands I wanted to see that night, but checking the list I had printed from the website http://www.showlistaustin.com/

It seemed that all the bands I wanted to see were playing free the next day. So a change of plans. We headed over to Daddy’s for some hot wings instead.

No badge and no wristband, I decided to take a couple of days off and head to Austin anyways. Officially starting Wednesday, I arrived about 1230am that night and headed over to The Hideout on Congress and 6th. One of my favorite bands that never comes to Texas was playing at 1am, Trespassers William. We had met them at SXSW 2 years ago and he had offered to help my band in any way possible. 2 years later he mixed and mastered the Ledaswan album. So we didn’t hesitate to get the chance to come see them again. Not that they were bad last time, but this time they put on a much better set. I would even say it rocked in its own way. I would describe Trespassers William music as an equivalent to that really great drunk you feel from wine…right before you go over into the “I drank too much wine stage”. Their musical is ethereal and beautiful. Listen to Trespassers William

The Hideout is a great little coffee shop that has a back room with stadium seating. This is used for both film and music. Being 1am when we got there, the employees suggestion for a bucket of beer instead of the 3 in my hand was a great suggestion. Thank you. And to the guys behind us that were trying to talk louder than everyone in the room before the show started…Fuck you!!!