sxsw photo literacy pt. quatre

SAT-UR-DAY

since we went to Israel in May on Birthright, we were invited to Birthright's SXSW bagels n' shmear/open bar party on congress which was also presented by jdub records.  when we arrived, they were given out flasks at the door. it was a great start to the day. 

as we mowed down on our lox and cream cheese, we watched the following bands:

girls in trouble (brooklyn)

deleon (brooklyn)

fool's gold (LA) 

(they sang in hebrew which was a delight)

after about 6 to 7 drinks a piece, we stumbled toward waterloo park to catch some more bands and sun.  but not before we stopped at the convention centre to check out flatstock, my poster artist wetdream. such a feast for the eyes, it's a bit overwhelming. but i did manage to walk out of there with a decision.  a fucked up poster by daniel romano. it's a fucking beaut.

we carried on to waterloo and caught another set by monotonix

we quickly walked back to our house to get ready for the night portion of saturday, but we got distracted and jumped on the trampoline, I didn't know we had in the backyard, for 20 minutes...

after that we went and caught wintersleep at the rusty spur

where they opened up for echo and the bunnymen!

we got perty drunk off jello shooters there, and made friends with the most non-gay-looking gay man who just couldn't get enough of my "monica-in-the-episode-where-she-has-humidity-induced-frizz" hair. shiiiitttttttyyy.

on to the vice party we went, nice and toasted. only to find out that we had to wait in line for an hour and we missed obits by one minute :(

the party was "open bar," but apparently vice's take on open bar is lining up warm cups of juice and tequila, and leaving it on the bar for people to take at their leisure. speedy, but gross.

the only band i remember from that party was annihilation time. 

they were good, but if you stand too close to the stage, be prepared to get soaked with beer, or bottled (in lo's case)

a dance party followed where i met my male, gay counterpart on the dancefloor.

we hit it off pretty well.

the night ended shortly thereafter, but not before bumping into Joseph Gordon Levitt for a second time on the street, hailing a cab, after picking up a chick.

This time, instead of pretending we didn't know who he was, we caved and told him how much we loved him. 

Laura even told him that her favourite line in 10 things i hate about you is when he says:

"i learned french for you" 

a great way to end the evening...

sxsw photoliteracy take three

f-f-f-friday

on our way downtown we stopped at this hole-in-the-wall bbq joint to have "breakfast."
this is what we had:

and

come to think of it, i have no idea what our vegetarian 8-pack member ate that day. (sowwy snack).
after that hearty meal, we walked to sixth and red river to emo's to try and get into Windish Agency & Pitchfork's crazy good line-up of a showcase. And after waiting for only two minutes we were in, which was sweet because this is what we got to see:
woods

wavves (sashy fell in like with man on left, not right)

then a quasi-gross security guard snuck victorious and i into the main room of emo's (we had been at the outdoor stage the whole time) so that we were able to see the fabulous
dirty projectors

it was vic's first time seeing them, so that was very special. the shitty thing was though, the security guard (josh) who snuck us in, expected us to repay him (somehow?). unfortunately (fortunately for me) he had a crush on victoria so she had to pretend that she was going to give him a hayjay or something, even though she never ever ever intended on actually doing it.
oh the sacrifices we pretend we're going to make... something we like to call "taking one for the team..."
we quickly went back outside to see
king khan

and the shrines

whose set was great, always is. but this time it inspired me to join a band. not as a musician per se, but as a cheer-leading, sweat-drenched dancer. but instead, i would actually stay on the beat.

though we were burnt out and beginning to sober up, sash, vic and i stuck around for department of eagles.

all i gotta say is HOLY SHIT that was the best set i saw all week. (sorry lo)
such beautiful beautiful music.
the only thing i regret is not peeing before their set. i didn't want to lose my place but my weak bladder was a tiny bit distracting. i may have even piddled a teensy bit.

after that show we took off to the caswell house for the annual north by northeast bbq. it's the best party because they have amazing food and free mooseheads available to all canadians, not just the ones with the wristbands (scoff scoff cdn blast bbq).
three or four bands played upstairs in this beautiful mansion but of course i missed all of them.
i was too busy socializing with my fellow canadians, and secretly wondering if jill barber is actually dating grant lawrence, and whether or not steve jordan remembered my sister ripping his shirt off the night before:

[okay i think we did have a real photo of it but unfortunately laura's camera didn't make it back to canada safely... so you'll have to pretend basia = l.katz and steve's shirt is ripped open.]

after the bbq we went back to our quaint little house to get ready for more. most of the girls showered and napped while i got dragged out to see a girl from nevada city california named
alela diane.

jack the snack looooves her and made it her ultimate goal to see her during sxsw. alela was slotted to play the swanky showcase at the hilton garden inn, quite upscale compared to the other venues in the festival. it changed up the pace which keeps things interesting, however, it also bumped up the door price to $13 USD! that doesn't seem like a lot but it is when you convert it to our shoddy canadian buck. So rather than paying, we decided to peek into the adjacent kitchen to see if it was empty and that way we could sneak through.
it wasn't empty. there were two hotel employees in there cleaning up from, what i'm sure was, a long day. that didn't stop us though. jack simply asked if we could please pass through the kitchen to get to the other side. she was completely honest and told them how badly we wanted to see her but that we didn't want to surrender what seemed like a fortune to the wayside.
they said yes. and even fed us along the way!
we sat front row and though i was pretty drunk by this point, and nearly falling asleep, i can confidently say that she blew me away.
After her set we walked on over to Ms. Bea's to meet up with the other ladies, say hi to todd p. and watch a whole lotta health.


but not before stopping at the corner store to purchase a 12 can case of dos equis. the last time i ventured to ms. bea's (the previous night), i was boozeless, and i vowed to never do that again.
i was pretty bombed while watching health.

which was good cause they kept me on my toes.
that is, until i could be kept on my toes no longer.
i got whisked away by victor and avi to go home and get a head start on ridding my inevitably looming hangover. yes, the fomo (fear of missing out) frightened me, but when i learned that the other lassies went off and saw sam roberts (again) it quickly subsided. though i'm sure i missed out, this is me pretending i didn't.

sxsw photo literacy pt ii.

thursday!

on day two there were 7 of us girls rarin' to go.
on the flight to austin, laura made a (boy)friend who invited us to a party at red seven.
there we saw:
hard lessons

fool's gold

lucero

then we trotted our way over to rusty spur to catch the end of the d'urbs and have a mini hamilton reunion..

after that lo sash and i went and hung out with our cousin tim and got some mexican food and margaritas at polvo's... delicious!

after that we went to meet up with our gals at the cedar street courtyard. jackie had arrived. our 8 pack was complete.
laura, our thursday hero, managed to finagle us into the blackberry party where we got to see:
sam roberts band

the delta spirit (this was a huge sacrifice for me because it was at this exact time that herman dune was slotted to play at buffalo billiards, missing them is almost one of my least favourite things to do, ever.)

i stayed so that i could see the black lips, because i've never seen them live before. two years ago, sasha, sarah, nichole and i missed them by five minutes at the mink in houston...

and last but certainly not least, we got to see primal scream.
not that i'm a huge fan or anything but it was just cool to be able to see them, even though we were pretty smashed by then...

we then wandered the streets and met up with chris bell (not before laura jumped on the side of an S.U.V. and grinded with it)
i somehow convinced the group to go to ms. bea's so that we could watch herman dune do a ten minute acoustic set at 3.20am.
it was getting close to that time and herman dune wasn't in sight.
i was pretty bummed but my mood changed while watching the ten minute acoustic set of best friends forever

that, and somehow finding a cab at 330 was a beautiful end to our night.

sxsw photo literacy pt. i

wednesday.

we started off our week by going back to our roots and joining the lovely folks at the canadian blast bbq. the bill included bands i've seen more times than i can count on one hand but still a great show nonetheless...
two hours traffic

our homeboys, the arkells.

mother mother, sans crazy chick.

beast. from montreal. (didn't pay too much attention to them, as we were stealing pop from the bbq next to us, through a fence)

the lovely edmontonians,
shout out out out out

after our first long day in the gorgeous and ferociously hot sun, we went home to nap and recharge for the red bull party at the moon tower.
there, we got to see my cousin's band
i love you but i've chosen darkness

before the next band, we started a crazy dance party.
music courtesy of dj diabetic

aka sheppard ferry, the artist behind the famous obama hope illustration:

next up was the always crazy, always entertaining
monotonix

which is where we were moshing in the company of mr. joseph gordon levitt, of "3rd rock from the sun" fame. and "10 things i hate about you" fame. soon to be "500 days of summer" fame.

(babe)
we stumbled home around 5am but couldn't fall asleep until around 7 because of all the red bull that was flowing through our veins.
that shit works!!
(free vodka redbulls=dangerous)