Sun, Mar 21 2010

Written by:Ian Bennett

Thursday found Rivmixx strolling up 6th Street where the locals were out in force! Skewed art-poppers Laurel Collective  opened today's proceedings and they should have been quite a puzzling prospect for the predominately Austin crowd gathered in Friends Bar. Very rarely does such an experimental guitar-psych-fusion make any sense, let alone on Texan soil; but it does. Playing a slightly "lighter" set than usual, the London five piece delivered a cull of fine cuts from their debut album, with a few little surprises - a massive flying saucer shaped piece of percussion graced the stage, along with what can only be described as a piece of silver tea wear. How British is that; using an antique tea-pot as percussion?!

Rivmixx headed over to Stubs next, which is the main open-air stage of SXSW. The strange thing is you actually enter the festival stage through a little Austin bar which then unfolds to reveal the main stage. Band of Horses smashed it from the first second dropping their breakthrough single 'Is There a Ghost' - never has the lyric "... I could sleep" had such a reverse meaning. Rivmixx got to this gig a band early to secure a spot, and just as well - a fight actually broke out over a piece of turf. Rightly so, though, White Denim's  set was THE gig of the festival so far - alt-country-americana coming home to roost. Despite playing to a smaller crowd than expected, everyone there was in awe. They really do have quite an accomplished sound.

The xx were the last band of that evening, and what a class act to finish on. Anyone who can cover Womack & Womack with as much true emotional soul deserves the respect of Rivmixx. Effortless is a word overused and often irrelevantly in the music press but these three mood-moguls really do pull it off. Plus, anyone who can command an entire orchestra with the tap of a finger is pretty good in our books.

On the way back to the apartment Rivmixx witnessed one of the most fierce emcee battles imaginable. There was a percussionist bashing out the beats on three upturned plastic buckets and a couple of dozen local rhymers spitting blazing-hot bars. This was a true and very real taste of urban Austin.

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