My own private SXSW

SXSW experience isn't only in the eye of the badgeholder

My first experience with the South by Southwest music festival came in 1992. I'd lived in Austin a mere six months and was waiting tables at the Magnolia Cafe. From that vantage point, I quickly decided that the annual music fest was a special sort of hell on Earth. The restaurant was packed around the clock and I quickly grew weary of the crowds, though I admit the extra tips came in handy.

Ricardo B. Brazziell
AMERICAN-STATESMAN

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My first taste of music festival wasn't palatable.

Mark Matson
FOR AMERICAN-STATESMAN

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Austin writer Spike Gillespie, photographed on the porch of her Clarksville home, with her dog Bubbles.

I developed an especially strong dislike for festival participants who wore those coveted badges. I had a name for them which I cannot repeat here. Suffice it to say I perceived an obnoxious sense of entitlement in these show-off badgeholders. Until, that is, I came to be one myself.

I don't remember what year I started covering the festival as a journalist and sometimes performer (back when poetry was still a component), but once I crossed the line from servant to badge-flashing member of the in-crowd, I acclimated rapidly. Sure, I allowed myself to feel the occasional twinge of guilt as I swept past mere wristbanders waiting in long lines to see the best shows. But could I help it that I had found a way to catapult over the mere minions?

My memories of perhaps a dozen SXSWs are a blur. That's thanks in part to the fact I was still drinking in those days but also because you can be stone-cold sober and still be overcome by the 50 million people who crowd this city and try, futilely, to attend all 60,000 performances.

Having transitioned from cynic to disciple, after a number of years I found myself sliding back into a pessimistic stance. All those bands paying all that money out of their own pockets to come here, play for free and harbor some false dream that they would be the Next Big Act Signed to a Huge Contract by some godlike A&R rep who happened to catch them, thanks to a full bladder that caused said rep to wander into a club in search of a bathroom, and accidentally discover their unheralded brilliance.

It became easy to imagine that the bigwigs in charge of SXSW were fattening their bank accounts courtesy of these hopeful, delusional acts that drove thousands of miles or flew from halfway around the world for a 45-minute shot at fame. And to this day, every March, you can hear the grumblings of the disgruntled, like some steady bass beat, decrying the injustice of this crazy system.

Perhaps because my son has grown up to be a fine guitarist — one lucky enough to have played, at the tender age of 15, on stages from Stubb's to the Continental Club, with acts such as the Polyphonic Spree and Jon Dee Graham — I have, once again, turned the corner and returned to the place where I love SXSW. Funny thing is, I no longer have a badge. I don't even buy a wristband. Last year, I rented out my house to a couple of Christian punk bands from Chicago (the Detholz — pronounced "Death Holes" — and Babyteeth) and mostly avoided the whole, blurry event.

But I didn't miss it. I watched my son and his friends, riding on adrenaline and little (if any) sleep, as they canvassed the city, show after show, repeatedly confronting the dilemma of having to choose seeing Much Loved Band A when Equally Loved Band B was playing two miles away at the very same time. I appreciated the sense of excitement this fostered in my kid, with his dreams of a career in music, a dream I refuse to dash by suggesting he contemplate law school as a backup plan.

As with the equally heady Austin City Limits festival, I offer to be his willing accomplice and chauffeur, picking up him and his friends, dropping them off, taking them to eat (no doubt aggravating harried waiters in busy restaurants). Let him harbor his dream and pursue it. Let all the young players in all the bands — good and not-so-good — ride high on it. Maybe they'll be the ones who get the contract this year. Probably they won't. But sometimes, the rush of the dream, if only momentary, is contentment enough.

As for me, I think I'll skip the crowds this year. Maybe I'll host a band — perhaps some heavy metal Buddhists called Zen Leppelin. No matter, I won't be missing out. The wave of adrenaline is contagious, and I will savor the vicarious thrill that comes when so much hope crams this town for a happy little while.

Spike Gillespie is the author of several books, including the forthcoming 'Quilty as Charged: Undercover in the Material World,' about the contemporary quilting scene.