The Triumphant Return of SXSW

South by Southwest is seen by many local Austinites as a necessary evil: a fun shot in the arm to the local economy laced by endless traffic jams and more people than the city can comfortably hold. 

I myself have experienced a shift in attitudes toward SXSW over the years. What was once a manageable music festival has grown more and more corporatized the past couple of decades, with superstar artists parachuting into an event which was formally about indie acts. The days in which artists were “discovered” at SXSW (think Broken Social Scene in 2004, TV on the Radio in 2005, etc.) are a distant memory in the rear view mirror. 

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While I continued to play SXSW day shows and nighttime showcases, I grew a bit disillusioned with the whole scene. If an act I played in landed a prestigious showcase and/or if yet another artist from out of town needed a pedal steel player, great. If Big Star Third was coming through and needed me to conduct the orchestra and play piano once again, awesome. If nobody called and I played nary a SXSW gig, fantastic: a good opportunity to slip out of town and clear my head. What had been a heady funtime of my younger adult years was becoming just another week of gigs.

Then came COVID.

In early March 2020, I got the call that all my SXSW gigs were cancelled, and that they were getting ready to go public with the shutdown of the entire festival. SX had been an annual part of my existence for a couple of decades, and its absence was an utter shock to my system. Even though the coronavirus had been in the news, receiving that call was THE moment I realized: this is really fucking serious.

That cliché “you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone”? As much as I loathe inane clichés, one couldn’t get past that one in 2020. 

One couldn’t get past it in 2021 either.

And here we are in 2022. This past week was the first SXSW since March 2019, and I couldn’t’ be much happier. In years past, I may have dreaded the influx of gig calls, texts and emails leading up to March, whereas this year I gave a hearty “yes” to nearly every show I could do. 

Many thanks to Moving Panoramas, Phil Ajjarapu and Allen OLDIES for having me play, and many thanks to all the beautiful people who showed up to hear us. Perhaps most important: thanks so much to SXSW for bouncing back. I’m thankful for your return, and I promise to refrain from complaining about you moving forward.