Wolf Gang, Wolf Gang: SxSW as Spring Break

by Joshua Heller

On Thursday, I set out without a goal. I blindly looked for friends or live music. I roamed on into the night without any success. The next day I made a schedule that I actually adhered to. The younger version of myself is going to kick me for saying this, but “organization is the key to success.”

I attended the Scottish showcase at the British Music Embassy. They served fajitas and taco salad. The showcase was sponsored by governmental agencies and local chambers of commerce. The British government, you see, puts money into the arts to develop the culture and business of the region. Also free food is a good strategy to ingratiate people to a band.

Later, the line at the Fader Fort was already very long. Behind me, girls in day-glo spandex were making fun of girls in striped dresses and sunglasses. The neon girls said: “That’s what people who used to be into American Apparel are wearing now.”

Odd Future came on the stage chanting “Wolf Gang, Wolf Gang.” Someone said that it sounded remarkably similar to “Wu Tang, Wu Tang.” The teenagers from Los Angeles have the same business model as the Staten Island superstars: Release albums under a common moniker, then drop solo projects independently.

Odd Future pretended to hate their audience. This resonated with the crowd. Tyler the Creator flipped everyone off, then said “I love you guys, this is funny.”

After saying “swag” a bunch of times, the crowd became decidedly eager to “Kill People, Burn Shit, Fuck School.”

I asked a girl for a piece of her cotton candy. She declined.

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At the hotel a group of teenagers asked me if I hated high school as much as they did. I said I didn’t remember. They were in “like a prog-rock slash straight-forward rock” band from Laredo. They’d performed two showcases at all-ages coffee shops. They said they were bored with school and wanted to pursue music full-time. I told them that was a great idea.

At the Lustre Pearl a couple in their forties took photographs of the knots in trees to send pictures of fake labias and assholes to their friends. I had hope for my future adulthood.

I entered the mosh pit during a Black Lips song. Someone helped me up, then handed me his business card.

SXSW, on one hand, is about the rekindling of youthful exuberance, while at the same time being very conscious that you have another life back home. You can get wild, but SxSW is spring break for people who are actually eager to return to their regular lives.

* * *

Matt and Kim played the break from The Shadows’ “Apache.” Then Erykah Badu played tambourine on stage. They performed a song whose music video showed them running around New York naked, which Badu herself appropriated. There’s an erosion of musical genres and artists creating music from the histories of hip hop, punk rock, electro and everything in between.

Kim asked the crowd if they had sex at SXSW. She pointed to Matt and said, “We did, this morning.” Matt and Kim are a good model for love. They work together to create something they are equally passionate about. Their shared love resonates with the crowd.

“I know it’s sappy, but this is the real world,” Matt said.

Joshua Heller has retreated to the rural countryside.