Austin – Living Up To Its Moniker Of “Live Music Capital Of The World”
Austin, Texas has a vibrant live music scene, and boasts more music Venues per capita than any other city in the U.S.. Austin’s music scene revolves mainly around the many nightclub Venues on 6th Street, but the pinnacle is arguably the annual music, film and multimedia festival called South By Southwest (South By Southwest).
South By Southwest officially began in 1987, originating as the Austin Battle of the Bands and is centered around the downtown Austin Convention Center. It has become one of the largest music festivals in the USA, with more thousands of performers from all across the globe playing in over seventy Venues across Austin over four days in March. Largely an industry-based event, South By Southwest has garnered a reputation for being the place for new, up-and-coming performers to break into the industry, and particularly British performers looking to break the USA market. Acts who have gained mass notoriety following playing performances at South By Southwest include The White Stripes in 2001, and British emo-punks Gallows who took the festival by storm in 2007.
2007 has been South By Southwest’s biggest year yet, and saw more than 2000 performers take over Austin amidst March 14th and 18th. Highlights included stand-out performances from The Rapture, Cold War children and Kings of Leon. David Byrne, formerly of Talking Heads, and The Who’s Pete Townshend were among the event’s conference speakers (Townshend later made a guest appearance, joining The Fratellis onstage and showcasing his trademark windmill guitar moves). British punk legends The Buzzcocks likewise played a raucous performance, as did U.S. punk icons Iggy & The Stooges. There has been likewise the emergence of a one-night-only supergroup, as Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine and Audioslave has been joined on his solo performance by a mass of unannounced special guests including Jane’s Addiction frontman Perry Farrell, MC5’s Wayne Kramer, Primus bass supremo Les Claypool and Slash of Guns ‘n Roses and Velvet Revolver fame.
South By Southwest is the single highest resources -making public party for the Austin community, generating more re Venue than even home games by Austin’s hugely popular college football team, the Texas Longhorns
South By Southwest is just one of Austin’s festivals – the city is likewise host to the All Tomorrow’s get togethers -esque Fun Fun Fun Festival, a two day gathering that last year saw shows across three stages from acts such as Cat Power and Diplo as well as sessions from Austin natives Okkervil River, Zykos, I Love You But I have Chosen Darkness and Explosions In The Sky, who headlined.
also, the Austin City Limits festival has promptly become one of the the majority popular and well-attended festivals in the entire United States, ranking alongside Coachella and Lollapalooza. The festival brings together over 130 performers across eight stages over three days. The festival works in conjunction with the popular Austin City Limits television show, which showcases Local Austin acts as well as artists playing the festival.