1:10 am La Zona Rosa. Camper Van Beethoven was supposed to start at 12:50, so I was surprised that Cracker was still playing when I got there. I was more surprised at how jam-bandish/frat rock they'd gotten in the last 7 years since I'd seen them live. Cracker, which is basically CVB plus Johnny what's-his-face on guitar in this incarnation, continued playing -- and sucking -- until 1:45. The nadir was when they brought some caterwauling woman onstage for a super-obnoxious blues song. I couldn't believe that I was missing the Decemberists for this bullshit.

1:45 am Camper Van Beethoven at La Zona Rosa. It's amazing how different things got when Johnny RockGuitarDude turned his patchcord over to Greg Lisher. They didn't raise the lights or anything; one guy unplugged his guitar and the other guy plugged in, and all the sudden the band was a completely different beast. Sure, they're cashing in on the novelty value, but they rocked those songs like it was 1989 and, tired and drunk as I was, I felt like I was on acid, which, in fact, I was on when last I saw CVB in 1989.

The set, which had almost no breaks:

• O Death
• Eye of Fatima Pt 1
• Eye of Fatima Pt 2
• All Her Favorite Fruit
• Sweethearts
• Balalaika Gap
• White Riot
• Wasted
• Good Guys & Bad Guys
• Shut Us Down
• Tania
• An instrumental I didn't recognize (not in the catalog)
• A song I didn't recognize (also not in the catalog)
• Take the Skinheads Bowling
• Pictures of Matchstick Men

I got out of there at 2:40 and hired a pedicab to take me most of the way back to my car. Now it's 4 am, and I've been writing this up for the last hour. Gotta crash.

Hayden, that's sounds so great. I went to see The Joel Plaskett Emergency (they're on my mix) last night, and despite my best efforts to arrive after the opening band, we got there just as they were beginning. They were the worst. band. ever. Not technically incompetent, but sooo bland and boring and mind-numbing. I was standing there prayer each song was their last, and thinking..."Hayden and Jon as at SXSW and I'm listening tothis CRAP!"

Yeesh, I felt 2 inches tall.

Dude -- The lights were so bright on us that we could barely see the front row. I did notice you coming in, but lots of folks were coming in and out and it barely registered. Don't sweat it.

More later.

Not technically incompetent, but sooo bland and boring and mind-numbing.

There were a looooooot of bands like that, too. I saw one band (The Frank something something Experience) maybe three times inadvertently, and suffered through a couple of songs of their cookie-cutter, wallpaper indie-rock. Anyway, next year, you should come down! I won't be able to hit too many of the night shows because of my new job, but it oughta be fun, anyway!

Don't sweat it.

Thanks, Jon. Makes me feel better. I'd done a forced march up 7th St, which has a big hill, to get there in time, and was about to collapse.

Anyway, next year, you should come down!

Mmm...tempting.

I was going to pimp Buck 65 to you guys (he's on my mix), because he was playing there and he's amazing live, but I then realized he was on at the same time as the PeeWee Fist.

Aw, you should have mentioned him anyway. Many of these bands play several times during the festival, what with all the free afternoon shows.

Oh well, you'll hear him on the mix.

11 Pretty Girls Make Graves. Good lord, they rocked. It sounded like the Voidoids with the Gang of Four's rhythm section and Debbie Harry on vocals. But somehow current, too. Wow.

I'm listening to them now! I got a copy from a girl who works with Mr. H.

Pssst. Hayden, check Press (I don't drink beer though).

So here's a bit of a funny thing, unrelated to anything. I've spent the last six years of my life fully convinced I hate Ska. Every ska song I'd ever heard made my face go all squinty like Charles Bronson. Then I borrow my roomates discman and there's a really bitchin' Ska CD in it (Let's go to Work by The Kingpins, BTW). I enjoy the hell out of most of it, proceed to listen to a few others, and realized I don't hate Ska at all. Which is weird enough to set me to thinking about why I figured I did.

Turns out, I just hate songs that are about the type of music they belong to. Ska seems to have a lot of songs about Ska itself. Which annoys the living hell out of me. On further reflection, I realized I also hate country songs about country music, punk songs about punk rock, and pop songs about sex. I'm not sure how that last one fits into the theory, but still. Furthermore, I don't really know if I hate songs from one genre about a different one.

Now, I don't really have a point per se, but this line of thinking makes me want to write a country song about Heavy Metal, just to see if I hate it. Maybe Satan's wife can two time him, and his lake of fire can get repoed and his hellhound can die. I dunno.

I can't get behind the genre-celebrates-itself hate as some of my favorite artists (Chuck Berry, Lou Reed, Public Enemy) wrote some of their best songs ("Roll Over Beethoven", "School Day", "Rock and Roll", "Bring the Noise", "Rebel without a Pause") about their music. Not to go all Goldwater, but... self-reflexiveness in the service of killer tunes is no vice!

Got bicyclops' & Sue's mixes this weekend. Haven't really listened to them, but ripped 'em & will pass them along to msbelle in the next couple days. Fun liner notes. And bicyclops' packaging: OMG! You've seen the cover [insert link I can no longer find here], but he also put album covers on the inside & used fun graphics on the back. So ambitious that I need a nap just thinking about it. msbelle, I will also send you a disc with tagged mp3s so that if you or someone else want them you can have them w/o going to the trouble of cursing Music Match, your computer & the heavens for hours at a stretch. (Btw, I think I ripped them as mp3 pro files at the highest setting I have -- higher quality in a smaller file. I think they're supposed to work with any mp3 player, but if they don't... sorry about that.)