SXSW Day 2

Three questions often overheard backstage at South by Southwest:
1) Where's the bathroom?
2) Who's got the drink tickets?
3) Where can I get something to eat?
The answer to question one is invariably the same, venue to venue: in the back, at the other end of that very long line.
Number two is usually taken care of by the stage manager. Get in his (or her) good graces and drink for free. All night.
Question number three, however, is ultimately the deciding factor in rendering a stellar performance from a road-weary band. (After the port-a-potty visit, of course.) Bottom line – if the band doesn't eat, there's no show.
Luckily for everybody, the city of Austin takes pride in feeding the thousands upon thousands of people who invade downtown, plague-like, and turns out its top-level street-food vendors in droves.
From bratwurst and lamb gyros to grilled chicken tacos and falafel, if it's able to be easily assembled on a street corner and then eaten mere seconds later, it's here. A must-visit is 6th Street mainstay Hoek's Death Metal Pizza. Yes, it's exactly what it sounds like and is as brutal as pizza gets. See it to believe it.
So this is how I find myself debating the pre-gig merits of chowing down truly-hellacious pork carnitas tacos versus a sauce-laden, barbecued brisket sandwich with Micachu drummer Marc Pell.
Eyeing my sauce-stained fingers, Pell thanks me for the scholarly debate and instead opts for the signature SXSW musician pre-show meal: a Lone Star beer in a tall, frosty can.
[Ed. note: At the time I just didn't have it in me to tell the Londoner that the once-mighty "National Beer of Texas" is currently brewed by the heathens in Wisconsin. Would have broken his heart.]
Bellies suitably filled all around, Micachu took the stage at 8 p.m.
The British noise-pop trio spat out song after quirky song, each bursting with the skree of home-modded acoustic guitars, the rattle of distorted tin cans, gut-shaking 808 bass drops and infectious, chorus-laden hooks.
A good start to a long night.
Brooklyn six-piece Dirty Projectors followed. Brainchild of Talking Heads-disciple Dave Longstreth, the three female, three male chamber-pop group spoon-fed an engaging set of African-flavored indie-pop to an enraptured audience. Beautiful, multi-part harmonies, handclaps, sing-a-longs; those in the know were there to experience it.
You'll be hearing of them soon enough.
In perfect opposition to the brainy, literate dance-rock of Dirty Projectors, the half-Californian, half-Brazilian DJ duo N.A.S.A. came to solely to party.
With green body-painted gogo dancers in platform boots and bikinis and foam-rubber-costumed alien B-boys, N.A.S.A. (North America/South America, natch) jacked a staid, indie-pop audience into a rump-shaking tent revival. N.A.S.A. favors a Girl Talk-influenced mashup routine – heavy on the familiar hits and beloved throwbacks, light on the irony.
They did, after all, come to party.
Danish psych-dance collective The Asteroids Galaxy Tour took up the reins and launched the still-manic party into outer space. These freak-folks in floppy hats and flowery shirts merged Mothership Connection-era space-funk with ABBA melodies and Psychic TV weirdness into a hypersonic, technicolor mindmelt.
Totally gnarly.
And then, like a comforting pat on the arm during a particularly intense trip, British electronic/lounge chanteuse Little Boots (Victoria Hesketh) old-schools everybody back down to reality, where late-70s Italo-disco is cool again and nobody has ever heard of Lady Gaga.
Finally, just after 1 a.m., a packed house greets Datarock.
The Norwegian indie-dance scions are given a king's welcome. Unfortunately what follows is a shockingly predictable pastiche of Devo, LCD Soundsystem and Death From Above 1979, all of whom did dance-punk waaay better than these clowns.
Tellingly, they were the only band who came dressed in matching, maroon tracksuits the whole week.
And thus the night ended. The audience cleared out. The bartenders started counting their drawers.
A few band members and stage crew volunteers stood outside the tent, riding a wave of alcohol, euphoria and exhaustion.
Somebody mentioned they were hungry.
As it happened, we were just a few yards away from a globe-spanning, international street-corner smorgasbord – Austin's street-food carts.