Don’t have a cow, it’s just SXSW time

Texas is many things, but subtle is not one of them. On Thursday, a big rig packed with frozen beef flipped on Interstate 35 near a road called Slaughter Lane, spilling a major load of dead cow in spectacular fashion. The same day, the local paper ran a front-page story warning of the local threat posed by vast wildfires raging in the state.

There, for just a moment, was the prospect of a roadside grill truly worthy of this state’s outsized image.

That barbecue didn’t happen. But on Thursday, Austin did stage another ridiculously large and messy celebration of its other great local tradition -- music -- with the 20th annual South by Southwest Music Conference and festival, which this year reached a record size with more than 1,400 acts performing during the five-day event. When SXSW started it was a scruffy celebration of indie music and, in some respects, it holds on to that ethos. But it also has become a sprawling music-industry summit and done so in an era when that industry is trying desperately to redefine itself for the digital age.

The result is an event dominated by hand-wringing during the day and wristbands at night. Afternoons are filled with lectures and endless hallway conversations on how the music industry will navigate through grim retail declines, commercial drags on artistry and the unpredictable swirl of technology. At night, everyone hits the pavement looking to get into not-so-secret shows, such as the Thursday night Beastie Boys set at Stubb’s, or the good-luck-getting-in party performance of bands like She Wants Revenge.

SXSW still wears its curled cowboy hat comfortably -- the presence this year of Kris Kristofferson, Neil Young, Steve Earle, k.d. lang and plenty of new acoustic heroes keep the faith for twang -- but there’s also room now for a performance by rapper Ghostface Killah, about as non-rural as you can get. Bands from all corners of the globe, too, make SXSW a singularly international music moment.

“There’s really nothing else like it,” said John Watson, manager of Wolfmother, the Aussie band that played one of its SXSW gigs on Thursday at the Beauty Bar, the new Austin location of the L.A.-born franchise where you can sip a cocktail beneath an old-fashioned helmet hairdryer or get your nails painted.

A hot band of the moment, Wolfmother is loud and lo-fi, channeling early Led Zeppelin, early Black Sabbath, early Deep Purple and early 1970s customized van, clearly a band with an eight-track mind. The scene was chaos; the local fire marshal shut down the entrance and, as with any good show in town, there were more people staring at the sidewalk than at the stage.

Wolfmother came through Austin last year looking for a U.S. record deal and got it; this time around, the three musicians were looking to flex their growing performance muscles in front of key tastemakers. Watson said the conference is many things to many bands, but for Wolfmother this year around it was an echo chamber.

“That’s exactly what we were looking for -- there are so many key people here who, if they see you and like it, it reaches out so much further than that room,” Watson said. The band was scheduled for a late party again Friday night and also crammed in an in-store appearance, a key on-air set for a major British radio show and press interviews. “Everyone is here and if you do well, it’s very organic, but it’s heightened organic because it can mean so much down the line.”

Organic, perhaps, but the event also has Miller Lite and MSN as sponsors and this year it brought three members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the British trade minister to town to discuss matters that rarely come up in the mosh pit.

There are plenty of scraggly kids with guitars, though, and a sense that, really, anything can happen if you are standing in the right place at the right time. On Thursday night, for instance, the densely packed crowd on 6th Street parted as a curious parade rolled down the street. There were odd costumed characters, tall with heads that bounced like pogo sticks, and a man in a bubble. It was the Flaming Lips, the veteran Oklahoma band that makes music that lies somewhere in the midst of Phil Spector, Pink Floyd and Lewis Carroll, and the guy playing the gerbil was lead singer Wayne Coyne.

Earlier, Lips guitarist Steve Drozd said SXSW is a remarkable confluence of music far and wide and a reminder of its vitality despite the state of major record labels and the proclivities of mainstream commercial radio.

“There is so much good music and so many surprises and this is a place where you can really feel that,” Drozd said. Well, you do if you can get in; Drozd pointed out that he wasn’t able to get his own family members into the Lips’ club show on Wednesday night. “Yeah, it’s tough.”

Early evening Thursday, the line at Stubb’s stretched out and around the corner. The barbecue landmark has an outdoor stage in the rear and it’s become as famous as any venue affiliated with SXSW. It is also probably one of the most unlikely venues ever played by the Beasties.

Their set Thursday night opened with “Brass Monkey,” their irresistible 1987 party song. What followed was a playful and commanding performance. The three members are lean and on top of their game, and roughhousing on stage they seemed like old neighborhood guys who had come back to the borough for a game of pick-up.

The Beasties came to Austin as featured speakers and elder statesmen (who saw that coming back when they opened for Madonna in 1985?) but the heart of this Texas event is the young bands looking to make their mark.

One was Aberdeen City, a rock band from Boston. “We’ve been trying for four years to get here and to get to this point,” drummer Rob McCaffrey said. “This is ... the place to be, it’s the real thing.”

The group played an ASCAP showcase on Wednesday night and, the next night a 6th Street bar for a Camel cigarette and Zippo lighter party (“It was good,” guitarist Chris McLaughlin said, “for the free smokes.”)

More than finding new career opportunities, McLaughlin said he and his band mates found a surprising sense of community some 1,700 miles from home.

“There were a gazillion rock bands here,” McLaughlin said, standing on a crowded sidewalk after a show while packing gear into a trailer. “It’s a funny thing to be in a place where for the first time you feel just like everybody else; just walking down the street, the way people dress, the things they do, all of it, it makes you feel like you belong.”