South by Southwest!

Austin's biggest music festival attracts carloads of industry pimps and hipster snobs but for newbies to the city it's a chance to participate in a legendary event without having to shell out hundreds for airfare and hotels. And finally, finally, finally, after months of waiting there is some word of the bands that will be performing.

SXSW, like almost all industry type music festivals of this sort, tries to squeeze as much money as possible by offering a multi-tiered caste system for ticket holders. The first and most expensive option forces you to shell out up to $1050 for an all events music pass, but you can breeze in and out of events like some record label industry bigwig hunting for an up-and-coming indie band to buy and have taxidermied. Option two allows you to pay something like $150 for a wristband and get second priority for shows (after the jerks who could afford the $1050). The poverty route has you waiting outside the venue hours before the show starts in the faint hope there's still space left for you to buy a ticket indoors. (Imagine ragtag orphans staring through the window at a turkey feast on Thanksgiving. It's something like that.) We're seriously considering the wristband. Yeah, it's a fuckload of dough but SXSW is one of the great Austin events and what's the point of money if you don't spend it!

After a quick perusal of the list, here are some bands we may or may not see:

The Black Keys
Black Mountain
The Blow
Dolly Parton (why the fuck not?)
The Donnas
Holy Fuck
Jandek
The Kills
The Raveonettes
Shout Out Louds
Sons & Daughters
X