Benny reports: SXSW post-game analysis
(Ed: Benny apologizes for this being so late, but he’s been brushing up on libel law for the past two days and now has a point of view for his next Chinatown Bus piece.)
Here’s one thing that Benny realizes — drinking from 1pm to 4am for four straight days wears a brutha’ out. This point was really driven home while wiping a drool glob from Benny’s neighbor’s shoulder on the flight home.
SXSW proved a couple of things for Benny (after the jump):
- Hype sucks: Benny can’t tell you how many suffered from overhypeosis, a condition affected by NME and SPIN writers who each seem to have a fetish with the other country’s bands.
- Lines suck: From the wristband line to the lines to get on the last flight to Philly, Benny’s week was just one long cattle/lemming/blurring line.
- Live sucks: The art of playing live is increasingly a dying one. Benny thinks this is because it must take years to channel brilliance unto an audience. The kind of brilliance showcased during the classy, packed and awesomely awesome Kings of Convenience show on Saturday where you could hear a pin drop during each song.
And so what is the common demominator to all the suckiness? Who contributes to all such maladies? Benny thinks it’s these barnacle-like creatures he saw scurrying 6th Street called “publicists”. I consulted an “industry friend” at length and apparently these people are “really good” at sending a lot of “emails”, filling out reports to correlate “progress” and to convince writers and “tastemakers” (another term Benny learned this week) of things that no one should pay attention to without them working it. (whew, that felt good for Benny)
For those not familiar with these creatures, you can tell them from a mile away. They’re usually fat, loud and trying to convince large doormen that they in some way make the music world happen, right down to the sequencing of an album, the first video and the free Patron that made that airport hanger truly memorable.
What if the world didn’t have these “publicists” in it? Would hype become truer? Would lines grow shorter? Would record labels spend more money to keep bands on the road so they could actual develop and learn how to work an audience and be entertaining?
Benny can only hope…..
