The thrill of discovery hits SXSW anew
Austin’s small clubs once again take their place on the music scene, with a number of breakout performances popping up around town.
More than any recent year, this South by Southwest felt like it was returning to its roots of discovery. The fervor of brand kitsch and arena-level superstars felt relatively muted, and all the most talked-about shows seemed to come from the tiny clubs the festival built its reputation on.
In that spirit, here are a few breakouts from the recently wrapped music festival in Austin, Texas:
G FLIP
A blocks-long line to get into one of the singer-songwriter’s afternoon showcases wasn’t moving. But one gang of Australians, all dressed in identical shirts printed with little broken hearts, cut through the crowds and walked in as if they owned the place.
They were the extended family of Melbourne-based G Flip, who delivered one of the fest’s breakout sets. A little bit of spiky indie rock, a little bit of blown-out arena-pop and a whole lot of charm announced a new talent already heralded at just the third solo show she said she’d ever played.
The singer, born Georgia Flipo, was in good company. The day’s showcase was bookended by the bewitching rock of fast-rising newcomer Stella Donnelly and the beat-bolstered, throat-ripping folk of Dubliner Dermot Kennedy. But G Flip’s nascent singles like “Killing My Time” and “About You” were so inviting and varied, so funny and meaningful, that it’s hard to not to see a star in the making.
BAD GYAL
The Barcelona rapper-singer has made headway globally for her club-infused twists on reggaeton and other Caribbean sounds that have dominated pop music of late. Bad Gyal sings in heavily, intentionally Auto-Tuned Spanish and Catalan, so she comes at the sound from a markedly different angle than in former Latin American and Caribbean colonies where it originated.
“Fiebre” and “Nicest Cocky” pull from all over the internet-connected global tropics. “Despacito” and Jamaican dancehall are global music now, but the connection between the Spaniard Bad Gyal’s ideas for them are more interesting and tangled than most.
PEARL CHARLES
In an east Austin venue that looks the part of a derelict roadhouse, L.A. country singer Pearl Charles played to a packed showcase there to witness Charles’ demure but hard-bitten cosmic country. Her new album, “Sleepless Dreamer,” has some light touches of disco and psychedelia, but its heart is right at the center of the classic-country era, where you can deliver pristine, wise ballads about men’s foibles beneath a lime-green Stetson hat and a puffy-sleeve dress hacked into a crop top. Her voice just gets better the longer she’s on tour, and the next time she gets back to L.A., she and her band should be in top form. TODD RUNDGREN
The music (and film and tech and everything else) at SXSW almost always looks to the future. So what a treat to wander into a club set from ’70s rock experimentalist Todd Rundgren. There are usually a few legacy acts each year, but it’s rare to catch a singer-songwriter who has been pushing the outer edges of rock since the ’60s — and has a worthy new collaborative album to add to that legacy.
Rundgren had some chart hits in the U.S. (“Hello It’s Me” and “I Saw the Light” among them), and his double-LP “Something/Anything?” is a touchstone for acts like Tame Impala. His new LP “White Night” has collaborations with current electronic boundary-pushers like Trent Reznor and Robyn and nods to his classic rock legacy with turns from Joe Walsh and Steely Dan’s Donald Fagen. So when he took the stage, he was doing what every band there was doing — hawking a new record. But there’s just as much pleasure rediscovering something older that turns out to still sound brand new.