Death By Texas: Day Four - Austin Salute Me
Exhaustion. My last day in Austin was far more subdued than days one through three. Most of it was spent camped at the Fader Fort, waiting on Redman and Swizz Beatz to perform — a fool's game. After being warned that re-entry would be difficult I rolled through at 2P.M. to catch The Good, The Bad and The Queen, whose sleepy, quasi-World rock misused the talents of drummer Tony Allen and bassist Paul Simonon — a rhythm section like that oughta have some spark and lead the charge, not lay in the cut whilst Damon Albarn sing baroque fairy tales. From there a cavalcade of scrungy, unkempt rockers (No Age, VietNam, Ladyhawk) bombarded the stage while I chilled in the back, drinking free beverages and getting my skin burnt.
Redman showed up nearly an hour late, well into the evening, and though he was only onstage for 17 minutes, that was more than enough time to break out fierce snippets of "Time 4 Sum Aksion," "Tonite's Da Night," "Da Rockwilder," "How High," new single "Put It Down" and the wack remake of "Rapper's Delight" that Def Squad did, while also mentioning his new album Red Gone Wild: Thee Album is out on March 27, exactly 29 times, by my count. We heard you, B.
Post-Red, anticipation grew for Swizz, whose "It's Me, Bitches" has somehow captivated America — it may be my favorite song of the year, despite being about nothing. Murph says: "It's just a really dope party record." True story. As the sun went down and the night grew long, anticipation grew some more. Then a bit more. Then people started to leave. Then more left. After nearly 90 minutes, Swizz showed up, to a quarter-full tent and acted like he was hollering from Madison Square Garden's stage. I admire the professionalism, the tenacity, and his quick run-through of hits ("Jigga, My N***a," "Touch It," "I'm a Hustla, et al.) revealed a career longer than you may remembed. But he did little more than chant over each song. Hardly inspiring stuff.
Then "It's Me, Bitches." I've not seen 47 people so excited in my life. It was like a pipe bomb full of candy exploded at a 7-year-old's birthday party. Swizz's half-raps (including the immortal "Chillin' in my Beamer/Listenin' to 'Ether'") did their job, exhilirating the crowd. At song's end he quickly scurried off stage, promoting his new album One Man Band Man far less than Red. And like that, he was gone.
*Oh yeah, I actually did get a chance see the Pipettes that night, from the parking lot of the Beauty Bar. They sucked.
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