I want to preface this note by saying that, if you've never been to SXSW that it's hard to find all the shows you may want to go see. I use two main websites, one shows the Official SXSW shows and the other shows all the unofficial ones. There are more of the unofficial ones. When you go to these sites, you either have to browse the shows (pain in the ass) or search for someone you want to see... so you have to know who you want to see. In my case, I'm into so many different artists that I've been into over my life that it's hard to do that. Tonight shows why this can be so hard because I totally would've missed one of my all-time favs if Jesse and Sherv hadn't invited us over to see Vanbot.
So... with that said, here was the day:
We got a late start, we didn't have much on the list. I originally wanted to see Blitzen Trapper at Waterloo at noon... but I missed that. The Gossip at 1pm... missed it. Chad Valley at 2pm... missed it. Wooden Wand at 5pm... missed it. We stumbled downtown around 6pm or so and met up with Reagan and we basically just wandered around. After an hour or so we headed to Casino El Camino to meet up with Ben, Alex, and Andi and hang out. We did that for a bit but there was a show I wanted to hit up before Exit went on at 9pm.
So we headed over to Club DeVille to see Sarah Jaffe at 8pm, but it was either badge/wristband or $20... mainly because there were a ton of bands playing but we only wanted to see Sarah and $20 is a bit much for a 40 minute set but luckily it was an outdoor venue on a blocked-off street so we hung outside and listened for free.
We then headed over to the 512 Bar on the packed 6th St to see Ben, Alex in Exit. They played a great set dispite there being some issues with the jack on one of Ben's guitars. It was Christina's first time seeing Exit so that was cool. I got some good photos that will be uploaded soon.
After Exit, I got over to the Whiskey Room to catch an electric set from Jennifer O'Connor which was great. She played "Always On My Mind" this time and I got a video but not sure how well it came out. That was very cool.
Shervin and Jesse had messaged us earlier saying we should meet them to see Vanbot at 11pm at Deseo Centro Lounge so we decided to head on over there... and it was here that the most unlikely and, at least to me, amazing thing EVER happened.
So I'm standing up by the stage with Sherv and Jesse and I see this girl over by the amp and I think to myself, no joke, "that kinda looks like Kaia" but then I was also thinking that there was no way because what would Kaia possibly be doing here? They were even taking a photo and I made a smartass comment about me taking a photo too. I then turned away and wasn't thinking about it.
So then like 10 minutes later I see that same girl talking to another woman and that woman was the spitting image of Amy Ray (of the Indigo Girls in case you aren't familiar) and after a second or two it dawns on me.... that WAS Amy Ray and if my memory didn't totally suck I remember reading about how Kaia Wilson was going to be touring with Amy Ray but this was years and years ago. So I'm a little in shock and I walk over and ask this woman if I can ask her a question... she said sure... I said, stumbling like a total dork... are you Kaia? she said yes. Wilson? she said yes. I literally almost died. I said something like, "holy shit, I can't believe I'm meeting you." She looked totally shocked that I would care who she was.
Let me give you some backstory here because you're probably confused if you're reading this. When I was a teenager I was HUGE into several bands that have been termed "riot grrl" like Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill, L7, Lunachicks... and TEAM DRESCH. Kaia was a member of Team Dresch. She later went solo for awhile and then she formed The Butchies after that and then went solo again. She then later started touring as part of Amy Ray's band. Let me just tell you that Kaia's first solo album, which was self-titled, was so huge to me I can't even begin to tell you. There are just a small handful of albums in my life that are unreplaceable in my heart and Kaia's self-titled is in the top 5. I still have the original cd that I purchased like 15 years ago or whenever it was. To run into her and be able to meet her and talk with her and take a photo with her is one of the biggest things that's ever happened to me.
EDIT: my memory is coming back to me and Kaia also formed another band Adickdid that I just remembered.
It turns out that Amy Ray played right before Vanbot and I had no idea. I had never looked up Amy Ray on the SXSW page because I had no clue that she would be playing. I found out tonight that Amy Ray is doing an acoustic show tomorrow and Kaia has TWO solo shows she is going to be doing including a big show at the "Gay by Gay Gay" event (a place on the South by Southwest moniker).
So yeah... I don't know. After I talked to Kaia I just shrunk away and tried to explain how epic that was to Jesse and Shervin. I then decided to go talk to Amy Ray and tell her how much I absolute love her like a dork. I then went over and told Christina about the whole thing. We were sitting by one of the open windows so we had a nice breeze. I honestly started to think about what had happened and I was getting emotional, I teared up and almost started crying. That is how huge of a thing this is. This is like a Depeche Mode fanatic meeting Martin Gore. Actually it's bigger than that. It's like if a Depeche Mode fanatic was drinking in a bar and Martin Gore and Alan Wilder walked in and decided to play an impromptu show right in front of you.
Edit: if you're wondering why I'm using a Depeche Mode reference, it's because I have a lot of friends who are DM fans and they will get the analogy I'm trying to make here heh
You can bet that I will be both at Amy Ray's show and both of Kaia's solo shows, I wouldn't miss them for anything. I'm gonna take my old beat up cd of hers and ask her to sign it too.
Wow, what an amazing thing to have happened totally unexpectedly at SXSW.
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