Volume 124 Issue 104
kansan.com
Friday, February 24, 2012
SPEAK
THE MORAL OF THE STORY: LIFE LESSONS AT A WILD FESTIVAL
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
--able Honda. I drove roughly half the way, having to quickly learn stick-shift on I-35 South (little margin for error). It was a stop-start nightmare each time we had to get on or off the highway.
// ALEX TRETBAR
Alex Tretbar spent a fast-paced week in Austin with Becky Sullivanfor the South by Southwest festival last year, and learned an unexpected lesson along the way.
Texas holds a magical place in my memory. I experienced my first profound adult revelation in Austin a year ago, during the South by Southwest music festival.
It all started when KJHK footed the bil for gasoline, food and a music badge, with the stipulation that I came back with a large chunk of interviews and live recordings. You can certainly enjoy yourself without a badge, but roaming freely from show to show is much easier with one lines are shorter, venues let you in for free, and you have a much larger pool of events to choose from.
The festival was a week before spring break, so I was lucky enough to have the station excuse me from class for the last four school days before the weekend. I looked forward to an exciting vacation that would transition seamlessly into spring break proper — I didn't know that I faced a brisk learning experience in downtown Austin.
I was joined by Becky Sullivan (KJHK's station manager at the time) and Amanda Sorrell, a DJ and former Live Events director. We drove straight down from Lawrence in Becky's clean and comfortable Honda. I drove roughly half the way, having to quickly learn stick-shift on I-35 South (little margin for error). It was a stop-start nightmare each time we had to get on or off the highway.
Luckily we jammed The Kinks' Village Green Preservation Society at least three or four times in a row, there and back the record always brings me back to that wonderful week; the sights and smells, the gusts of fresh Texas wind whipping through the car windows.
We arrived and dropped our things off at a friend of Becky's house and hit the town. It's impossible to even come close to seeing every show at SXSW — it's essentially a festival with no boundaries and no set agenda. While there is an official listing of SXSW showcases and events, many venues, houses, restaurants and bars throw their own unofficial shows. There was even a band playing in the window at a Pita Pit downtown.
Throughout the week I saw performances by The Dodos, Deerhunter, Joan of Arc, Sean Lennon, Yoko Ono, Tapes n Tapes, Thee Oh Seees, James Blake, Ty Segall, Kurt Vile, The Black Angels, Sun Araw, Tune-Yards, Small Black and The Fresh and Onlys, among many others. I scored interviews with as many of them as possible, often having to misrepresent myself or simply sneak around to get where the artists were.
One particularly rewarding afternoon was spent at Club Deville, an outdoor venue (not unlike a bigger Replay Lounge) in downtown Austin. The show offered free tallbools of Red Stripe, Guinness and Jeremiah Weed lemonade. Deerhunter, Ty Segall, Kurt Vile, Glasser and Small Black were slated to play, and it was to last roughly from noon to 7 p.m. It was a loud, drunken mess by the time 5 p.m. rolled around, but I was running back and forth from the stage to the VIP area, recording live audio and taping interviews.
I waited for reporters from publications like MTV-U, Pitchfork and Spin to get what they needed before quickly tapping the artists' shoulders for a brief chat. Some of them mentioned how much more relaxed they were with me than with the fast-paced, high-pressure interviewers from bigger websites and magazines. My ego was giddy.
I dropped by a fancy sushi joint downtown - tipsy, sweaty and exhausted - and had an expensive Japanese beer (alcohol
was one of the few things I actually had to pay for myself) and some fresh sushi. One of the chefs at the bar dared me to eat the entire macaroni and cheese appetizer myself. I was still starving so I accepted. It was the best mac and cheese I've ever had - a Vermont white cheddar concoction - but I found myself bloated and waddling around aimlessly downtown 30 minutes later.
On one of my last days in town I waited at a bus stop around noon, a little hung-over with my hair still wet, hoping to catch a ride to make it to whatever show I had planned for the afternoon. Though I wasn't feeling great physically, I was at the peak of my self-satisfaction and success for the week.
A man limped up to me and asked where I was from and what I was doing in Austin. I explained, and he told me he was a musician, but he had significant loss of brain function from a car accident playing and writing was nearly impossible for him now. He had difficulty speaking, and showed me a dent in his chest from the wreck. He introduced himself as John, and we boarded the bus together as it finally approached the stop.
Ai first I was embarrassed. We were the only two talking and he was loud and hard to understand.I had to constantly ask him to repeat himself,and vice-versa My embarrassment soon turned to shame for being so selfish. This man was truly down on his luck, and I was sitting here worrying about what these strangers might be thinking.
I let go and engaged him in conversation. He was on his way to see his therapist and was getting off at the next stop. He insisted on giving me his phone number to play music sometime. He thanked me profusely for talking with him, and then everything seemed to slow down as he leaned in to hug me, and whispered, "Love is everything. I wish you the best." It was the most heartfelt talk I'd had with a musician all week.
John limped off the bus, and as I rolled away I watched him make his way slowly down the sidewalk. I was stunned that such a minor act of patience and tolerance had made this man so happy, and I remembered to cherish each moment in life — it can all be taken away in a heartbeat. It was the simplest of realizations, and its occurrence in the midst of SXSW was like accidentally stumbling upon the quiet center of a hurricane.
--students descend on the north concourse of Allen Fieldhouse to ensure their camping group keeps its spot in line for the Missouri game. With this contest set to be the last tilt in the foreseeable future of a rivalry that predates the advent of collegiate athletics, students are desperate to secure their seat and witness history.
LIKE RANKER/KANSAN
From the left to the right: Sam Kovzan, sophomore from Leawood and Tansey Schoonover, a freshman from Roswell, Georgia, work on speeches for their communication class while Emily Pfeifer, a freshman from Hays, studies biology. Kovzan said they had been camping for about 30 minutes when several basketball players came out for a press conference.
"I think it's pretty crazy," Colin Vipond, a freshman from Omaha, said. "Being from Nebraska, it's all about football. Now it's all about basketball. I was in shock when I even first heard about camping."
Normally, the camping is not as intense. But for Missouri, everyone is trying to get the best seats possible.
"I just know usually within the first few days people drop like flies, but only one group has dropped out ahead of us so far," Vipond said.
Haley got to split a Pizza Hut cheese pizza, delivered to him by junior guard Elijah Johnson, with another camper. But pizza time is not the only time the campers can catch a glimpse of the players.
"It was good," Kyle Haley, a junior from Hays, said about interacting with the players. "It's different I guess, knowing they're my age. It's kind of unique that they're as popular as they are."
pushed junior forward Thomas Robinson around in a laundry hamper as the players delivered pizza.
"I'm looking at the gods of our school," Tansey Schoonover, a freshman from Roswell, Ga, said as students gathered to watch the men's basketball team walk to practice.
Worse than waking up early is the fear that a camper might oversleep his or her shift. In her freshman year, Maggie Hirschi, a senior from St. Louis, Mo., woke up at 5:55 a.m. for her 6 a.m. camping shift at the Fieldhouse before a game against Texas. She rushed over from her Oliver Hall dorm room but arrived too late, and her group lost its number three camping spot.
The men's and women's bas-
Students try to maintain sanity during hours of camping. Vipond's group pitched in together to purchase an air mattress that
surf the Internet. Sometimes I sleep, if you have an early shift, but it's really hard on this floor."
The north concourse will continue to bustle with student activity until numbers are handed out three hours before tip-off on Saturday.
"Mizzou ones just are always fun because, you see the dedication student have to come to these games." Hirschi said.
INARY War is SS
CLASSIFIEDS 2B
CROSSWORD 4A
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CRYPTOQUIPS 4A
OPINION 5A
Edited by Ian Cummings
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SPORTS 1B
SUDOKU 4A
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Kansas without Missouri is like Batman without The Joker or the Hatfields without the McCoys. Would anyone really care about one without the other? Thanks to a need for attention from one side and a stubbornness from the other, we are about to find out.
Both teams will continue winning basketball games. Missouri might even win a championship in the SEC. But left in the wake of Saturday's game will be a tremendous void that a hundred games against West Virginia or South Carolina could never fill.
When the game ends, win or lose, take one last mental picture of the aftermath. Because if the powerholders get their way, that memory is all your children and grandchildren may ever know of one of the greatest rivalries ever played.
ents, unless stated otherwise, © 2012 The University Daily Kansan
Edited by Taylor Lewis
Get your ticket for the Campus Movie Series at the Kansas Union. Tonight's featured film is "The Muppets."
Today's Weather
Strong winds, mostly cloudy.
Gone with the wind.