This article originally appeared on Boston Band Crush ).
The Motion Sick give us their motivation for making the trip to Austin for SXSW. Give them a good send-off tonight (3.6.9) at Church of Boston – they are headlining a stacked bill with: MEandJOANCOLLINS, The Luxury, REVERSE, The Lights Out and they’ll be on WAAF (107.3 or 97.7) on Sunday from 11:30pm-12.
SXSW Interview Questions:
1. Where/When are you playing?
03/19/09 Green Light Go Showcase @ Fran’s Hamburgers 3-6 PM
3-6 PM
Acoustic performances by The Handsome Family, Ben Mallott, Robert Harrison of Future Clouds and Radar, Golden Bloom, Aimee Bobruk, Static of the Gods, Graham Wilkinson and the Underground Township, and The Motion Sick
03/20/09 SXSW Official Party Sponsored by Berklee College of Music @ Friends
208 E. 6th St.
Austin, TX
Kid:nap:kin 5:05-5:25
Melissa Ferrick 4:35-4:55
Annie Lynch and the Beekeepers 4:05-4:25
The Volunteers 3:35-3:55
The Hollow Sound 3:05-3:25
Aaron Sinclair (of Frank Smith) 2:35-2:55
SuperVolcano 2:05-2:25
The Motion Sick 1:35-1:55
Ma’ayan Castel 1:05-1:25
Free with a SXSW badge or advance RSVP
RSVP to: alumniaffairs@berklee.edu
03/20/09 Pete’s Bar Austin, TX
2. How did you get your SXSW gigs?
Respectively: we work with Green Light Go for publicity, our guitarist Patrick learned to play his augmented triads at Berklee, and I peruse Craigslist.
3. Is this your first time at SXSW?
We went down last year and played 4 shows. One of them got a writeup in Strangeglue:
4. If you’ve gone before, have you performed and how did it go?
We’ve unfortunately attended very little of the conference. When we’ve been down in Austin, we’ve been pretty much working non-stop. Last year, we did catch a few nice shows: Billy Bragg, She and Him, Le Loup, and some others.
5. How important do you think it is to have an “official” showcase?
I think it’s more important on paper than it is in actuality. People are generally impressed by official shows, but the reality is, the shows are all what you make of them. You have to work hard to get people there and make sure to make the contacts you want to make while at the conference.
6. What do you hope to achieve by playing at SXSW?
Last year was kind of a learning experience. I think we’ve got a better sense of how to take advantage of the festival and meet more people.
7. How do you plan to use the conference (beyond your show) to promote yourself?
Ideally, I wish we had the opportunity to attend the whole conference. I think it is actually a very important part of networking at SXSW. It’s really quite tough to stand out amongst the
hundreds (thousands?) of bands playing. A lot of bands expect that they can just show up, play a 30 minute gig and get a flood of label offers and I’m pretty sure that has never happened to anyone. We just hope to take advantage of our short time in Austin (less than 2 days) to talk to as many people as we can.
8. Are you attending any of the actual conference? Are you attending other shows, what shows/bands are you looking forward to?
I don’t think we’ll have the opportunity to attend much of anything this year. I do look forward to sharing the stage with many of our fine co-showcasers.
9. Do you expect that Boston will have a strong showing this year?
I think that the music world in Boston is better than it has been in the 10+ years that I’ve lived here. This will be reflected at conferences like SXSW and CMJ this year and for at least several
years to come. I am really excited to be part of what’s going on right now because I think we, as a city, have a chance to make a strong national musical mark.
