South By Southwest Hip Hop 2005 Mar. 16 - 20 Austin, TX Be There to Be Down!

Peace to Tosin of Sinful Designs for the flyers.

Well the fruits of a couple of months of labor, and years of pondering and hard thinking are all gonna come together next week in Austin, Texas. If you have never been there it's like an oasis overflowing with beer and barbecue for a few all too short days in March every year. The South by Southwest conference and festival catches a lot of flack from those who lack the game to get into the bitch, but for those who have mastered the fine art of festival infiltration like myself, it's fucking nirvana.

Seriously, I don't care what kind of music you like. I don't care if you're a fucking vegan hippy dippy type. If you like beer, you'll love SXSW cuz the shit don't stop flowing for like 5 days straight. All day all night, people throw hellafied parties with free beer and food. All night you got incredible line ups and like hundreds of thousands of millions of clubs. All day you got panels and shit that you can pretend to learn from and the trade show is also the shit. Seriously, if you are the type of person who loses pens like I do, just hit the SXSW trade show every year and stock up, everybody gives away fuckin' pens. It rules. And magazines. You'll carry home a redwood worth of magazines if you really want to, and I do, every year.

I missed a couple of years. Three years ago I broke my frickin' collar bone the Monday before and couldn't even utilize my press pass. I missed it in 1996 cuz I moved to Amsterdam. Other than that, I've been there pretty much every year since 1990. Back then I'd stay on peoples floors (that year literally I slept in my stationwagon with two dudes the first night which sucked and then as we stood on a corner discussing getting a cheap hotel with the last of our money some girl walks up and says something like "Don't I know you?" And i was like, "Yeah" and I did know her, from fucking screaming at her on the street in New Orleans during Mardi Gras a few weeks before. When me and my friends pretended to have a band and ended up opening for L-7 on Fat Tuesday, shit was silly. Anyway, rockers get love at SXSW. So she let us sleep on her floor while she slept with a member of the Buck Pets and in the morning she woke up and there was some noise downstairs so she ran outide down the stairs, picked up a pipe out of the alley and smashed their windows out. And as we groggily awoke to this the fucking cops came, it was fucked.)

So I used to stay on peoples floors and then like upped my game to press pass status and got some family in Austin, or actually first I lived in Austin for a while... And well shit, SXSW is just a fucking 5 day party for those who can handle it.

I started helping my man Andre Walker back in like 1993 book the hip hop shows, and then last year I hit 'em up and asked if I could bring some Texas rappers through, they were all for it and this year we got carte blanche (sp?).

So below please find the final list. Everyone should show up and I generally run a tight ship show wise. Artists are on time, sound is good, people are happy. In fact MY soundman (Alan Cunningham) is handling all my big shows so its guaranteed good. If you want to see what the hell is going on in Texas right baut now and if you want to see some groups from outside of Texas who I happen to like (or like, who I thought might bring a few fools in), come out.

Try to guess which groups on the list were "suggested" by SXSW. There's only a couple actually. The um, goofy ones... Maybe only one actually. Thats not a shot at SXSW just the goofy ones who don't like their headlining set times cuz they are GOOFY BEEYATCHES NOBODY LIKES ANYWAY. Try to guess. I want to fight someone, on Sunday though, after it's all said and done. Austin is peaceful, we will keep the peace. Serg from Somanyshrimp coming tho and if he needs to steamroll somebody, I got his back.

Actually I don't want to fight anyone. I'm on cloud nine right now. SXSW goes down next week and I want to meet as many of you as possible. Below you can figure out where I'll be and I won't be hard to find. I am 7 foot 6 inches with a blue shirt on and a soulja rag. Holla.

Wednesday, March 16th, Backroom
Bun B & MDDL FNGZ, Port Arthur/Houston
Devin the Dude and the Odd Squad, Houston
Swishahouse, Houston
CHOPS, Philly
Play-N-Skillz, Dallas
Basswood Lane, Austin
Abstraq the Grindologist, Beaumont
HSE, Houston
Barely Broke Family, Austin
DJ Rapid Ric and DJ Chill in between sets, Austin/Houston

Thursday, March 17th, The Vibe (all live bands with rappers)
ESG, Houston
Bavu Blakes, Garland/Austin
Money Waters, Dallas
Zin, Houston
Mojoe, San Antonio
LRJ, Houston

Thursday, March 17th, Zero Degrees
Diplo of Hollertronix, Philly
DJ Lt. Dan, Delaware
DJ Rapid Ric, Austin - with Magno and Chalie Boy
DJ Chill, Houston
Fingathing, UK
Nick Nack, Austin - with Bavu Blakes and Enfoe

Friday, March 18th, Fox and Hound
Slim Thug, Houston
Chingo Bling, Houston
Trae, Houston
Grit Boys, Houston
DSR, Dallas
South Park Coalition, Houston
Ovadose, Gary, Indiana – formerly of Grind Family
Ghostwriters, Houston
MC Fatal, Austin
Deep
DJ Chill/Rapid Ric between sets, Houston/Austin

Friday, March 18th, Zero Degrees
Josh Martinez, Sleep, Chiccarones, Canada
Studemont Project, Houston
Grand Buffet, Pittsburgh
Lunar Heights, San Francisco
NOOK, Austin
No Luck Club, Vancouver
Kevin Coval, Chicago

Saturday Night, March 19th, International Caribbean Lights
Daara J, Senegal
C-Mon & Kypski, Netherlands
Th’ Corn Gangg, Canada
Cartel de Santa, Mexico
Eternia, Canada
Moodruff, Canada
DJ Panko, Spain between sets

Saturday, March 19th, Zero Degrees
Frank N Dank, Detroit
Non Phixion, New York
Zion I, Bay Area
Scavone, New York
Tre Hardson, LA
Tahir, Tallahassee
Doujah Raze, New York
Malkovich of B.L.X., LA
ATX Records Click, Austin

CLICK HERE FOR ALL THE SXSW INFO Also click there for venue addresses and any other info you may need. You can pay at the door at all shows, but get there early cuz if you are late you might miss out. Don't front on me people, come holla... And uhhh disclaimer... everythang subject to change, but shouldn't...