Never have I seen musicians so excited to be playing for their audience.  One of the most unique experiences yesterday was watching Band of Horses play a beautiful set inside the Presbyterian church.  The setting and the music seemed to fit perfectly and they started the set by asking “So, what do you want to talk about?”  Maybe it was the bands I happened to watch but I felt all shows had a level of intimacy and authenticity that just left the audience with a feeling of euphoria after it was all over.  During Ra Ra Riot’s gig last night at the Club De Ville, Wes jumped into the crowd to finish off their final song and told the fans ”I need your high fives!” as he jumped around seemingly wanting to connect with everyone in the audience.

With this many bands, people, partying and line-ups you would think people would be frazzled and rowdy but everyone seems to thoroughly enjoy being here and respect their fellow festival goers as well as the craft of the musicians they are here to see.  I love it and am very excited to know where all the talent showcased here this week will end up in the next year before SXSW 2011!

To engage a consumer to purchase anything to do with their favorite band as opposed to easily downloading it the band needs a cohesive idea, concept and quality product to put out.  Gone are the days of simple front and back panel CD covers, consumers now are looking for an entire experience to engage with from deluxe album packaging, great looking t-shirts, collectible posters, vinyls, and interactive web sites all with quality art.  Successful packaging has evolved beyond the simple container.   Basically if you can handcraft a quality product, and put a  great story into it, people will pay up for the merchandise and the album.  Strong ideas create longevity.

One panel guest spoke nostalgically about the smell of a freshly opened CD and how it smells like Fritos!  Hope that is a good thing!