Once the dream of attending SXSW started to become a reality, I soon realized I had no idea what I was doing.
Sure, I know that a massive amount of musicians and music lovers descend upon Austin, Texas, for about a week in the middle of March. But, other than that, I didn’t really understand the logistics that go into attending the festival.
My friend, Sean, and I know a couple of people who reside in Austin, so the lodging aspect is hopefully all taken care of. But as for actually deciding where to go, what to see and how much it would cost, I was clueless.
Thankfully, I was able to answer most of my questions via the information superhighway.
One of my biggest worries early on was the price of attendance. As it turns out, there are basically three levels of concert-goers — people with badges who can pretty much go anywhere they want, people with wristbands who can get into most shows with relative ease, and then the people like me who wish to spend as little money as possible.
Thankfully, there are about as many unofficial (read: free) parties at SXSW as there are official ones. Generally, the free parties run during the day, and the ones that charge a cover are later at night. Needless to say, I’ll be doing most of my concert-going during the daylight hours.
For more on the festival, here are some links I found pretty helpful.
- A solid SXSW primer.
- A more in-depth look at how to prepare. Make sure you read all three posts — they’re not all sequential.
- More from the same girl on her actual experiences at SXSW — five posts in all.
- A wimpier approach to planning.
- A possibly even wimpier survival guide.
- A list of all the bands who will officially be in town.
- The unofficial schedule to this year’s SXSW, including all the free parties.
- A shit-ton of free music — the SXSW torrents. There will be a second torrent posted within the next day or so.
Later this week, I’ll post a list of my recommendations for free shows worth checking out.
Infinite Shuffle 
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