With plastic ivy, photo negatives and polaroids dangling from the ceiling, Ivytide hit the stage at Theatre Fairmount on Saturday to an adoring home crowd. Celebrating the release of their latest album, portable darkroom, the room was in ultra-high spirits with groups of young girls erupting in screams whenever singer, Nathan Gagné, directed his flirtatious lyrics to their filming phones. 

Death to All. A field of beans. Thousands of screeching fans throw the hammer down as the world’s best Chuck Schuldiner lookalike assumes the position. Wild.

Tribute bands are horrible. The kind of people who choose to dress up as famous musicians just because they’re bored of pulling 40 hours a week in a stained office chair make me sick. I mean sure, who doesn’t look in the mirror and look back at themselves with a stiff Jim Morrison face every once in a while, but there really are a lot of perverts out there.

SXSW had a different feeling this year as artists pulled out of the festival in support of Palestine; Raytheon, a weapons company, had events at the festival, and though the rest of the artists came because of the opportunity SXSW provides them, some expressed that they do not support the US providing weapons to Israel and demanded a cease fire.

Live music is a strange form of entertainment, if you really stop to consider it. As an audience member, yes, you pay for the privilege of being entertained by a band or performer whose works you enjoy, and yes, ideally, these performers earn something in exchange for that work. But to get on stage and run through your most known songs, night after night for months, sometimes year after year, is a strange desire. It would seem to me that for most musicians, for whom private jets and sold out stadiums aren't the norm, the promise of payment isn't generally enough -- as cliche as it sounds, you really have to do it for the love. 

‘Does Casa del Popolo have a generator?’. ‘Does it have A/C?’. These were notions that certainly went through spectators’ minds as they ran into the venerable show bar during a fierce electrical storm that left parts of the city in a blackout. At thirty degrees plus humidity, Casa’s ventilation would be put to the test, hosting three indie rock outfits whose high energy would push the system to its limit. It was worth it.