Reed’s music carries such an emotional impact that you cannot help but go along for the ride as he lulls you into introspection with intensely quiet emotional vocals then drives you to awareness breaking into compelling rock rhythms and sound that bring you to a peak of empathy with his message. Reeds guitar solo yearns for your understanding of the bitterness and hopelessness reflected in the lyrics of the song, but also counters melodically with shreds of desperate hope and understanding gently woven into the music.

“It’s emotional music. One of the things I love about rock.” said Reed, “It’s so emotional.”

Throughout the interview, Reed gave somewhat caustic mention of the mainstream industry’s ongoing criticism of his music, reminding us that reviews of the album “Berlin” proclaimed it as “the worst album ever” and the “most depressing” music ever.

Reed said, “I understand people don’t like everything you do, but to not like it because of the subject matter, that’s pretty narrow minded.”

Reed went from sardonic to hilarious as he went off to ask if people in Texas didn’t know how to turn off their cell phones and then promptly segued into cow-tipping. Now, that pretty much disconcerted Willner, but he rolled with the punches!

Reed also fielded some questions pre-submitted by the audience. When asked which other album he’s like to re-create today, he mentioned “Magic and Loss,” saying that he valued that contribution as modern rock rarely has dealt with the issue of the loss of a friend. Willner added the insight, “Depressing music can be very healing.” That might sound trite, but I think it’s a wonderful point, and emphasizes again why Reed’s music has been so influential and world changing. In a later panel this same day, the amazing songwriter Shawn Phillips commented that when you write a song about a relationship with another person, you can change a few people, but when you write a song about a relationship with your inner-self, you can change the world. I think Reed’s music is a stunning example of the truth of this statement. (Check back later today for more on Shawn Phillips, both in the panel and his music showcase last night.)

When asked if the way he writes songs has changed over the years, Reed articulately responded, “No.” Fortunately, he went on to elaborate. Reed actually studied acting and film in college, but felt that he wasn’t that good. He started reading to music in his early days, and that became a song. (That explains some things to me…) Reed spoke about the early days of punk, and how he saw it form from people who couldn’t play R&B because they hadn’t heard R&B growing up. So when he played in an early punk band, the group focused on that style, and actually fined each other for playing a blues riff!

Reed talked about how he loves the aggressiveness and steel of punk. He said, “All that young guy stuff — That’s punk. And it’ll exist forever. Where else are they gonna put it? It’s there, or jail.”

Returning the issue of songwriting, Reed said, “I try not to think. Thinking won’t take me where I want to go. I rely on instinct.” And an awesome instinct it is! Despite his dry, sardonic demeanor, Lou Reed is incredibly articulate and well spoken. And like most songwriters, he is incredibly intelligent. So, if the only thing you got from the mainstream media’s coverage of his SXSW interview, then you should know that there’s a more to Lou Reed than his very quotable pith “I have a BA in dope and a PhD. in soul,” the latter seeming to be the main message in many of the headlines.

Another issue that Reed was very passionate about was that of sound, and the lack thereof in the mp3 format. Reed says that if you like good sound, you have to have a good recording unit, good speakers, a good mic, a good amp and so on. If the guy making the record cares about good sound the cost goes up. If you don’t care about sound, then you have mp3. Reed summed it all up with this pithy comment, “It’s like making it easier to make things worse.”Reed did later return to the issue of technology in some more positive aspects, however, saying, “The level of intelligence and integrity mixed in with the computer is opening up whole new avenues of music.”

I walked out of this interview with a newly enhanced appreciation for the intelligence, integrity, emotion and passion of Lou Reed. He is the kind of artist that we at Savvant Music are looking to find about to make the next earth shattering changes in the world of music, and this interview was an inspiring reminder of the significance and righteousness of this cause. Thanks Lou!

Irishman Foy Vance followed Neilsen-Chapman with his one-man show in which Vance filled the room with a full band’s worth of music through the magic of looping. While the looping gimic has been around for a long time, Vance is a master of putting a song together such a way that you don’t even notice how it’s done. Vance layers harmonies and rhythms during interludes that bring increasingly complex melodies, harmonies and groove. As he builds the background harmony, Vance goes from deep baritone to a beautiful high falsetto climbing another interval after each verse. The result is an ever increasing tension and structure that ends with him down on his knees pleading “please don’t go”. It’s great breakup music. I was so carried away in the emotion of the song that I didn’t even notice that while he was down on his knees, he was shutting down the loops (on the floor) to fade the out the song.

Vance showed he could fill the room with music even without the loop machine with his new song asking “How can you break a heart that’s already broken?” This song absolutely gave me goosebumps. A beautiful melody, wonderful chords and rhythms had me asking to buy a CD with this song on it after the gig (no such luck – it’s a brand new song, so you’ll just have to catch him live, but I still got a CD!).

Finally, Belfast rock band The Answer, just blew the place away in a fantastic acoustic guitar set. The incredibly georgeous Cormac Neeson fronts this band with searing, highly emotive vocals with harmonies and a classic rock groove and smoother melodic acoustic riffs from guitarist Paul Mahon and bassist Michael Waters. Drummer James Heatley was on the sidelines for this acoustic gig, but they’ll be in full force at their showcase this Friday. I loved Neeson’s smooth voice in the earlier songs, then with a rocking gospel sound in “Preachin’”. Late in the set they apologize for their lack of experience doing an acoustic set! Huh? The Answer was awesome, and I can’t wait to see them again and in full-rock mode. You’ll hear a lot from this group in the near future! Be glad!

You can catch these last two bands during SXSW at these showcases:

The Answer plays at Latitude 30 this Friday, March 14 at 12:45am (well, technically it’s Saturday, but really it’s a Friday night gig…).

Foy Vance plays that same night at Buffalo Billiards at midnight.

My vision is that Savvant Music will be influenced and really guided by the people who have always told their friends and neighbors about new cool, awesomely hip music. You know, the guy who always seems to have heard of the best groups or the chick who has tickets for the hottest concert because she knew they were great before anybody else did… A lot of these people are writing blogs now, and others are out there in chat rooms and fanzines still telling their buddies about great music via word of mouth. Some are disk jockeys playing late at night or early in the morning when the corporate monoliths aren’t mandating pop playlists from hell.

Well, these are the people we need to nurture and grow into a community which helps us find, support and promote great music of all kinds. And here’s what I learned at SXSW yesterday will help us to do just that.

The panel “Knowing the Audience: Improving Communication Between Artists and Fans” was made up of Steven Sesar, VP marketing and business development at WooMe, Ron Bloom of PodShow and WooMe, Slava Rubin, founder of Indiegogo, Raymond McGlamery, managing partner of Zen Mediagroup/Buddylube (trying really hard not to guess what that means), Vinvin, a french filmmaker and Steven Stokols, CEO and Co-Founder of WooMe.

During this session, McGlamery was waxing eloquently about the information overload coming from social networks and commented, “After awhile you get so much crap you just start deleting it all. You don’t even care if there’s a good band in it… Myspace is no longer a reliable source.” And I have to wonder… was MySpace ever a reliable source for good music? I don’t think so! Maybe at first you could at least get a feel for bands with a good “buzz”, but what does that tell you about whether the music is good? Not much, I’d say!

Ron Bloom commented that there are millions of internet-based programs including blogs, podcasts and internet radio, and there is a layer of people within those programs who are passionate about playing the music you love. Some may have 1000 listeners, may have a million. Once you get past 1000 listeners, you are talking about a show or program the size of an average radio station. Bloom recommends that we cross promote our music between these programs. Find the people who are promoting great music. There are some incredible broadcasts out there. Wow, Ron! That’s exactly what I’m thinking, and exactly why we started Savvant Music. Let me add that there are so many broadcasts, pod casts, video blogs, etc about music, that it becomes rather difficult to find the good amongst the ever increasing pile of, well, not-so-good. That’s where we at Savvant Music are looking for help from the savvy music community! What are the best programs out there? Who has the best ears, and who always recommends the best artists, no matter what the genre? If you are one, or if you know who they are, please share you knowledge here! Leave a comment! I’ll be on those sites tomorrow checking them out.

In fact, while I’ve diverged to this topic… If you know of any really incredible artists we should check out at SXSW 2008, please let us know asap!We check back on comments all day long and are dying for input on what artists to go see this week!

Back to the panel… Steven Sesar reminds artists to also remember to engage with your fan base. And Vinvin told us what we all should know — today, if you’re not on the internet, you’re dead. Vinvin recommends video blogging for artists. This enables fans to feel that they really get to know the artist — meet his cat, watch him play guitar. As an example, he mentioned Deepak Chopra – Chopra doesn’t need to talk to his fans, but he does, because it makes a difference to existing fans, and enables him to reach new people.

Steven Stokols pointed out that it’s the internet users who really want to engage with the artists. For example using Meebo where the artist is actually talking to you. And of course, he then plugged his company WooMe as being even better. I’ll have to look at WooMe more closely. The only thing it really asked me when I signed up was if I was interested in Girls or Boys or both. Does this mean it’s a dating site? I told it girls and boys, because I’m looking for people who care about music and I don’t care what gender they are!

McGlamery pointed out that in the mainstream music industry today, the record labels often force bands to do fan interaction work and that makes artists unhappy and resentful, especially when they don’t really see the value. Artists need to be sure the labels are using your site in a way that the you and your fans real benefit and appreciate. He claims that most artists really don’t search out and understand the fan interaction technologies, especially the bigger they get!

Ron Bloom pointed out that in the old days music was packaged in albums, and the album told a story from the music, to the artwork on the cover, to the liner notes on the inside. Now the technology online enables us to deliver these stories in a different way to our fans, if we but chose to do so! You can provide fans with a short, unplugged version of a song you’re working on – let your fans see what you’re working on; let them contribute to the second verse!

With today’s tools, independent artists have a real advantage — Blooms says “If you want to make a living as an artists, there’s no better time in history to do it.” Bet we could have some interesting discussions around that comment! But, in general, I think Bloom is right on!

McGlamery wrapped up by reminding artists not to underestimate your power to participate in that dialog between you and your fans.

Well, there was also a really cool panel called The Weird Turn Pro: Crowdsourcing For Creatives from Derek Powazek, CEO of Pixish and Fray, but I’m already late for today’s sessions so I have to run! I’ll be back with more soon!

Cheers! from Anny

Now, there must be about 400 blogs out there tonight (I don’t know, I didn’t count them) blasting Ms. Lacy’s performance, and if you’re interested in the gory details, see any of the links below. Several of the bloggers seemed to feel that the problem was that Lacy is female and was being discriminated against as such, or that she isn’t a geek, so didn’t know how to ask geek-relevant questions.

Lacy’s problem with the crowd at SXSW was not that she’s not a geek, nor that she’s female (although the hair twirling was a bit weird…). The problem was that she is a poor interviewer. I started really searching for one truely open quesion about 15 minutes into the interview, and did not hear a single question from that point on which left Zuckerberg anything to say but “Yes, Sarah, I do agree with your presumption of what I’m thinking” or “No, Sarah, I am not aligned with the words you just tried to put into my mouth”. I thought Zuckerberg did an admirable job of trying to actually provide his own answers to some Lacy’s closed questions, but she responded by interrupting him and didn’t really appear to be listening to what he actually said.

I also think Zuckerberg did a fine job of politely suggesting (subtly at first, then more directly later) that she ask him a question, but she never took the hint. The audience, however, did take the hint and was very pissed off by the time took a more direct approach. At his suggestion that she actually ask him a question if she wanted him to answer, the crowd erupted in applause (some standing) because most of us were terribly frustrated and had been for the duration of the “interview.”

Another big problem was that Lacy seemed to want to tell us her opinion of what was going on at Facebook, about what happened when she talked to Zuckerberg (and how bad an interviewee he was despite her valiant efforts ) and about her book about Zuckerberg (which I’m not going to link to, because it pisses me off that incompetence might breed links to Amazon in this case). Frankly, I wanted to hear Zuckerberg tell us about Facebook. Instead, we heard Lacy telling Zuckerberg what she thought he should say.

What may have most contributed to the crowd turning so ugly, however, was that most of the people there have a lot of respect for Mark Zuckerberg, and Lacy’s behavior during the interview was really quite disrespectful, condescending and inattentive to this brilliant young man that so many here at SXSW admire. She interrupted him constantly, she criticized his short answers to her closed (or sometimes pre-answered by Lacy) questions, she told a story about him being so nervous that he sweated profusely, and she referred to an executive he’s hired as the “token grown up” at Facebook. I thought that was a pretty in your face insult to Zuckerberg, but maybe I’m just sensitive. But so was the crowd. So there you go.

Enough about the Sarah Lacy train wreck.

On to what Zuckerberg actually did say in the few opportunities afforded him…

Zuckerberg reiterated his theme of Facebook is about communication, not valuation and buyout opportunities. He emphasized his mission to build a platform uponwhich world problems can be solved. It’s a big bold statement, but I admire the man for thinking big. It might be rare for many of us to actually have a significant impact on world problems or social issues, but if no one thinks about tackling big issues then no big issues will be conquered ever…

In support of this mission, Facebook has started to launch the platform in differnt languages with a Spanish language version recently launched and a French language version to be launched within a week.

Zuckerberg also very candidly discussed privacy issues that are percistent and challenging for Facebook. Zuckerberg feel that Facebook must give people full and very granular control over what information they share and with whom they share it, and that most of the issues to date have been a result of insufficient user control in these areas. Zuckerman suggests that trust is a key element of Facebook’s design, and that features will support and enable users who have demonstrated trustworthiness to communicate faster and with more people. So, for example, while a user may be limited in the number of invitations they can issue, the more people who accept your invites in Facebook, then the more invites you offer. This being based on the assumption that you are a responsible inviter. (Is that a word? I didn’t think so.)

Of special interest to me was the question regarding rumors of negociations by Facebook for music play and sales integration. Zuckerberg claimed not to know (right…) and said they were “talking with people” about alot of things, but that “he has nothing to talk about.” Hmmm… sounds like something could be going on, but he was pretty evasive.

At one point Zuckerberg was asked about whether Facebook drove a very high valuation as a possible barrier to an undesired buy out, Zuckerber said it’s not that Facebook is trying so hard not to be bought, “it’s just that we’re not focused on that. We’re focused on building an application.” And he reiterated that the vision of communication and connection is what is really important to him. This made me really like the guy. Because I feel very much that way about my company. It’s not about becoming a billionaire (although that wouldn’t suck). It’s about making a difference in the world.

I think it’s a shame that Zuckerbergs message may have been clouded under the smoke from Ms. Lacy’s poor interviewing skills. I hope we can walk away remembering the important stuff, but I’m guessing the train wreck will be much more remembered than the comments. Oh well.

Here are some links if you want to know more about the SXSW Interactive Interview-Slayer Revolt — you won’t find much about Zuckerberg’s message there, I’m afraid, and I disagree with some of their conclusions about exactly what went wrong, but here they are…

The Underwire by Lewis Wallace

Master of 500 Hats – Dave McClure

YouTube video of the clueless Ms. Lacy demonstrating a distinct lack of poise and empathy in a post-train-wreck interview.

The Buzz Machine – Jeff Jarvis-this one at least gives some insight into the message Zuckerberg was trying to communicate.

The problem is, they’re hard to find! At SXSW even industry “outsiders” such as we are likely to get “tips” on artists to see — after all, most of the attendees are there to promote themselves or someone, but the tips we get tend to fall into one of two categories: “buzz” bands that everyone “hip” has heard about, or “pet”: bands being promoted by themselves, their management, their friends or their label. The problem with the latter is that it’s so hit and miss, mostly miss. And “buzz” bands are the industry darlings — not what we are looking for here at Savvant Music.

Another option is to listen to hours and hours of online samples provided by the good folks at SXSW and hope you find something interesting, preferably fascinating. Then, if you do, hope (often in vain) that they’re decent live!

This might make you wonder why we bother, but the truth i that this is the problem no matter where you look for music. The reason we go to SXSW is that there are so many bands there (around 1700 showcases) that the filtering and discovery process is marvelously compressed (and often exhausting).

And this is why we are here ad what you need us for — to help filter through all this music and to find those special artists, overlooked by the mainstream industry — artists you’ll be really revved to hear, that blow your mind.

Meanwhile, if you know some really amazing artists we should be sure to look at this coming week at SXSW, please let us know! You can comment here on our blogs, or you can send me email at: anny (at) savvantmusic.com!

See ya in Texas, y’all!

Anny