Many more pictures of this concert will be available for viewing courtesy of Juan Duarez. He shot this show right alongside me, going so far as scooching over to offer me a better shot of the DJ station. His commitment to shooting the show as well as possible was obvious, and he covered the sets of multiple DJs that I missed. If you don’t like his shots, look at photos Instagramed by concertgoers (Instagram) and the friends and family of the night’s performers. They’re intimate, taken with care and attention. They make my call of duty as a concert coverage provider at least a little more redundant.

Likewise, there’s a better way to experience the songs that were played last night than listening to the live, bootleg audio available in the player at the bottom of this post. Having just opined on the critical importance of modern live audio engineering in fueling an evolution in popular music, offering such a crude reproduction of these songs is some kind of a surreal editorial statement, or a joke, or a lame attempt to draw more hits to this story from people searching stuff like “free download baauer harlem shake mp3.” If you want to know what Baauer (born Harry Rodrigues) sounds like, his music is definitely accessible. (YouTube) He’ll probably appear within a reasonable distance of your region some time in the near future, possibly on this year’s “Worst Of Both Worlds” tour alongside Danny Brown. That’s assuming copyright troubles (NYTimes) don’t derail Rodrigues’ career, but that obviously won’t actually happen. 

Yet it seemed so important to see this show. Rumors that Kanye West would perform as a surprise guest certainly upped the ante for a brief, naiveté-laden moment. But for the significance of his one single alone, that damn Harlem Shake, ignoring this event would be ignorant.

The song, defined as to include a sprawling set of associated phenomena, has revealed the current nature of modern mainstream music media. This fact was the subject of an interview conducted by myself on Annenberg Radio News, with Kevin Driscol, a PhD researcher who’s specialized in the science behind digitally-distributed song and dance crazes. (Annenberg Radio News) While all new music can be understood in the context of a marketing and public relations network that includes YouTube and other digital distribution companies as the basic stuff of its existence, Baaeur’s typhoon of professional recognition illustrates that situation boldly. 

Having already steered your attention away from the audio at the page, I will now renege that suggestion to say it’s worth hearing out if you want to know what Baauer's live performance actually entails. Every unique performance is interpreted in a broad context, and whether you note innovative artisanship in his work or think he’s a monstrously overhyped run-of-the-mill tool who plops a few bells and whistles on otherwise genero beats will be a subjective process.

As an experience, the show that ended early this morning was irrefutably shaped by the space it occupied. It was an absolute cavern of a venue, repurposed from its normal commercial use for the sake of this ‘secret’ show. The front entrance bore “Premium Liquors” as its permanent neon label. Renovation included the addition of a laser projector, full bar, tonnes of speaker cones and almost nothing else. An odd sheet of white tarp hung in solitude from one rafter, and those standard small fences to keep the audience’s clumping activities regular.

The sound quality was devastatingly fantastic, towards the end with the speakers. Moving further away prompted considerations as to why this concert would be thrown in exactly such a manner. Surely interested financial sponsors were in no short supply. Then why was the light array in this building reduced to a shade just under 'Dracula’s Lair?'

Most importantly, the stage area’s design and position was such that few attendees had even a sliver of sightline to view performers. Extremely few — no more than 60 at any given time, out of a veritable sea of dancers all hungering for a look from the front row. The talent was squished between towers of speakers, slumped with no elevation at one end of the facility. This screamed to be recognized as a consciously specified element of the event, encouraging members of the crowd to turn inwards, affording attendees anonymity while simultaneously ratcheting up the commoditized value of seeing the showcased superstars.

Baauer was named one of the “Must See” acts of SXSW 2013. (The Daily Beast) It’s pretty reasonable to guess the implication of that isn't this show, in a three-hundred yard industrial tube of a venue packed with high-hundreds of bodies all sheeting sweat and one bathroom per sex (it got grisly) was for everyone. It was a weird show, and inscrutably told volumes about how performances at this kinda-cultural-Mecca work. If his standard for shows in the future resembles this, it’ll be a real surprise.

 

Follow the East By Southeast series in realtime multimedia form via Meograph.

Click here to read all of Neon Tommy's coverage of SXSW 2013.

Read more of NT's show coverage here.

Reach Staff Cartoonist Graham Clark here. Follow him on Twitter here.

LISTEN: Click the play button below to hear a live recording of Baauer's set.