SXSWorld
Issue link: https://sxsw.uberflip.com/i/81862
Pages from the by Jason Cohen 2002-2006: Music, War, the Internet and Mumblecore SXSW founder Roland Swenson didn't really prompt Neil Young to make his 2006 protest album Living With War. Jonathan Demme—part of an extraordinary string of geniuses, including Robert Plant in 2005 and Pete Townshend in 2007, that even the most jaded lifers in the SXSW offi ce could get moony over. But for Swenson, nobody meant more than Young. "Th e chance to introduce one of my heroes was daunting," Swenson says. "I stayed up late writing a long, mildly overwrought speech covering the importance of the song 'Ohio'—how it did so much to crystallize opinion against the war in Vietnam. It had demonstrated to me for the fi rst time just how powerful a force music could be." Operation Iraqi Freedom had been going on since just a few days after SXSW 2003, so to conclude his introduction, Swenson threw in an aside: "Mr. Young, if you can hear me [backstage], we need another song." But for a while, it sure seemed that way. Young was SXSW's keynote that year, in conversation with director Says Swenson, "I felt a sinking sensation as I realized I had not only put my hero on the spot, I had also done one of the worst things you can do to an artist: compare his early work to what he is or isn't doing right now." Mere weeks later, Young wrote and recorded Living With War, which SXSW SCRAPBOOK then received a May 8 rush-release. "My phone started ringing with reporters asking if I thought I had anything to do with it," remembers Swenson. "I did my best to play down that idea. I said that at most, I was like the rooster who crowed before the sun rose—but I sure didn't make the sun rise. Still, stories appeared across the world quoting my introduction to Young's keynote. Finally, Young gave an interview where he credited billionaire Steve Bing for the inspiration of the album, and my 15 minutes of fame were over." Politics and war had been on people's mind throughout the festival— and for each of the four years before. When Salon's Andrew O'Hehir contemplated the SXSW 2006 fi lms: Al Franken: When God Spoke ("forces you to revisit those dark, dark days" of the the 2004 Bush/ Kerry election) and the Pixies documentary loudQUIETloud ("a story of resistance and rebellion grown old and adapting to changing times"), he concluded SXSW was "in its own unthreatening, vintage-clothes- 'n'-cappucino manner... launching one protest after another against the " A few lucky internationals had made deals with acts like The Strokes and White Stripes the year before, when they weren't so famous," says Swenson. "So the word of mouth in the U.K. and Europe on SXSW was stronger than ever." Swenson says now. "I was pretty pleased with myself, but as I crossed the stage and shook hands with him, I noticed a bit of steel in his eyes. I thought to myself 'Uh-oh.' " Young's fellow Ontarian Michael Hollett, of NXNE and NOW mag- azine, whispered to Swenson, "Say, you kind of challenged him there." But Young was gracious, saying onstage that he gets "a lot of feedback, and I just got some more." 8 SXSW ORLD / M ARCH M USIC 201 1 "I was quite surprised by the level of applause from the audience," way America is right now, and how it's being run." On the Saturday of SXSW 2003, an estimated 7,000 anti-war pro- testors moved from a rally at the Texas capitol building to Congress Avenue, merging with (and in some cases already a part of) the collec- tive Sixth Street masses (though the Chicago Sun-Times' Jim DeRogatis wondered why no showcasing musicians formally joined the rally). Th at year's artist's panel, held just a few days after the Dixie Chicks' Natalie Maines told a London audience that she was ashamed President Bush