Sunday peaked at 94 degrees and wrapped somewhere in the 40s – we’re used to it. In cutoffs and sweaters, the Chronicle music team caught hedonistic electroclash, rambunctious UK garage, and two killer rock & rollers from Cardiff, among others, at the end of SXSW’s first – now only – weekend. Outside these fresh discoveries, Jazz Re:freshed OUTernational returned for its 10th annual showcase of British jazz, and Hayley Williams popped up at Assembly Hall – not to perform, but to celebrate a different kind of decade milestone.
Jazz Re:freshed OUTernational Celebrates 10 Years at SXSW
Jazz Re:freshed OUTernational’s 10th anniversary showcase of British jazz proved as fulfilling as past years’ events. Zola Marcelle taught the crowd a traditional Zimbabwean greeting, then she and her trio treated them to a heartfelt, bilingual set of groove, jazz, and soul. Singer/bassist Amy Gadiaga, a Paris native of Senegalese, Malian, and Gambian ancestry, followed with a bop quartet that salted a set of originals with covers of standards “Bye Bye Blackbird” and “Someday My Prince Will Come.” Newcastle quintet Knats mirrored Gadiaga’s keys/bass/drums/trumpet instrumentation, but scanned Stanley Clarke more than Ron Carter. The addition of poet Cooper Robson to the band’s high-energy attack helped them stand out as wholly different from their colleagues. Nigerian-born guitarist Femi Temowo’s relationship with Jazz Re:freshed goes back almost a quarter century, and it’s easy to hear why: The infusion of instrumental firepower into Afrobeat conjured the most scintillating show of the night. Hotly tipped drummer/producer Mackwood and his band were almost prototypical Jazz Re:freshed artists – equally comfortable with tradition, drum-and-bass, broken beat, and hip-hop in a way that brings the original swing into the modern era. Show closer Werkha wielded guitar, bass, and Ableton Live with a reedist and drummer to turn the night into a dance party that left the crowd sated. Here’s to another decade. – Michael Toland
Luke Tyler Shelton Proves More Than a Sanguine Seventies Croon
“We thought we’d try to work through as many songs as possible, so it might be a little all over the place,” warned Luke Tyler Shelton midway through his set. He seemed to surprise even himself by making it through seven songs in his allotted 30-minute showcase Sunday night at Antone’s. He also held to the promise of unexpected versatility. On his debut EP, Blue Sky, Shelton unfurls a daydream California folk that hearkens the Seventies songwriters of his native L.A., but onstage the 26-year-old proved he could punch with more power. To kick off, he transformed the loping ramble of “A Bus Ain’t a Home” into a full-blown, low-down honky-tonk sound with his fourpiece, before dipping into standout ode “Anna.” Baby-faced and soft-spoken, Shelton could benefit from some harmonies to accent his sweet melodies and calming croon, but the weeping pedal steel across “Feeling Always Down” served almost as well. Switching to electric guitar to launch into the blues boogie of Fleetwood Mac’s “Tell Me All the Things You Do” shot a jamming jolt into the setlist, though, and the spectacular take on David Crosby’s “Traction in the Rain” melted with loneliness and soulful touch. Closing with his EP’s title track and the mellow country sweep of “Love on My Mind” reset the sound, but Shelton showed he’s more than just a sanguine voice. – Doug Freeman
Hayley Williams and Brian O’Connor Chart Their DIY Business Journey
“Misery Business” didn’t just introduce Hayley Williams’ multi-octave vocal range to multiple generations of pop-punk fans – it also influenced an entire scene’s haircuts. Inspired by Japan’s Harajuku girls like Gwen Stefani before her, the Paramore singer tapped stylist Brian O’Connor to, as he put it, “shred her bangs to high heaven,” and an orange-and-white feathered phenomenon was born. Countless iconic looks later, the besties-turned-business partners talked 10 years of their hair dye company, Good Dye Young, at Create and Cultivate’s Future Summit. Chatting briefly with the woman entrepreneur platform’s founder, Jaclyn Johnson, the duo underlined their origins as DIY kids and the learning curve that comes with starting a business from that background. “We have had several of these tower moments that just felt like, ‘Oh my God, are we the dumbest people in this industry?’” Williams admitted, adding that they initially hired “dudes that didn’t know shit about hair” in their early business owner insecurity. Only recently, she said, have they assembled a team with specific beauty – and subculture – know-how. Same goes for merging Good Dye Young with Williams’ day job. While O’Connor stressed that, “Yes, it’s her likeness, her name, but it’s not what we push to motivate [consumers],” Williams said confidence that the decade-old company officially has “its own legs” inspired them to create a neon yellow shade specifically for her recent solo album Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party, and a deep purple hue for her friend, the rapper Rico Nasty. It’s hard not to cringe at a celebrity brand, but at least Williams and O’Connor sell a product they know something about. The proof was in the rainbow sitting at attention inside Assembly Hall. – Carys Anderson
JayaHadADream Gives a Cold Lesson
A breezy Sunday evening littered with gusty wind couldn’t overpower the ice-cold tour de force JayaHadADream demonstrated during the British Music Embassy’s BBC Introducing showcase. The teacher-turned-rapper from Cambridge performed most of debut full-length Happiness From Agony, a project which vindicates her professed enjoyment for writing music without concern for genres. She impressively tackled a variety of sounds during her 31-minute set: grime (“Bug”), rambunctious garage (“The Bank”), melodic UK drill (“Twiggy)”, and an interpolation of J. Cole deep cut “St. Tropez” (“At the Abbey”). Similar to many talented MCs from England, the 26-year-old of Jamaican and Irish descent can readily switch her flow like a Swiss Army knife to cut through different beats. Her rawness and introspection were also on full display as she used verses to give a window into her life as a youth. “Twiggy,” a standout song dedicated to her grandmother, offers a calming piano complementing JayaHadADream’s laid-back, sharp punchlines. The chorus reveals youthful nights listening to Notorious B.I.G. and a hilarious line shortly after stating she won’t “sell no kitty”: “Why you say fuck me for like Fiddy?” The first woman nominee for Best Grime Act at the MOBO Awards offered herself a small pat on the back before closer “Nothing’s Changed”: “I’m in America doing music, so I think a lot has changed.” – Derek Udensi
Miss Bashful Brings Glittered Electroclash Euphoria
As cyclone-strength winds swept through the city last night, Miss Bashful’s candy-coated techno set made it clear we weren’t in Austin anymore. The excitement around the Mexico-born, Houston-raised songstress was hard to miss: The German Music Export presenter mentioned that her set had sparked the most interest of the night, and by showtime fans were already crowding Speakeasy’s windows for a glimpse. With electroclash mainstay DJ Luca Eck behind the decks, Miss Bashful commanded her bedazzled mic, weaving fan-favorite cuts like “Ride That Beat,” “NEIN SCHATZ,” “Muschi Muschi,” and “Glamour Snobby” throughout the set. Pausing between songs for a sip of champagne, the Berlin-based provocateur made the set feel less like a performance and more like a night out with friends – dancing across the stage, hyping the crowd, and even locking hands with a fan at one point. The room was dancing at full tilt, and even those who looked like they’d only just stumbled in soon gave into the brash pulse of her high-voltage club sound. With her sunglasses fixed firmly in place, she carried herself with the decadent, after-hours spirit of early Aughts recession pop on speed, delivering a knowingly provocative brand of high-gloss club hedonism. Ears might’ve left ringing, but viva la fiesta! – Miranda Garza
Ella Ion Walks a Heavier Folk-Rock Trail
Thematically western, lyrically folk, and tonally rock, Ella Ion fuses an alt-country sound that transcends trend cliches in its best moments. In the antler-adorned room of Seven Grand, the arrangement’s two-, sometimes three-part harmonies felt like the sing-along folk of sticky saloons and traveling songsters, but buzzy feedback and guitar breakdowns yanked the Australian act into post-punk’s house shows and well-gratified bars. Live cello, whether complementing the bass in staccato bursts or effecting a moonlit atmosphere in the depths of the composition, filled out the quintet’s enchanting sound across tempos. After a tight, drum-filled opening, the band stripped back into quieter corners for several songs. In slower moments, Ion’s dulcet voice tugged on traditional folk-rock heartstrings, but her melancholy-barbed storytelling and near-baroque, precise harmonics were even more resonant when the pace picked up. A sharp sense of vocal rhythm and an elastic percussive quality, plus some extra watts of electric guitar and delay, make 2025 releases “Blue Black Crows” and “Creature Skin,” which closed out Ion’s Sunday night set, infectious and distinct. These lightly distorted, strident performances pulled the breezy folk strings into a more complex pattern and are what make Ella Ion stand out in the alt-country landscape. – Caroline Drew
Wales Brings Swan Dive into FOCUS
At the crack of 8:02pm in one of the fest’s best utilized spaces, innocuous Red River staple Swan Dive, Sunday’s FOCUS Wales showcase jolted open with the Family Battenberg. As the three guitarists tuned, SXSW-shirted drummer Billy Stillman set off some Fifties-surf/krautrock beat across his kit. After a few seconds, almost in unison, frontman Eliot Jones, lead guitarist Ethan James Duck, and bass throb Jess Pritchard turned back toward him, a movement seemingly touching flame to accelerant. Bursting into full bloom, the Cardiff fourpiece slammed their electric psych zero to 60 through rock & roll history. Jones didn’t boom “break on through to the other side,” but then maybe he did, the band lunging, thumping, throbbing a Sixties Sunset Strip moment. “We usually play stadiums,” quipped Jones. “Fucking massive,” rejoined Duck. When Pritchard stripped topside down to her bikini, they threw some go-go on the mojo, snapping off the knob ’til the soundman barked “last song!” 25 minutes in. Full free flight into the astral cosmos, high on double guitars, bass, and drums, this monarchy-checking Family Battenberg achieved pure oneness, the universal chord.
Later, Panic Shack mobbed the club’s ghostly front room, sucking the gale force winds in off the sad and empty festival streets for a full-on tempest inside. Four women from Cardiff with Nick Doherty-Williams on the kit dressed vaguely pep squad, but delivered a hyperkinetic punk rrriot like the roller derby. A Welsh version of our town’s Die Spitz? Panic Shack maxed out Music Capital aspirations all right, front pugilist Sarah Harvey delivering snotty feminism in timeless sardonicism while Meg Fretwell and Romi Lawrence dropped mortar-fire guitar work, and bassist Emily Smith held down the middle like a Euro football center back. “Kaaahr-diff,” they pronounced with New Wave Eighties insouciance. Chopping out “Jiu Jits You,” their powerful pop blast flashed back to onetime Hollywood punks the Go-Go’s, then “Tit School” swelled an anthem worthy of the early Donnas with equal lip: “I didn’t go to Brit school, I went to tit school/ I didn’t get straight As, I got double DDs.” Last July’s eponymous full-length bow preps you for the club. Live, Panic Shack puts that club upside your bloody head – back at Swan Dive again tonight, Monday, 8pm. – Raoul Hernandez
Spacestation’s Icelandic Indie Rock Lands in Austin
Fittingly, a strong, cool breeze blew as Nordic acts took over the tent outside Zilker Brewing Company. The penultimate set at the venue was from up-and-coming indie rockers Spacestation, who hail from Reykjavík, Iceland, and were making their U.S. debut. The cold didn’t seem to affect the down-strumming shoegaze of the young outfit. Their sound is a familiar one in America, though Víðir Rúnarsson’s Icelandic vocals summon intrigue with their rhythmic, punkified delivery. The frontman and guitarist also has a knack for harmonically satisfying guitar flourishes, adding a much-needed layer of texture to the sound. The setlist didn’t do justice to the band’s attempts to widen their sound in the 2025 album Reykjavík Syndrome. Songs like the psych-rock “Cosmic man” or the Velvet Underground-inspired “Another Sunday” would have better rounded out the set. Nevertheless, Spacestation has yet to write a bad song, and they were able to keep the crowd engaged as temperatures quickly fell into the 50s. The language of the lyrics switched between English and Icelandic throughout the set, but the band landed on their native tongue with “Í Draumalandinu,” a post-punk party perfect for a set closer. – Joseph Gonzalez
