After months of planning and preparation, Austin is finally on the horizon.
Our third-annual South-By-Southwest "Boston & Beyond" party with Berklee College of Music (Berklee's 11th event at SXSW) goes down Thursday, March 17 at noon (local time) at Brush Square Park, located next to the Austin Convention Center. If you're at SXSW or heading down very soon, all you need to do to party with us is RSVP here. The party is all ages and open to SXSW badge holders.
If you're staying here in New England, keep it locked to Vanyaland and you won't miss a thing. We'll be broadcasting all of the performances via VanyaRadio, and updating audio and visuals from Brush Square Park all afternoon. You'll be tasting the Lone Star and tableside guac from the Iron Cactus fresh on your lips.
The "Boston & Beyond" party is co-presented by Berklee Alumni, The Red Room @ Cafe 939, and Heavy Rotation Records. Below is the lineup, with individual profiles on each performing band available via our slider.
"Boston & Beyond" 2016 Lineup
12:15-12:45: Rann (Brooklyn)
1:00-1:30: M+E (Heavy Rotation Records, Boston)
1:45-2:15: mar | co (Boston)
2:30-3:00: Lady Pills (Heavy Rotation Records, Boston)
3:15-3:45: Plastic Waves (Boston)
4:00-4:30: IAN (Los Angeles)
4:45-5:15: Great Grandpa (Seattle)
IAN, 4 p.m. set time
It’s only fitting that a band with a growing reputation on both coasts has now set its sights on the flyover states. But that’s the plan this week for IAN, the Los Angeles-born, Boston-based dream-pop trio that might form a BAMF guitar-gang with Great Grandpa and Lady Pills after our SXSW party on Thursday. That is, if they have time — they’ll be blasting over to play the Hardly Art showcase after we’re all done with Brush Square Park to rock out with Tacocat, Shannon and the Clams, Protomartyr and others.
All this love will only add to the growing exposure of Jillian Medford’s band (“Jill-IAN”, get it?), which began as a solo project and has lately been bouncing back and forth with ease between the scene underground and the rock club circuit. Last summer’s self-titled record was a brilliant blast of fuzzy guitar-pop, and we aren’t alone in singing these praises. Writes Stumble On Tapes: “We adore IAN, they have a way of infusing the perfect pop song with vulnerabilities and rock n roll… She’s just brilliant, Give it a listen.”
Impose Magazine, Allston Pudding, and the Boston Globe also sang sweet praises over the past year, and Boston Hassle writes of Ian’s “legendary sad-girl anthems”: “By embracing a bit more noisiness, IAN creates determined energy and the songs deliver the emotions behind them with confidence. Yet they are more than just garage-set rock, and the tracks utilize little tricks to give them unique dreamy qualities.”
Rest your head, child, and listen to IAN’s lovely jams below…
