I fought the crowd to see R.E.M. last night, standing for over two hours before the band began playing. Even with my pretty excellent (and hard-earned) vantage, it probably wasn't worth all the effort.

R.E.M. was playing to promote their upcoming (and apparently pretty good) new album, Accelerate, slated to be one of the band�s hardest rocking albums, as per pre-release hype.

"We're going to be playing a lot of new songs tonight," Michael Stipe said. "The good news is that if you don't like them, they're all under two-and-a-half-minutes"

The new songs lived up to their billing. They were short and streamlined and a little raw

A few scattered, final thoughts on my time in Austin and SXSW:

• I’ve learned to love the city and its conveniently centralized downtown. There’s so much to do in such a tightly packed area; and for the first time, I can see why anyone would actually want to live there.
• For a purported “liberal oasis,” though, the city sure doesn’t offer much in the way of vegetarian food. As best I can tell, the people of Austin subsist entirely on barbeque and pizza by the slice.
• Eugene Mirman is quickly becoming one of the funniest comedians on the circuit. During the Mess With Texas day party Saturday, he stole the show not only during his set, but also during Brian Posehn’s. Posehn was so hoarse he could barely speak, and it quickly became clear the painful rasp wasn’t past of his act. He wheezed out an anecdotal joke or two that was inaudibly to all but the very front rows, until Mirman presented a novel (and as best I can tell, genuinely spontaneous) solution: Posehn whispered the jokes to Mirman, who recited them line for line, unable to stifle his own laughter. Mirman’s quixotic delivery of Posehn’s ultra-crass jokes

SXSW is pretty easy when you have a media badge. By and large, you’ll be let into any show you want. But there are a few hyped shows where press credentials aren’t enough, and perhaps the most hyped of all was yesterday’s from Vampire Weekend, the preppy Afro-popsters who were compiling binders of New York Times and Spin press clippings before they even put out an album (their ascension has only continued since the album finally dropped.)

A fortuitous (and much appreciated) connection put me on the “must get in list” for the show, which despite the name, he told me, only gave me just a slight chance of getting in. And sure enough, the crowd was already well over capacity when I arrived. Two long lines waited; one for people who were on the list to get in (not all of whom would be so lucky), and an even longer one for those who stood absolutely no chance of getting in. I eventually made the cut in time to see opener Bon Iver, the indie-folk outfit which sounded as beautiful live as on record. When Justin Vernon rode his long, blissful falsetto, the audience closed their eyes contently.

Perhaps improbably, Vampire Weekend also lived up to their considerably greater hype. They had the crowd singing along, stomping and dancing through their entire set. I still think that they risk a massive backlash once their novelty wears off

I spent a good 14 hours wandering SXSW yesterday, dropping into various venues and tents when something caught my ear. Early in the day, I was enticed by one singer-songwriter with a particularly lovely voice. It turned out to be a familiar one. It belonged to Peter Moren, the Peter part of Peter, Bjorn and John.

He was plugging his upcoming solo album, performing somber songs with just an acoustic guitar and the Bob Dylan harmonica set up. The audience wasn’t really buying it

With her dark, weary eyes and her dry persona, Zooey Deschanel is an improbable lead actress, but those same qualities have endeared her to indie culture. This year, the actress released a debut album with guitarist M. Ward as She and Him, and between her star power and Ward’s devoted following, theirs was one of SXSW’s more anticipated sets.

Deschanel is casting herself as something of a Jenny Lewis-type, a doll-sized, blue-eyed soul singer with a country lilt, but in spite of being the more seasoned actress, she doesn’t have Lewis’ confidence. She looked absolutely horrified on stage; her hands twitched slightly until she folded them together tightly. She interacted with the audience stiftly until the inevitable happened: During the routine call for requests, a woman shouted out “Last Christmas,” a mangled reference to Deschanel’s role in Elf.

"Last Christmas?” Deschanel said warmly, before computing the request. “Oh, yeah

With seven members and trunks full of equipment, the coed indie-punk group Los Campesinos! requires a fair chunk of time to set up and take down their stage, but last night at the Arts and Crafts showcase time was in short supply. I blame Jason Collettzzzzzzzzzzzzzz