One of the great treats of SXSW is the sheer cheek-by-jowl-ness of it. One moment you can be standing in the ladies’ room during the SPIN at Stubb’s party, complimenting someone on her fab silver-glitter eye makeup. Moments later—without any long delays– that person you complemented might turn out to be Lauren Mayberry who is fronting the Scottish indie-pop bandCHVRCHES (pronounced “Churches.”)

Turns out that Chvrches getting onstage lickety-split at the SPIN party wasn’t just a fluke, as explained by music person Matthew J Barnhart in his postHow To Be In a Band at SXSW or Whatever (posted with apologies to Thor Harris and Harris’ rock ‘n’ roll gospel How to Tour in a Band or Whatever.)
Barnhart was tour manager and front of house engineer for Chvrches just-ended North American tour.

In the post Barnhart colorfully dispenses “cranky old mother****** advice for bands coming to SXSW next year.” In practical terms, this means he laid out the why and how of getting onstage fast at SXSW (or anywhere). Among his suggestions: Travel light:

CHVRCHES are nearly fully self-contained: all we need from the venue is 4 mic stands. The band runs their own in-ear monitors from stage via Ableton Live. All the house sound system gets is 10 XLR lines from our stage box. Line-check takes less than 1 minute, and we’re ready to go.

If you haven’t already caught Scottish indie-pop group Chvrches, check out their video for “The Mother We Share” below.