You know a live performance warrants your attention when you immediately think the show flyer is fake. But apparently it's true -- DC hardcore punk legends BAD BRAINS will be in Boston on Monday, April 16, and they're bringing with them NYC aggro dudes H20. We couldb't get no love from the GZA? What the eff.

One of my favorite moments of this year's SXSW happened damn near out of nowhere. I was walking back to Phoenix HQ (a fancy hotel room at the Radisson) with Carl Lavin of Great Scott and a few other flash cats whose identities I now forget, and for some reason I voiced an uncontrolable desire to catch a SURFER BLOOD show.

I am horrified. I had no idea when I wrote my pair of posts about Wild Flag and tUnE-yArDs at SXSW last week that both bands (both!) had been prominently featured in NPR's coverage of the event. To make up for that oversaturation, here's a band that's received criminally little coverage but that were my favorite personal discovery of the week.

While some of us had to board the SXSW Sad Plane and get back to beautiful, warm and scene Boston USA, the rest of the Phoenix crew hung back in Austin into the engaging Sunday afternoon and caught a bunch of still-raging 617ers over at the Treehouse on 6th. It was all a part of the second half of Wadzilla Mansion's two-part showcase, and well, it sucks those cats can put on shows 1,993 miles away and not in Allston due to permit bullshit.

No account of punk rock at SXSW would be complete without at least something from Off! -- not to mention Bodega Girls covering Off!, if we can borrow Kates's Flipcam -- but for now these videos will have to suffice, since our Off! video is currently on a plane.

Within 10 seconds of TRASH TALK taking the Fader Fort stage, someone had managed to throw a trash can into the pit.

Praise Jah for video. I almost forgot stumbling into the MSTRKRFT party at the Mohawk, I think on late Friday night closer to Saturday's a.m. curfew, ending Day 3 of SXSW's music chapter with a motherfucking hard dance party courtesy of the Toronto electro duo. Shit got so real Carl Lavin of Great Scott and Boston Band Crush's Richard Bouchard, two notably staunch rock and roll dudes, were taking it all in, eye-closed, head-bobbling, with our crew on the dance floor near the bar (obvs).

Vocals, percussion (LOTS of percussion), bass, two saxophones, an occasional ukulele and a looper. Those are the tools that Merrill Garbus and friends used to win over the crowds at her multiple SXSW appearances. "Win over" is probably an understatement. As I sat on the edge of the stage after her performance at the French Legation Museum this past Friday afternoon, people lined up in front of where Garbus was disassembing her extensive set up.

There was a moment, standing on line outside the Mohawk in Austin Saturday afternoon, a hahhard but extravagant Day 3 of #SXSW, where I wasn't too sure I'd get inside to see UK gazers YUCK, and well, really didn't care. The place was PACKED, a result of TV On The Radio playing the venue's outside tent, the same spot I think I saw MSTRKRFT several morning hours earlier.

For the past 18 months, those of us who keep an eye on the intersection of music and technology have been extolling the coming wave of music-discovery engines. The smartest people in both music and tech are trying to write the app that will introduce you to your new favorite band -- which often means keeping track of the bands people are talking about online.

In the better late than never department, this is the first of what I hope will be several posts highlighting some of my favorite moments at SXSW.

First up: Wild Flag, ubiquitous at this year's festival, playing 8 (eight!) shows over four days. Here's what I love about this band: It's not simply the Sleater-Kinney/Helium/Minders pedigree.

Odd Future rolled into this gauntlet as the front-runner in terms of hip-hop buzz (both inside and outside of the rap community). And after a slew of riotous onslaughts, they'll leave that way (here for Phoenix coverage of the pandemonium at Fader Fort). But Mac Miller is without-a-doubt the other nu-rap big to break huge down here, easily graduating from the mid-sized venues he's been playing nationwide to halls and theaters on momentum caught in Austin.

I'll be the first to admit that I've always been hesitant to check Erk Tha Jerk. Not like I haven't ever dug someone with a ridiculous handle – word to Trick Daddy – but I get a lot of shit in my inbox, and sometimes it's easiest to judge a book by the author's name. I don't open shit from Lil Young or Young Commercial either, though perhaps I should start.

The other night we caught the first couple sets of an Agency Group showcase at the Mohawk, where we got a focused snapshot of what's to come from indie hip-hop's most dominant label in the next few months. Sure, there's a new Atmosphere album on the immediate horizon, but if there's ever been an imprint that relies on its entire roster – from the grandest headliners to up-and-comers – for deep, tremendous releases, it's this one.

For twenty minutes on Thursday night, my friend Akhil and I rounded the perimeter of the Scoot Inn looking for a way in. It was 1:30 a.m., the venue was at capacity and Talib Kwali was performing inside. We had just seen Beach Fossils fans almost tear down an outdoor stage tent at Shangri-La, we were drunk and we really wanted to see some hip-hop.

I don't know what to tell you about what went down tonight at dusk at the Fader Fort: I have seen the future of rap and its name is ODD FUTURE? Nah, right. South by Southwest is often, at bottom, several thousand professionals deciding by fiat what the agreed-upon agendas will be for the next three months. Artists are carefully groomed, worked like dogs, and put mercilessly through ther paces.