The fertilizer plant that exploded on Wednesday, obliterating part of a small Texas town and killing at least 14 people, had last year been storing 1,350 times the amount of ammonium nitrate that would normally trigger safety oversight by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

Yet a person familiar with DHS operations said the company that owns the plant, West Fertilizer, did not tell the agency about the potentially explosive fertilizer as it is required to do, leaving one of the principal regulators of ammonium nitrate – which can also be used in bomb making – unaware of any danger there.

Fertilizer plants and depots must report to the DHS when they hold 400 lb (180 kg) or more of the substance. Filings this year with the Texas Department of State Health Services, which weren’t shared with DHS, show the plant had 270 tons of it on hand last year.

A U.S. congressman and several safety experts called into question on Friday whether incomplete disclosure or regulatory gridlock may have contributed to the disaster.

“It seems this manufacturer was willfully off the grid,” Rep. Bennie Thompson, (D-MS), ranking member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, said in a statement. “This facility was known to have chemicals well above the threshold amount to be regulated under the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards Act (CFATS), yet we understand that DHS did not even know the plant existed until it blew up.”

Company officials did not return repeated calls seeking comment on its handling of chemicals and reporting practices. Late on Friday, plant owner Donald Adair released a general statement expressing sorrow over the incident but saying West Fertilizer would have little further comment while it cooperated with investigators to try to determine what happened.

“This tragedy will continue to hurt deeply for generations to come,” Adair said in the statement.

Failure to report significant volumes of hazardous chemicals at a site can lead the DHS to fine or shut down fertilizer operations, a person familiar with the agency’s monitoring regime said. Though the DHS has the authority to carry out spot inspections at facilities, it has a small budget for that and only a “small number” of field auditors, the person said.

Firms are responsible for self reporting the volumes of ammonium nitrate and other volatile chemicals they hold to the DHS, which then helps measure plant risks and devise security and safety plans based on them.

Since the agency never received any so-called top-screen report from West Fertilizer, the facility was not regulated or monitored by the DHS under its CFAT standards, largely designed to prevent sabotage of sites and to keep chemicals from falling into criminal hands.

The DHS focuses “specifically on enhancing security to reduce the risk of terrorism at certain high-risk chemical facilities,” said agency spokesman Peter Boogaard. “The West Fertilizer Co. facility in West, Texas is not currently regulated under the CFATS program.”

The West Fertilizer facility was subject to other reporting, permitting and safety programs, spread across at least seven state and federal agencies, a patchwork of regulation that critics say makes it difficult to ensure thorough oversight.

An expert in chemical safety standards said the two major federal government programs that are supposed to ensure chemical safety in industry – led by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) – do not regulate the handling or storage of ammonium nitrate. That task falls largely to the DHS and the local and state agencies that oversee emergency planning and response.

More than 4,000 sites nationwide are subject to the DHS program.

“This shows that the enforcement routine has to be more robust, on local, state and federal levels,” said the expert, Sam Mannan, director of process safety center at Texas A&M University. “If information is not shared with agencies, which appears to have happened here, then the regulations won’t work.”

HODGEPODGE OF REGULATION

Chemical safety experts and local officials suspect this week’s blast was caused when ammonium nitrate was set ablaze. Authorities suspect the disaster was an industrial accident, but haven’t ruled out other possibilities.

The fertilizer is considered safe when stored properly, but can explode at high temperatures and when it reacts with other substances.

“I strongly believe that if the proper safeguards were in place, as are at thousands of (DHS) CFATS-regulated plants across the country, the loss of life and destruction could have been far less extensive,” said Rep. Thompson.

A blaze was reported shortly before a massive explosion leveled dozens of homes and blew out an apartment building.

A U-Haul truck packed with the substance mixed with fuel oil exploded to raze the Oklahoma federal building in 1995. Another liquid gas fertilizer kept on the West Fertilizer site, anhydrous ammonia, is subject to DHS reporting and can explode under extreme heat.

Wednesday’s blast heightens concerns that regulations governing ammonium nitrate and other chemicals – present in at least 6,000 depots and plants in farming states across the country – are insufficient. The facilities serve farmers in rural areas that typically lack stringent land zoning controls, many of the facilities sit near residential areas.

Apart from the DHS, the West Fertilizer site was subject to a hodgepodge of regulation by the EPA, OSHA, the U.S. Department of Transportation, the Texas Department of State Health Services, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the Office of the Texas State Chemist.

But the material is exempt from some mainstays of U.S. chemicals safety programs. For instance, the EPA’s Risk Management Program (RMP) requires companies to submit plans describing their handling and storage of certain hazardous chemicals. Ammonium nitrate is not among the chemicals that must be reported.

In its RMP filings, West Fertilizer reported on its storage of anhydrous ammonia and said that it did not expect a fire or explosion to affect the facility, even in a worst-case scenario. And it had not installed safeguards such as blast walls around the plant.

A separate EPA program, known as Tier II, requires reporting of ammonium nitrate and other hazardous chemicals stored above certain quantities. Tier II reports are submitted to local fire departments and emergency planning and response groups to help them plan for and respond to chemical disasters. In Texas, the reports are collected by the Department of State Health Services. Over the last seven years, according to reports West Fertilizer filed, 2012 was the only time the company stored ammonium nitrate at the facility.

It reported having 270 tons on site.

“That’s just a god awful amount of ammonium nitrate,” said Bryan Haywood, the owner of a hazardous chemical consulting firm in Milford, Ohio. “If they were doing that, I would hope they would have gotten outside help.”

In response to a request from Reuters, Haywood, who has been a safety engineer for 17 years, reviewed West Fertilizer’s Tier II sheets from the last six years. He said he found several items that should have triggered the attention of local emergency planning authorities – most notably the sudden appearance of a large amount of ammonium nitrate in 2012.

“As a former HAZMAT coordinator, that would have been a red flag for me,” said Haywood, referring to hazardous materials.

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Rescue teams searched the charred rubble of homes in a small Texas city Thursday for survivors of a fiery explosion at a nearby fertilizer plant that killed as many as 15 people, injured more than 160 and destroyed dozens of buildings.

Three to four volunteer firefighters were among the missing following the blast Wednesday night, said Sgt. William Patrick Swanton of the Waco Police Department.

Firefighters had been fighting a blaze at the West Fertilizer Co. for about 20 minutes before the 8 p.m. blast rocked West, a town of 2,700 people about 20 miles north of Waco.

The plant had tanks of volatile anhydrous ammonia, including what initial reports said was a tanker-sized container like those hauled on freight trains, Swanton said at a news conference Thursday. However, the immediate threat from fumes appeared to have abated, he said.

The blast destroyed 60 to 80 houses, officials said. It reduced a 50-unit apartment complex to what one local official called “a skeleton standing up” and left a horrific landscape of burned-out buildings and blackened rubble.

“It looks like a war zone with all the debris,” McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara said.

Amid such devastation, the death toll remained a rough estimate of five to 15 people, Swanton said. He said more than 160 people were injured and that number was likely to rise.

Emergency crews were moving from house to house in a search-and-rescue operation, Stanton said.

“That’s good news to me, meaning that they’re probably still getting injured people,” he said. “They have not gotten to the point of no return where they don’t think that there’s anybody still alive.”

Firefighters missing

The firefighters had been battling the fire and evacuating nearby houses and a nursing home out of concern about possible dangerous fumes before the explosion occurred, Swanton said.

Texas Public Safety Department spokesman D.L. Wilson said half the town, eight to 10 blocks, had been evacuated. Officials said 133 people were removed from the nursing home.

“There are still firefighters missing,” Swanton said. “They were actively fighting the fire at the time the explosion occurred.”

The firefighters were members of a large volunteer corps who had arrived on the scene.

One law enforcement official who also served as a firefighter was found alive but remained in critical condition at a local hospital, Swanton said.

The cause of the fire remained unknown and it was being treated as a crime scene, which was standard procedure, Swanton said.

President Barack Obama, who flew to Boston for a memorial service for victims of the Boston Marathon bombing, offered support and prayers to the victims in Texas.

The explosion came two days before the 20th anniversary of a fire in Waco that engulfed a compound inhabited by David Koresh and his followers in the Branch Davidian sect, ending a siege by federal agents. About 82 members of the sect and four federal agents died in that fire.

In West, witness Kevin Smith told CBS News he had just climbed the stairs to the second floor of his home when he felt the blast.

“The house exploded. It was just a bright flash and a roar; I thought it was lightning striking the house,” Smith said. “I felt myself flying through the air about 10 feet, and it took a second or two to realize that the roof had caved in on me so I knew it wasn’t lightning.”

Three hospitals in Waco and Dallas reported treating more than 160 injured in the blast.

Ground motion from the blast registered as a magnitude 2.1 seismic tremor and created a jolt felt 80 miles away in Dallas, the U.S. Geological Survey reported.

The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was one of several agencies investigating.

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An explosion tore through a fertilizer plant and leveled dozens of homes in a small Texas town late Wednesday, killing a number of people, injuring more than 160 and spewing toxic fumes that forced the evacuation of half the community.

Officials declined to say how many people died in the explosion in the town of West but said they expected to find more bodies as search teams combed through the rubble of the plant and surrounding homes.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara said. “It looks like a war zone with all the debris.”

The blast, triggered by a fire at the West Fertilizer Co. plant, was reported at about 8 p.m. Central Time in West, a town of about 2,800 people 80 miles south of Dallas and 20 miles north of Waco.

The cause of the fire was unknown, officials said. Waco police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton said investigators would examine whether the blaze originated from “criminal activity or whether it … got sparked from some type of chemical reaction.”

“We do have confirmed fatalities,” Texas Public Safety Department spokesman D.L. Wilson told a news conference early Thursday, about four hours after the explosion. “The number is not current yet. It could go up by the minute.”

West Mayor Tommy Muska told Reuters that five or six volunteer firefighters who were among the first on the scene were missing.

Officials said flames that continued to smolder inside the plant posed two threats: the possibility of setting off further explosions and the emission of hazardous fumes into the town.

Swanton said a residual fire burning underneath additional chemical tanks had been brought under control “and I don’t think that is any longer a threat.”

Wilson said about half the town, about eight to 10 blocks, had been evacuated and that further evacuations were possible if winds shift overnight as expected.

Firefighters had been battling a fire at the plant and evacuating nearby residences and a nursing home for about 50 minutes before the blast occurred.

CNN reported that at least two people had been killed, but that figure could not be independently confirmed.

Wilson said 50 to 75 homes were damaged by the explosion and a fire that followed, and that a nearby 50-unit apartment complex had been reduced to “a skeleton standing up.” Muska put the number of destroyed homes at between 60 and 80.

Wilson said 133 people had been evacuated from the nursing home, which was heavily damaged, but it was not immediately clear how many residents of the facility were hurt.

Three hospitals in Waco and Dallas were receiving the bulk of patients from the disaster. “We are seeing a lot of lacerations and orthopedic-type injuries … things you would expect in an explosion,” said David Argueta, vice president of operations at Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center in Waco.

Cause unknown

U.S. Rep. Bill Flores, whose district includes West, said he doubted any foul play was involved. “I would not expect sabotage by any stretch of the imagination,” he told CNN.

Video footage showed a large fire burning at the scene before exploding into a fireball. The blast produced ground motion equivalent to that of a magnitude 2.1 earthquake, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

A middle school and several homes were severely burned. Dallas television station WFAA reported from helicopters that a three-block area of West appeared to have been flattened.

The air in town remained thick with smoke hours after the explosion, and the area around the blast site was littered with shards of wood, bricks and glass.

Jason Shelton, 33, a father of two who lives less than a mile from the plant, said he heard fire trucks heading toward the facility five minutes before the explosion, and felt the concussion from the blast as he stood on his front porch.

“My windows started rattling and my kids screaming,” Shelton told Reuters. “The screen door hit me in the forehead … and all the screens blew off my windows.”

Gov. Rick Perry issued a statement saying his office had “mobilized state resources to help local authorities” deal with the incident.

A White House official said the Obama administration was aware of the situation and monitoring local and state response through the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The post VIDEO: Many killed, dozens hurt in explosion at Texas fertilizer plant appeared first on Metro.us.

by either the prosecutor or her police officer husband, authorities said.

The shooting, shortly before midnight Monday, comes two weeks after Colorado’s prisons director was slain as he answered the front door to his home, and two days after the district attorney of Kaufman County in Texas was found shot to death with his wife.

An assistant prosecutor in the Kaufman County district attorney’s office was shot to death on January 31, and authorities have said both Texas murders and the March 19 slaying of Colorado prisons chief Tom Clements appeared to be targeted killings rather than random acts of violence.

In light of the three previous cases, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation is leading the probe into the latest shooting, which occurred in Hot Sulphur Springs, about 95 miles northwest of Denver.

“There are no apparent ties to recent shootings; however, investigators continue to pursue all possible leads and background information on this (dead) person,” the bureau said in a written statement.

Authorities did not immediately release the names of the deputy prosecutor and her husband in connection with Monday night’s shooting.

The deputy district attorney made a 911 emergency call and reported that a man was at her door “behaving very erratically,” police said.

The prosecutor then told dispatchers that the stranger forced his way into her home. An altercation ensued inside and shots were fired, leaving the unidentified man dead, police said.

A spokeswoman for one of the agencies investigating the incident told Reuters that the prosecutor and her husband, himself a sheriff’s deputy, both fired at the intruder, but it is too early in the probe to know who fired the fatal shot.

The Colorado prosecutor and her husband both suffered minor injuries and have been placed on paid leave pending the results of the investigation.

Clements, the state’s prisons chief, was shot to death on March 19 when he answered the front door of his home near Monument, Colorado, about 45 miles south of Denver.

Authorities have matched the handgun used in Clements’ slaying to the weapon used by a recent Colorado parolee, 28-year-old Evan Spencer Ebel, in a gun battle with police following a high-speed chase through Decatur, Texas, last month.

Investigators have named Ebel, a member of a white supremacist prison gang, as a suspect in the killing of Clements and in the death of pizza delivery man Nathan Leon, 27, who was found dead in suburban Denver two days earlier.

Ebel was killed in the shootout with Texas police. A search of his car turned up a pizza deliverer’s shirt, visor, pizza box and heat bag.

The post Intruder killed at Colorado deputy DA’s home appeared first on Metro.us.

The killing of a Texas district attorney and his wife, in the same county where an assistant prosecutor was shot dead outside a courthouse in January, does not appear to be random, a local official said on Sunday.

Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his wife, Cynthia, were found with fatal gunshot wounds at their home near the town of Forney, Texas, on Saturday, two months after Assistant District Attorney Mark Hasse was gunned down.

“In my view it appears that it was not random. It was a targeted attack,” Forney Mayor Darren Rozell told CNN.

“We’re obviously sad and shocked but there’s some outrage too,” said Rozell.

He did not elaborate on a possible motive for the double murder, but neither he nor Kaufman County Sheriff David Byrnes ruled out a link between the killings.

Hasse was shot and killed the same day the U.S. Department of Justice released a statement saying the Kaufman County District Attorney’s Office was involved in a racketeering case against the Aryan Brotherhood white supremacist group.

“It’s unnerving to the law enforcement community, it’s unnerving to the community at large,” Byrnes told a news conference. “And that’s why we’re striving to assure the community that we are still providing public safety and will be able to do that.”

Byrnes’ office reported the shooting deaths late on Saturday.

Kaufman County Judge Bruce Wood said the last known contact with either of the McLellands was about 7 p.m. on Friday.

Wood described McLelland as a friend as well as a colleague. He said he and McLelland had spoken regularly about Hasse and the investigation.

“I can’t fathom someone doing this,” Wood said. “It is completely senseless, and completely out of the blue. Perhaps it is retaliation, but we won’t know that until someone is caught.”

Numerous state and federal officials, including the FBI and Texas Rangers, are involved in the investigation, Byrnes said. He said it was too early to discuss whether there were any suspects.

McLelland, a 23-year U.S. Army veteran who served in Operation Desert Storm, had five children including a son who is an officer with the Dallas police department, according to a biography on the county website.

Authorities have made no arrests in Hasse’s killing. McLelland had vowed to bring his killer to justice.

Earlier this month, the Hasse slaying case took a new turn when the Kaufman police chief said the FBI was looking for any link between Hasse’s death and the March 19 shooting death of Colorado prisons chief Tom Clements.

Evan Spencer Ebel, 28, a Colorado prison parolee suspected of killing Clements, died in a shootout with police in Decatur, Texas, on March 21. Ebel was a member of a white supremacist prison gang called the 211 Crew and had a swastika tattoo, prison records indicate.

Judge Wood said Kaufman County investigators had found no link between the shooting death of Clements and the killing of Hasse, however. “No connection was found to the Colorado shooting,” he said.

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As SXSW comes to a close, the crowded streets of Austin will return to a more relaxed status quo. But the musical party that began here last Tuesday will keep on rippling outward to the world for the next few months as thousands of press outlets report on which acts wowed them.

Metro’s published a list of “must see” acts last week was spot-on, if I do say so myself. Nick Cave put on an epic performance in an out-of-character venue. Thurston Moore’s Chelsea Light Moving played their most intriguing gig with skateboarders riding a half-pipe in the background. King Tuff proved he’s even tougher live than on record, while Jim James took people by surprise with his new direction.

After seeing close to 100 bands, there are a few notable acts that I was especially happy to have caught.

Our award for The Best New Foreign Act goes to the band Indians. Music emanating from the mind of Copenhagen’s Søren Løkke Juul, he admits he only had three songs to his name before he signed to 4AD last year. “I never even thought about making a record,” he said after one show. “I just made songs because I felt like I needed to express something.” Playing eight shows in five days, Juul performed with a band this time, filling in his somber synth songs with shimmering atmospherics and heavy-handed electronic drums.

The Most Energetic Show was delivered by Pangea at a club called the Volstead. Talk about surprises — Pangea wasn’t even on the schedule. Somehow word must have gotten out because the small room was packed and pleased. Playing a set somewhere in between punk and metal, they varied speeds, but always remained heavy. The drummer hit so hard it didn’t seem like the skins could sustain the beating. The crowd followed along with the passionate performance by moshing and crowdsurfing. At one point, the speakers almost fell over. I’m pretty sure that’s not supposed to happen anymore. But it did. And it was special — but is not for the faint of heart.

The Best Overall New Band is Wildcat! Wildcat!. I had a feeling about them based on the name alone. And wandering into one of their many shows, I was totally taken. A four-piece, each with a mic, two keyboardists, bass and drums, the band lies somewhere between rock and electro. Their four-part vocal falsetto harmonies make them stand out and add warmth to their summery sound. While the band has known each other since they were kids and each have played music together before, I was intrigued to learn the band only began last year and have only released two songs. One of the hardest working bands at the festival, they played 10 shows in five days and seemed to be having more fun than any other band I saw. Oh, and they covered the Tears for Fears song “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.” Everybody does, but these guys just might get to.

#Informationoverload @SXSW
Long gone are the days of walking the streets of Austin with a printed schedule and a highlighter. In an atmosphere that is already all about sensory overload, technology ruled SXSW this year. Parties were announced via Twitter, there was an app for schedules and oftentimes when you got to the shows most of the audience members had their heads down to text or tweet. Also, if you didn’t have a platinum badge, the only way to get into the Prince show, was to have a Samsung Galaxy phone and complete a scavenger hunt.

Prince was not the only mega star to get Austin buzzing. Green Day, Justin Timberlake, Stevie Nicks and Dave Grohl also took part in the action, playing exclusive shows held in venues way smaller than they are used to playing.

The post SXSW wrap up: Packed clubs, predictions and new sounds appeared first on Metro.us.

Whether planned, secret or last minute, there are hundreds of daytime shows that go on throughout the week at SXSW providing you with a chance to catch those acts that you might otherwise miss — not to mention that these gigs were often accompanied by free food and drink.

Waking early, I headed straight to Club de Ville, one of my favorite old haunts from SXSWs of years past, as the Austin band Feathers took stage. A five-piece comprised of four women and a male drummer manning an electronic drum kit, Feathers wore tall heels, looked like the Runaways years later and sounded like a gothic Pat Benatar.

Each day, the Convention Center hosts panel discussions as part of SXSW. I ducked into an program intriguingly titled “Drunk Comedy at SXSW.” The internet sensation known as Drunk History that became popular on Funny or Die, is coming to Comedy Central and Kyle Kinane and Derek Waters were there to discuss their plans. Playing the part with tallboys in cozies, they talked about the concept, confessing that it was only sup-posed to be one video short until Jack Black asked if he could be Ben Franklin. The rest is history … drunk history.

From there it was up a few floors to see Devendra Banhart. Pretty and polished he sat and played a handful of songs with his signature falsetto warble and intriguingly absurd banter like wishing everyone a Happy Halloween.

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds were slated to perform at Stubbs Amphitheater on Wednesday night while the sun was still up in the Austin, Texas, sky — a strange and rare choice for his dark tunes. Cave, as I expected, stalled until the darkness fell, and with the smell of barbecue in the air, opened with a few tracks from his latest album, “Push the Sky Away.” Almost possessed, he brought life to the quiet songs and followed them up by an epic run through some of his best work. “From Her to Eternity” was followed by “Red Right Hand,” “Jack the Ripper and “Deanna.” While much of the band is new, the Bad Seeds complemented Cave’s commanding stage presence with tense reserve, all except violinist Warren Ellis, who has in time become Cave’s maniacal right-hand man.

Next up was the Love Inks, an Austin band whose single, “Blackeye” has been in constant rotation in my headphones for the past year. A modern day girl-group with fuzzy reverb, the band backed up the sound on their record with remarkable poise.

For the remainder of the night I decided to set up camp at one venue, rather than wait in any more lines. I then headed to Hype Hotel for what should have been an excellent lineup, but ended up serving as a stark contrast to the veteran Cave’s class and showmanship. The Orwells kicked things off and after noticing the X’s on their hands I learned that they are teenagers. They don’t look it, and they don’t sound like it. Sure, the lead singer has a bit of Jim Morrison snotty angst, but the band played well … until they were told it was their last song. Thinking their set was being cut short, the guitarist told the sound guy that he had been lied to, provoking the lead singer to swing his microphone around and smash it into the cymbals before sending it into the crowd. After a physical altercation with the soundman, they left the stage for good. It was a rock ‘n’ roll moment that you don’t see very often anymore … for better or worse.

Whether or not it was the Orwells’ fault, the sound only went southward: Cords were busted and sets were delayed. The anticipated Phosphorescent shone despite the ordeal. Seven members deep and with two keyboardists, their sound was fleshed out roots rock with an expressive backwoods voice. Making it through most of the set without complaints, they also threw their mic after their last song. Are rockers now borrowing from rappers?

Things would only get worse as Foxygen, who sound sexy and polished on record and have a big buzz from many major press outlets, ended up sounding like an out of tune and out of work showtune band.

The sound and showmanship only returned as Jim James closed out the night with a short set.

But maybe there’s hope for these young bands. Once upon a time there was young punk named Nick Cave who might have behaved the same way.

The post SXSW Night Two: Class vs. crass in Austin, Texas appeared first on Metro.us.

No, this is not a crowd shot of the Vatican, but for many, Sixth Street in Austin, Texas is a religious landmark.
(CREDIT: Andy Sheppard/Redferns/Getty Images)

The freaks and the fashionable parade the streets from noon until morning, making people-watching alone worth the price of the plane ticket. I joined the masses on Tuesday looking for something new, and I quickly found it. Making my way to the Paste Magazine/Newport Folk Festival’s showcase, I arrived just in time to see the start of Hurray for the Riff Raff’s set. The female duo from New Orleans played a riveting stripped down set of country-tinged blues combining cover songs by Billie Holiday and Fred Neil as well as a slew of originals. Alternating between acoustic guitar and banjo, backed by a fiddle and the occasional toy piano, their set seemed perfectly at home on the front patio of the rickety old house now known as the Blackheart Bar. Not only will Hooray for Riff Raff make their debut at the Newport Folk Festival this year, but they found out just hours before their set they will be the opening act for the Alabama Shakes upcoming tour.

From there it was on to Viceland to catch the Skaters’ Austin debut. The buzz around them, combined sharing a bill with Waaves and Japandroids created a line of about 2,000 people snaked around the block — a line that would only be trumped later by Deadmau5. This was the first show I missed out on, and I hope it’s my last.

After watching a few songs from the street, I decided to make better use of my time and headed over to the Mohawk to hear the Danish band, Indians. A three-piece consisting of more keyboards than people, the band layers loops, Moog synthesizers and a brain-rattling drum pad to create dreamy, slightly dancey music. The Copenhagen croon of lead singer Soren Juul works well with Enya-like atmospherics.

Looking to for some more traditional rock ‘n’ roll, I drifted off to The North Door to catch Vietnam. After taking the past five years off, Michael Gerner is back with a new six-piece lineup and a recent record, but their sound remains the same. It is dark, lengthy and often druggy narratives, which are delivered without traditional verse/chorus structure and set against a heavy shimmer of blues guitar riffs.

After seeing the line for Jim James a couple blocks from the entrance. I decided to go home and rest up for Wednesday. It’s going to be a long week.

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With My Morning Jacket taking a brief break, the prolific Jim James is trying something different with his recent solo album. “Regions of Light and Sound of God,” released last month, seems and sounds as though divine intervention has led the songwriter to new sonic soil.

Playing almost all of the instruments on the record, this isn’t your traditional stripped-down solo journey, but instead an epic musical onslaught that sounds as though a dozen people contributed to the final product.

Taking his new tunes on the road, James has built a quartet comprised of fellow Louisvillians to help rebuild the audio architecture of the solo record in a live setting. After catching his first few shows in NYC last month, my skepticism quickly turned to satisfaction as the new band delivered some magical moments that not only gave life to the album, but took the songs to another level.

Focusing primarily on electronics, James’ band fills the instrumental backdrop while he mans the mic, taking on the role of the traditional frontman, and occasionally picking up random and often unlikely instruments.

While My Morning Jacket are no strangers to SXSW, James makes his first appearance at the festival this week as a solo act. MMJ’s first trip to the Austin came early in their career and James is quick to note the benefits of playing the festival back then.

“The year was 1914,” James says in jest. “The first settlers had just come onto the Austin shore. Alongside other explorers like us who had heard about the legend of gold in them rolling hills and mountain ranges of downtown Austin, we rolled into town just before dawn on March 13 of that year and took up shop at the Pecan Street Ale House … or was it Urban Outfitters … or was it Yard Dog? It’s hard to say, the memory starts to slip with time and age and you have to brush those cobwebs away.”

All jokes aside, the venues and day of the month are real, but the year was 2002 and SXSW became one of the band’s first shows outside of Europe and Kentucky.

“It’s all strange and wonderful,” says James. “I mean, we’ve worked our asses to the bone over the years and it feels good when you chase a dream and see some progress on that front. It’s very exciting and we are very grateful to the universe to have been allowed to make some progress on our dreams.”

‘True destiny’ on the line
Since their SXSW debut, My Morning Jacket has only played the festival one other time — in 2008. They went from being unknown hopefuls in 2002, to being one of the SXSW’s main attractions six years later while previewing their album, “Evil Urges.”

So what is Jim looking forward to seeing this year?

“My true destiny,” he says.

— Jim James plays three shows at SXSW and participates in a panel discussion and a non-SXSW-affiliated benefit show at Willie Nelson’s Ranch

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Every year, thousands of musicians, record labels, fans and publicists from all ends of the earth make their way to Austin, Texas for the five-day sonic soiree and sensory overload known as South by Southwest, which for the rest of the week, you’ll see referred to as SXSW.
For the uninitiated, SXSW is, in theory, where bands go to make it, labels go to show off their talent and the rest of the industry goes to latch onto untouched potential. As for me, I’m there to take it all in, write it all down and tell you all about it. While there’s no possible way to see every act, here are a few I’m looking forward to.

Chelsea Light Moving
The band’s name may seem esoteric, but their leader is one of rock’s greatest guitarists. With Sonic Youth on indefinite hiatus, Thurston Moore’s latest outfit is far from the delicate stylings of his recent solo records. CLM combine Sonic Youth’s atmospheric guitar sounds with artistic abrasions most similar to Moore’s 1995 “Psychic Hearts” record. On CLM’s self-titled debut, released last week, Moore possesses a newfound angst and seems angrier than ever.

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Ten years ago, Nick Cave may have seemed a bit out of place at SXSW. But after scoring three westerns, and providing the musc and a screenplay to the Southern bootlegging movie, “Lawless,” he now seems to embody the ideal of the dusty American outlaw (despite being from Australia and the U.K.). While his recent release seems more like a solo record than a Bad Seeds endeavor, his commanding presence in live shows is as powerful as a fire and brimstone preacher. SXSW is the first of his 20 sold out North American dates and one of the hottest tickets in town.

Generationals
An electro pop duo from New Orleans, Generationals combine guitar and electronics to create blissful textures and melodic hooks that overpower the inherent melancholia that lingers in the backdrop. Playing seven shows in four days at SXSW, the band will preview their third and best full-length, “Heza,” due out in April.

King Tuff
While the name may suggest some Studio One dub producer, only the weed smoke links Tuff with Jamaican styles. The pride of Brattleboro, Vermont and one of Sub Pop’s latest acquisitions, KT’s music is more akin to the haunting acoustic psych sound of Girls, but with a grunge-y energy.

Skaters
NYC by way of Boston and England, Skaters will be one of the newest and busiest bands in Austin. Consisting of members of Dead Trees and Dirty Pretty Things, Skaters are one of Warner Brothers’ hopes for a youthful rock ‘n’ roll revival. They’re headed straight from the studio after wrapping up their debut LP, slated for early summer release. There’s already a buzz around them, based on their free EP, and extensive European and U.S. tours are already booked for spring. Expect infectious guitar ballads that make you move, but also make you think.

Prince
Wait, what? Yes! In the past few years SXSW has become about established superstars staging their comeback into the public consciousness as much as it is about undiscovered talents. Now that Justin Timberlake has been co-opting Prince’s big band setup of the “Diamonds and Pearls” era, it’s time for his Royal Purpleness to show JT how it’s really done. Prince will reportedly stage an as yet not totally confirmed club show with a 22-piece band during the festival.

—Follow Nolan Gawron on Twitter this week at @metrousmusic. Check out this website all week for his updates on the best of SXSW. Check out our playlist below…

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