Another day, another industry panel (am I the only interested in attending these things?). "Comedy on the Music Circuit" brought together funnymen David Cross, Zach Galifianakis and more talking heads discussing the comedy-music hybrid, so I was hoping for a little, well, comic relief. Instead they took jabs at indie rock fans for being "humorless and too self-serious" (indie rock jokes, by the way, are the new hippie jokes, nyach, nyach). Just who did they think had paid to listen to them here? Cross remembered a night he opened for the Strokes a few years back and a guy peed on him. Ok, that did sorta tinkle, – sorry, tickle – me. And when Tony Kiewel, head of A&R at Sub Pop Records, mentioned the time the label was "inches away from bankruptcy," Cross asked, "Were you seven inches away?" (Nyach, nyach). "I don't get it," said Galifianakis.

At the exclusive Spin magazine barbecue at Stubb's I just about made it to the last of the Buzzcocks' set, one of three scheduled for the festival, that included "Ever Fallen in Love?," "Orgasm Addict" and "What Do I Get." (I'm almost certain guitarist Steve Diggle had on the same polka dot shirt he wore last summer at the Henry Fonda show in Hollywood.) With spilled beer in my hair, this is as punk rock as I ever felt. But we will meet again. Half the music at SXSW is on the streets, and on my way out I spot a Japanese band playing accordions, drums, stand-up bass and trombones. Asakusa Jinta are.....here, let their flyer do the talking: "Came from the Far East. They call their music 'Asianican hard marching band.' Their music is a mixture of Rockabilly, Japanese new wave, ska, uptempo country, punk and Japanese Kenka and Kayokyoku from the 1930's." Been there, heard that.

After a long haul across the bridge (the "bat bridge") that gave me a blister I'm sure has masticized into a tumor, I was front and center for Public Enemy who headlined the hip-hop Dew Music Festival at Auditorium Shores and delivered a blistering, full-on show of political putdowns. Too bad this was an outdoor amphitheater filled with damn dirty dreadlocked hippies playing kazoos for change. (What's funnier is watching middle-aged moms eating popcorn out of Ziplock bags and trying to throw gang signs.) This was a reunited P.E. with Professor Griff and clock-wearing Flavor Flav celebrating the group's 20th anniversary. When-I-Say-Chuck-You-Say-D kicked things off with "Welcome to the Terrordome" backed by P.E.'s sword-wielding, uniformed military dancers. He had the crowd playing verbal ping pong to every scathing attack. "Fuck George Bush!" Fuck George Bush! "Fuck Dick Cheney!" Fuck Dick Cheney! "Fuck Tony Blair!" Fuck Tony Blair! "Condoleezza too!" Condoleezza too! (This is Public Enemy and they are in Texas). Sad how "Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos"'s words ring truer today than they did in 1988: "They wanted me for their army or whatever/Picture me giving a damn – I said never.") Flav, ever the court jester, sang himself a happy birthday and thanked everyone for making season two of Flavor of Love VH1's highest debuting show. "911 Is a Joke" is my favorite jokey joke song. Unfortunately I was being distracted by a drunk girl crying on my shoulder about her DUI's, probation and the need for weed. Chuck D didn't stray from the serious, pleading with the audience to "never let an old man send a young man to war," and ended the night with the classic "Fight the Power." Flav informed us that we are our own best friends. On that note, I hugged myself and congratulated myself on a performance well done.

Fearing a repeat of the Lily Allen turn-away, I head to Stubb's two hours before for The Good, The Bad and The Queen (one of the festival's biggest headliners), sit on wet concrete and stay put. Wearing a sweater with Chevron stripes and silver pants, Perry Farrell was leading the Perry Farrell's Satelite Party with Nuno "Extreme" Bettencourt – and a big-breasted, blond backup singer whose purpose looked unclear – doing a funkier, less psychedelic Jane's Addiction. He spouted some cosmic shit about the open skies and how it's all ours, as Farrell usually does. Badly Drawn Boy played, I think. (Someone with a Mancunian accent was singing.) "People think we love this shit," heckled a group of Brits behind me. "But we don't." "It's all about fuckin' pixies and forests." The Boy went from bad to worse when he decided to break into Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'." Now, normally I love it when anyone does a Journey cover; Journey sucks? No you suck. But the Boy is no city boy born and raised in south Detroit, and he's certainly no Steve Perry.

I really don't know what to make of The Good, The Bad and The Queen. This is the kind of chilled, electro-lite, goatee-stroking mood music that back in my day might've been called trip-hop and completely ignored. But all the buzz says it's uncategorizable and boundary-less and is supposed to have meditative powers simply because TGTBTQ is a supergroup (the Clash's Paul Simonon, Blur's Damon Albarn, the Verve's Simon Tong, and Fela Kuti drummer Tony Allen) who isn't doing a Clash rehash or Blur 2 or even Gorillaz 2. We'll see. Simonon is a just a cocky rooster, intermittently taking drags from his cigarette and creeping about the stage in a black gangster suit; what deprivation watching him up there not playing "Guns of Brixton." Albarn looked bored as always, at one point holding a flute he hardly played. "History Song," is a cool mashup of Afrobeat-meets-the Specials, and "80's Life" is a sweet throwback to Motown doo wop. The rest were vanilla, some serene, some spooky, but still plain, beige and neutral-as-Switzerland rice cake. So make out I couldn't, and maybe shouldn't.

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