The relevance of a song like “Nights of the Living Dead” at a festival like SXSW is obvious. Sure, there are drunk teens touching each other (what the song is actually about), but there are also zombies of other sorts, blood sucking corporate types who can dance along to this song, careful to not reminisce about a past they never had, wandering the streets and rambling and drinking and going to garage sales, because if they did have that past then they would probably be the ones on stage instead of the ones with notebooks and pens. I should have jotted this down in my notebook; I was drunk and no longer in possession of a notebook. This is what doing shots while listening to Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin will do to you. They were the band playing inside at this showcase, the Polyvinyl / Team Love affair that was a who’s who in indie pop; Tilly took the outdoor stage after Headlights to close things down.

I’ve said a few things about Tilly in my life that are somewhere between untrue and just dumb: that the second album is way inferior to the first and that the guys in the band are boring and extraneous. I think this latter statement was based on the fact that I also considered that one guy in the band really scary, like a darker and more aggressive Oberst, a guy who really could snap and kill some twee kids. The second album I just never gave much of a chance. But tonight, songs like “Bad Education” killed it, as did “Urgency,” one of Tilly’s many singalongs that I initially thought I was sitting down to write this track review about. But then, through the hazy memories caused by those damn shots, I remembered “Night of the Living Dead.” And with “Night of the Living Dead,” there is only on thing to say, and it may be a very juvenile, and obvious thing to say, which is okay, remember, because that is what this song is really about. So: getting really fucked up, watching girls sing and tap dance on stage, and yelling “I wanna fuck it up” along with the crowd, is a really good way to end a Friday night.

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