Fishing for something to watch on my cable-less television about a year ago, a fuzzy channel 63, a.k.a. the bilingual version of MTV called MTV Tr3s, showed me something that just blew me away: a sharp-rapping slender Andalusian woman who had all the attitude of a pre-neurotic, early Fugees Lauryn Hill. As her sing-song rap video played on the tube, I stood there admiring the lady emcee’s crisp and technically varied vocal delivery, all in Spanish. And then the name popped up on the corner of the screen: Mala Rodriguez.

Chants of “Mala, Mala, Mala” (meaning “bad” in Spanish) filled the Flamingo Cantina before she grabbed the mic and hit the stage last night. Backed by two hype men and a backup singer-dancer, she walked on just after 1 a.m., wearing a red beret, white skirt ensemble, lime green fishnets and red Mary Jane shoes. She quickly went into a set list that included most of the songs, such as “La Loca,” “Toca Toca” and the down-tempo, dreamy “Volvere,” off her 2007 major-label debut, “Malarismo.”

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We here at Soundboard are committed to, if nothing else, helping you plan your summer vacation. Might we suggest a trip to Britain this July? Start your sojourn in Glasgow, Scotland, on July 3 to see My Bloody Valentine, then head down to see Bjork on July 5, in a just-announced headlining slot at the Wild in the Country Festival. This is the Icelandic singer’s only English festival appearance this year, according to Wild reps. Other acts confirmed for the Knebworth Park dance-centric fest include Pendulum, Foals, Booka Shade, James Zabiela and DJ Sasha. We can’t think of a better way to spend your Fourth of July weekend than with Bjork in the very country we wrested our independence from.

– Charlie Amter

Photo of Bjork performing in Shanghai by Associated Press

Guest blogger Randy Randall is one half of No Age. He and his co-conspirator Dean Spunt released “Weirdo Rippers” last year.

We are at SXSW. We played the Rhapsody party early this morning. Mika Miko were awesome at the Other Music party last night. They played right before Jay Reatard and Times New Viking, who are amazing. So much good music!!!!

We got some photos to share:
Stephanie, from Finally Punk, wonders why the bar ran out of water and is only giving away beer?

Mika Miko rock the JellyNYC/Myopenbar parking garage party.

Safety first. Always safety first.

–Randy Randall

Tom Brosseau is a North Dakota native with a penchant for Flannery O’Connor. His latest album is “Cavalier.”

Yesterday

I arrived in San Antonio from Los Angeles. I collected my things and picked up the rental. They had me in a beige two-door that I just couldn’t bear.

“Happen to have something darker in color? Have you a Chevy Impala?” I asked the gal behind the counter.

“You’d probably look a whole lot better! Beige is so common in this line of work, and to tell you the truth, I’m tired of it!” she smiled. “Problem is no Impalas.”

I spent a week once in San Antonio. I stayed in one of those motels outside of town. The days were lazy, slow. I remember the evenings being painted anti-twilight. I did a lot of walking. The air was full of electricity.

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Guest blogger Santi White, a.k.a. Santogold, plays with new wave, punk, reggae, hip hop and lots else on her upcoming debut. She recently toured with Bjork.

I’ve officially been awake for 35 hours. The dark circles and deep lines were creeping across my face by the minute, despite my best efforts to be the ever-so-social “artist” at the label dinner I just attended in Austin for SXSW. I snuck out just as my entree arrived (three hours later) and enjoyed the slow walk in perfect evening weather with my boyfriend.

Today was fun. I was dreading this trip, in all honesty. I felt like my schedule had been overbooked, which had turned me into a ball of anxiety just thinking of all that I needed to do just to be prepared. I found out just last night that I would be gone for three weeks, and stayed up all night doing a wrap-it-up-pack-it-up. I was all set to be a complete hater on this trip. Sat on the plane next to a creepy guy who stared at me while I slept. Traffic to the hotel put me behind schedule for my MTV interview and performance of a new song I barely knew. So I ran into my hotel room for a quick shower, a not-so-quick hair wash, a bite to eat and to download the instrumental for the song. I was an hour late, but no one acted like they cared. I did my interview and my song and it was painless. Enjoyable even. And I was free for the rest of the day!

Diplo happened to be eating Mexican food (my favorite) across the street and I wanted to crash his meal. We’d been bickering all week about this mixtape we’re working on and I thought it might be fun to go slap him around a bit.

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What a difference a day makes. Twelve hours previous, R.E.M. had left the very stage at Stubb’s Bar-B-Que that Motörhead now claimed. Ah, the wonders of SXSW.

Dressed in black, including a black Civil War hat, the mustachioed Lemmy Kilmister led his trio, warts and all, through an hour of pure rock that set the standard for all who dare follow in their wake. Twas the Scion Showcase, sponsored by Vice on the fliers and banners, but in reality it was a merciless metal melange featuring High on Fire, Napalm Death, Enslaved and festival surprises Motörhead.

The capacity crowd filled the backyard on Red River in the 80-degree heat; evidence, some say, that Lucifer himself laid out the $180 to get a wristband and mix it up in the dust. Hopefully, he didn’t sell his soul to himself, because this show was free.

Motörhead hit the stage on time, introduced themselves and casually explained that they play rock n roll. The devil horns from the crowd were raised high and the rock was laid down in a steady, forceful way.

In a festival filled with pretty emo boys and hipsters in leggings, it was more than refreshing to see a leather group of old fogies shove the metal down the throats of the kids, who accepted it with smiles and cheers and asked for more.

Photos of the band and the scene after the jump…

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Nothing was going to stop Bun B’s late night show at Club Fuze off Austin’s 6th Street. Not the several visits from local fire officials — due to the audience being packed shoulder-to-shoulder and the mass of folks waiting outside to get in, which included rapper Tech 9’s crew — and especially not the fact that after a few songs, his mic started to give: “Come on man, these people came out here to help me represent for Pimp C, can’t we get the mic right!?”

The remaining half of legendary Port Arthur, Texas, rap crew UGK dedicated much of the show (with the requisite lighter and cellphone salutes) to his fallen rhyme partner, Pimp C, who died Dec. 4 in Hollywood, partly due to sipping sizzurp, it’s been reported. Bun majestically plowed through an extensive set that dug deep into the group’s classics, such as the drug game anthem “Pocket Full of Stones” and the Eazy-E-inspired “Front Back and Side to Side.” He also threw in some tracks from his “Trill” album, including “Get Throwed” and “Draped Up.”

The highlight of his set was when frequent UGK collaborator Dizzee Rascal joined him, lacing the set with his Cockney raps. That moment seemed most fitting for a SXSW audience. Toward the end of the show, Bun rapped both UGK parts when he performed the Grammy-nominated “Int’l Players Anthem (I Choose You).” He included a shout-out to soon-to-be-former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, because, well, as Bun said, “He chose.”

– Post and photos by Camilo Smith

There’s no question that MySpace and emo go hand-in-hand — but blogging and alt.country? Leave it to Ryan Adams to make the Internet safe for twangy songwriters. Once a (too) prolific musician, Adams has been relatively quiet since a 2005 trifecta, releasing only last year’s “Easy Tiger” and an in-studio live EP, “Follow the Lights.” Seems he’s been spending his time online instead, streaming goofball rap jams under the moniker DJ Reggie on his official site, sending anonymous poems to Gawker and most recently, posting weird, occasionally affecting home movies on his now-defunct YouTube channel. The restless singer is already on to the next project: blogging at D R Adams Films, which kicked off Wednesday with a whopping 12 posts.

At the time of this writing, today’s posts include a new video, a response to Gawker (who won’t give the poor guy a break) and a tale of a day in New York, which for Adams included a trip to the John Varvatos store (“i don’t know how, i just ended up there”), a fashion faux pas (“i had on this amazing cobra commander t-shirt and an agnus b. sweatshirt and looked more or less like i did in 1999 right around when grunge happened to middle america after it got christian (wow).”) and a Hemingway-esque encounter with Jesse (presumably Malin, a fellow New York rocker and collaborator): “I felt old and happy as I sat catching up with my friend. Old and sat right within my own tiny frame. we talked much slower. and the hours were not threatening to me …”

Dude sounds pretty confused for a guy who spent most of last year talking up his sobriety. While his public freakouts are far from Britney proportions, it’s a bit disconcerting to see an ordinarily eloquent lyricist (and for my money, one of the best musicians working today) spill his guts online like a 15-year-old My Chemical Romance fan. With no new albums on the horizon and not a whiff of news in months on a postponed box set of older sessions, fans like me can only hope he’ll take a break from his “Big Feel Sorry for My Depressed Self Poopy Party” long enough to record a new record. It’s not like he’ll need much time.

– David Greenwald

Photo of Adams (or is that the illegitimate son of Colonel Sanders and TS Eliot?) by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for IMG

Flo Rida’s “Low” is the only song allowed on the radio. You may think you heard a wisp of Chris Brown or the new Usher, but you were wrong — it was actually just a station identifer filling space between spins of Flo Rida. KXLU is now devoted entirely to streaming indie rock Flo Rida covers on the Internet, and Larry Mantle is using a vocoder to sound like T-Pain so listeners will think his show is actually a soothing, long-form version of “Low.”

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It’s a lot like speed dating, this music portion of South by Southwest. The sets are very fast, they get right to the point, you take it in, then move to the next suitor. You see and hear a lot of new names, and even the familiar faces seem slightly different.

On Wednesday, I took a look at a dozen varied and exciting bands in less than 12 hours, including Quiet Company, the Shout Out Louds, Yacht, Bad Rackets, This Bike Is a Pipe Bomb, R.E.M., the Lemonheads and Ancestors.

Quickie reviews and lots of pictures after the jump.

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