I remember in 2011 standing at the front of Antone's listening to a band I had never heard of from Seattle as they harmonized and swept up my soul in their beautiful, melancholic melodies. They were The Head and the Heart and their songs have not been far from my ears since. The Lumineers, who I recently referred to as "the love child of The Head and the Heart, The Avett Brothers and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros" were a transformative group in a lot of the same ways at this years SX. Their melodies had a way of getting to me and taking up residence. I don't think they will go anywhere for quite a while and though I don't often like to see bands more than once during SXSW if I can help it, I gladly changed plans to hear them as often as possible.
Lumineers at SXSW 2012 Photo by Amanda
I heard them the first night at an unofficial event at Cedar Street Courtyard and later in the week when they filmed a few songs in a living room downtown. They are as infectious live as they are streamed through soundcloud (which is the only place I can seem to find them right now-album out April 3 though!) Their songs have a delightful range within the indie, folk, rock, spectrum, gracefully winding between upbeat, fun songs like "Classy Girls" and mellower, "Slow It Down". Their single "Ho Hey" had everyone singing along. They were easily one of my favorite groups at the festival this year and I am excited to follow their journey.
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