A trawl through the 2012 SXSW music schedule published earlier today reveals that there at least 8 Scottish bands who have been invited to attend this year’s festival in Austin, Texas. We expect more to be announced in the next few weeks.

The 2012 music festival will take place in Austin from March 13th to March 18th and once again Dear Scotland will be there to report and reflect on the impact of the Scottish artists. There will also likely be a small gathering of any remaining Scots amid the recording of the annual Song, By Toad SXSW podcast at Dear Scotland HQ on the last Sunday of the festival.

Last month we wrote that only two Scottish bands had featured in the initial announcements – Three Blind Wolves and Laki Mera. Both those acts remain on the list below. Of course, an invitation by SXSW is only the first step in getting to play the festival. Bands then will try to secure sponsorship from Creative Scotland and raise funds to cover the costs of flights and margaritas. Then there is the visa application which needs to be expedited due to the short window between official confirmation and the festival itself. So at this time the only thing that can be guaranteed is that this list will change between now and March.

We would also hope that the number of bands attending increases from 8, otherwise this would represent a significant drop from recent years. In 2010 there were 14 bands and in 2011, there were 15 bands from Scotland.

I will endeavour to update this list in the next few weeks and you can also follow the bands at this twitter list:

http://twitter.com/dearscotland/sxsw2012

 

SXSW 2012 Showcasing Bands from Scotland

From official list as of January 18, 2012

French Wives

Laki Mera

The Stagger Rats

Tango in the Attic

Three Blind Wolves

The Twilight Sad

Twin Atlantic

Woodenbox with a Fistful of Fivers

http://sxsw.com/music

Dear Scotland’s SXSW Schedule

Tango in the Attic

httpv://youtu.be/9K6rSl0zmtY

SXSW Timelapse

httpv://youtu.be/BrEYMP2rb3c