Pitchfork

Plan B [Karma Lounge; 8 p.m.]

Plan B is a London-based rapper who plays acoustic guitar while he rhymes. Wait, come back! He's actually an excellent storyteller, and his debut album Who Needs Actions When You Got Words is a syringe spike of white-boy rage. But when opened the Clash magazine showcase, standing up there hurling invectives at his mom's crackhead boyfriend while strumming away, it didn't really work. He just didn't seem angry enough.

Errors [Karma Lounge; 8:30 p.m.]

Mogwai didn't play SXSW this year, but their influence seeped into two of the Scottish bands I've seen play so far. The Twilight Sad build their melodic emo epics on a bedrock of Young Team noise, while Errors, who are signed to Rock Action, the label Mogwai runs, fuse the same sort of racket with what could be called IDM (for lack of a better term). I think I'll name their sound "disco squall". Or maybe "squall disco" has a better ring to it? Squisco? Sisqo?

Lo Fi Fnk [Beauty Bar Patio; 9:15]

All day Thursday, I kept seeing a precious blonde-haired kid, who looked like he was 12 years old, walking around Austin in the 80-degree heat wearing a Philadelphia Phillies sweatshirt. Wow, I thought. That's some serious dedication to my hometown team. Maybe Ryan Howard really will take them all the way this year!

Turns out he's the drummer for Swedish group Lo Fi Fnk. And his dedication to the Fightin' Phils ended when he took the stage and put on an Adidas sweatshirt. I don't know if he's actually 12 years old, or if he's ever even heard of the Phillies, but he plays a mean set of dinky electronic drums.

Lo Fi Fnk were silly and fun as expected at the IHEARTCOMIX showcase, with the two frontmen bouncing in baseball caps with the tags still on while hammering out cute electropop ditties. Strangely, the drummer never smiled. Perhaps he was too hot in his sweatshirt?

Aa [The Parish II; 11 p.m.]

Full disclosure: I know Aa's John Atkinson from college. So I'm proud to see his band get better and better, and their forthcoming album gAame is a forceful distillation of their wild racket. The Gigantic showcase was at some cheesy bar (as are most SXSW showcases, come to think of it), which wasn't quite the right environment for Aa's homemade light show and multiple-drum kit attack. But they still managed to get pretty crazy.

Shitdisco [Beauty Bar Patio; 12:30 a.m.]

Another Scottish band! Shitdisco play techno-informed punk with a bit of snarling attitude, which reared its head when their set at the IHEARTCOMIX showcase was cut short due to Matt & Kim (who preceded them) going into overtime. After only about 20 minutes of music, the plug was pulled, causing Shitdisco to throw stuff, knock over some amps, and throw water on the crowd. Or at least I hope it was water, because that stuff got all over me.