BY BILLY ALTMAN >LA.COM

Friday at South by Southwest 2008 could probably be best summed up this way: It's not the heat – it's the itinerary. With temperatures in Austin unexpectedly soaring into the nineties, I had my hands (not mention arches) full racing around town trying to
absorb at least a few songs by numerous acts I wanted to see at some of this year's absurdly abundant day parties.

At least I was fortified, thanks to a pre-noon run out to fabled Kreuz's barbecue in Lockhart, some 30 miles south of Austin and worth
every gas-guzzling mile. Not only were the ribs, brisket and (yes) clod terrific as always, but I even got in a few minutes of greasy
conversation with the fellow early-bird diner at the next picnic table - Thurston Moore. The Sonic Youth leader filled me in on the
tribute to festival keynote speaker Lou Reed that he, Moby, Joseph Arthur, Yo La Tengo and other assorted hipsters had taken part in
Thursday evening. (I asked Moore what song he'd done; he said he'd chosen the rarity "I'm Not a Young Man Anymore" because "I'm turning 50 this year; made sense.") Once back in town, timing was everything.

At the BMI brunch I missed Tijuana's Ceci Bastida but caught LA's Priscilla Ahn, whose gentle folk-tinged songs sounded perfect wafting through the balmy air behind the Four Seasons hotel. Then it was on to Brush Square near the festival's Convention Center headquarters, where assorted Australian acts played.

I saw Craig Nicholls and the rest of The Vines, now a few years removed from their on-the-cusp hit status but nonetheless still in good working garage-y order. I couldn't stay for longtime fave Paul Kelly, but thankfully I'd seen the gifted, criminally underheard singer-songwriter on Wednesday, where he introduced several (as always) memorable new tunes, including a haunting topical time-stopper called "God Told Me To." The next stop was the Yep Roc Records' party on Sixth Street for Toronto's Sadies who, like Paul Kelly, seem to appreciate and respect American roots music far more than most natives. Brothers Dallas and Travis Good twang with the best of them, and you gotta love a group whose instrumentals fall somewhere between all the themes from Clint Eastwood's spaghetti westerns. Also, best total group sideburns on display all week.

Speaking of Amrican roots, I then headed across Town Lake to Threadgill's, where I narrowly missed old pal Tommy Ramone, who these days lives in upstate New York near Woodstock and plays banjo and mandolin in a duo called Uncle Monk whose songs sounds like - well, like the Ramones if they'd been a bluegrass band. I did, however, get to see rockabilly pioneer Dale Hawkins, who not only delivered his eternal "Susie-Q," but also tossed in "My Babe," which he got to record as a token white act at Chess Records in 1958 and into which he inserted a verse from its original source, the gospel classic "This Train." Now that's a history lesson to get behind.

Last stop of the afternoon was way back north and east to Stubbs, and by the time I got there (a little after five), newly anointed buzz
band Vampire Weekend had finished. With their official showcase still  coming up later, I stuck around for LA's primo punk progenitors X, whose buzzsawing set – and the reassuring sight of Billy Zoom's ever-frozen psycho killer smile - recharged drained batteries.

And that was just the daytime.

Friday night's festivities began with a visit to ever-cool Jovita's, where the wayback machine was in full effect via San Antonio's
Krayolas, the late '70s Tex-Mex Beatles whose suits, ties and boots remarkably still fit. So did the goodtime spirit of their British
Invasion-based music, which on this night included covers of both the Fab Four and the Dave Clark Five (you don't see that every day) and a guest appearance by Sir Douglas Quintet organist supremo Augie Meyers for their version of his irresistible "Little Fox."

There must've been something in the jalapenos at Jovitas because the entire night soon veered into flashback territory. I again missed Vampire Weekend, who'd been (deliberately?) booked into Antone's, which could only hold about two-thirds of the crowd trying to get into see them. From the looks of things at the doorway for the two songs I witnessed, the audience seemed surprisingly subdued – there because that was deemed the thing to do. That thing the band did/does

- "Hi; we're nerds" (nod nod, wink, wink) - seems a bit too calculated for my tastes; let's just say I remember Weezer. I also remember Blue Cheer, the mahatmas of metal who forty years after they turned Eddie Cochran's "Summertime Blues" - and lo the civilized world – upside down, they've defied all odds to still be standing, let alone thundering. Suffice it to say that original tubthumping drummer Paul Whaley and devil-throated bassist/ vocalist Dickie Peterson, along with the new kid on the chop block, twenty-five year BC guitarist "Duck" McDonald, turned Emo's Annex into …no, not a love-in; more like a melt-in.

My night - and what was left of my hearing – was set to end catching my noontime meateating mate Mr. Moore at the Mohawk Patio, where he was demonstrating that you can make just about as much unruly noise with acoustic instruments as electric ones. But then, on a whim, it was back over to the far West Side for most of Dave Wakeling and his reggaeing English Beat's delirious set at Momo's. Nothing like a packed-to-the-rafters crowd joyously jumping up and down as one chanting "Mirror in the Bathroom" to end another great, albeit exhausting day and night at SXSW.